Rise Of The Lame
For basically the entire season, the dregs of Major League Baseball have been the Washington Nationals, the San Diego Padres, and the Seattle Mariners. These three teams have been losing consistently since April, falling out of contention early and locking up spots in the cellar by mid-summer. All three have been nearly equally inept as well, engaging in a chase of sorts for the first overall selection in next year’s draft, widely referred to as the Strasburg Sweepstakes, named after the University of San Diego right-hander of the same name who is the early leader to go number one next summer.
However, over the last week, something strange has happened – all three teams have caught fire and attempted to exit the race for worst.
Last Monday, the Padres welcomed the first place Diamondbacks and promptly swept them, winning 4-2, 9-2, and 5-4. Colorado came into town for a weekend series and won the first game on Friday night 9-4, but then lost by the same score on Saturday and fell 2-1 yesterday. Over the last week, the Padres have won five of their six contests, only the third time this season they’ve pulled that off.
Not to be outdone, the Mariners managed to take two of three from the first place Twins in Seattle to start the week, then flew to Cleveland and swept the red hot Indians, who had won 10 games in a row. When combined with a series win against the A’s before Minnesota came to town, the Mariners have now won seven of their last nine games.
And finally, the Nationals, the clear favorite to finish with baseball’s worst record, and the most consistently horrible team in baseball this year. At least, until last week. On Tuesday, the Dodgers rolled into the nations capitol fighting for their playoff lives and left without a win. Atlanta came in for a weekend series and didn’t fare any better, as Washington’s putrid offense exploded for 24 runs in the three game series. When combined with the 11 run surge in the finale against LA, Washington has now racked up 35 runs in their last four games – they scored 26 runs during a 12 game losing steak just a few weeks ago.
Combined, the terrible trio is 16-2 in their last 18 games. Apparently, the only team that wants Strasburg is the Pittsburgh Pirates, who have now lost 10 in a row in a desperate attempt to get into the mix. Of course, with Scott Boras expected to advise Strasburg, they might not want the #1 pick either.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
Technically, since the White Sox finished off the Orioles in Baltimore to take a half game lead in the Central thirty minutes before the 10:10 EST start of the Twins-Mariners opener, Minnesota was never in first place at any point in the series.
As a side note, should Cleveland have kept CC?
They are 11.5 back in the standings, and CC has won 9 games for the brewers. That would roughly put them 1.5 games back in the standings. In hindisght (which is always 20/20) should the indians have been buyers not sellers?
Strasburg goes to San Diego State.
Matusz was the one from University of San Diego.
I don’t think that C.C./Cleveland math is quite correct, but I see your point, sort of.
Also, re: The Nationals, when healthy, they have a solid offensive core: Milledge, Dukes, Zimmerman, Guzman. All of those guys have been hurt this year. Throw Nick Johnson into the mix (I won’t hold my breath, but dammit he is good when he’s not on the DL), and they could have a productive team in ’09.
Sort of. Their pitchers are terrible though:
Tim Redding
John Lannan
Odalis Perez
Jason Bergmann
Shawn Hill
Collin Balester
Matt Chico
Garret Mock
Tyler Clippard
Mike O’Connor
Add that to Texas’ offense and you still don’t have a playoff contender.
Steve, I hope that was a joke. If not, you’ve lost your right to use numbers.
I was feeling lazy and didn’t feel like looking up who/whom has replaces CC in the order and subtracting their wins from what I have above. It was just meant to be a rough approximation to make the point that the Indians could very well be in the mix had they hung on to CC. Would they be 2.5 back no, but they could easily be within 5 games. Especially had they been buyers at the deadline.
Scott, you’d be surprised if you checked out the Nationals starters’ ERA. They’re surprisingly average. Redding, Lannan and Perez have been oddly consistent, ERAs of 4.55, 3.92 and 4.14, respectively. Compare that to the White Sox top three starters: Vazquez 4.38, Floyd 3.61 and Buehrle 4.12. They’re quite similar.
Throw in Texas’ offense, and you have a contender in the AL Central.
This Boras drama is hilarious. I hope he advises Strasburg, because I suspect that keeps Pittsburgh from drafting him.