By Thomas Boswell
Friday, May 27, 2005
Part of the fascination of a hometown baseball team is watching it suffer.
That's certainly where the Nationals are now with 10 men on the disabled list, others hobbled, the whole team in a three-week batting coma and the next 10 straight games against top foes. You want tough? The Nats have got it. They're on the road against the NL champ Cards. They've lost five of six and are only one game over .500. The woeful Reds just swept them. And, on their off day yesterday, they made eight personnel moves.
For those keeping score, rode-hard-and-put-up-wet Jon Rauch is likely out for the season, ineffective starters Zach Day and "I, Claudio" Vargas have been shipped to the minors while valuable reliever T.J. "Shrek" Tucker returns from the MASH unit. For some teams, Iwo Jima; for the Nats, just a typical day. The gods have gotten medieval on 'em all season.
You want snakebit? John Patterson, the starter with the lowest ERA, took three needles this week to relieve back pain. He became faint and nauseous from the treatment, so medics hooked him up to oxygen and an IV. But the IV inflamed a vein in the pitcher's arm and his wrist went numb for hours. He went on the DL on Wednesday. From his back? Or his wrist? Take your pick.
Next time, guys, why not just put the IV in his left arm? You know, the one he doesn't pitch with.
In such times, teams learn what they're made of. But self-knowledge won't be limited to Washington players. Many in this area will discover whether they are part of that perverse breed that loves the delicious agony of a 162-game season. For both teams and individuals, baseball is a game of almost incomprehensible hot streaks that are so exciting, and equally mysterious slumps that are so demoralizing, that your own daily moods can be affected by the team's bipolar fortunes.
The common denominator of lifelong fans is that, whether their team is soaring or sinking, they can't tear their eyes away. If former secretary of state Colin L. Powell gets his wish to be part owner of the Nats, he may wonder if it was wise. Attaching your emotions to a baseball team is dangerous business, more obsessive than bonding with any other sport. If that team is also a wounded underdog, surrounded by enemies as it fights for a new start in a new city, the drama can be addictive.
What attracts Powell also touches others. Countless fans take an emotional "ownership" role in a team. Half-consciously at first, they buy into the club as they sense the daily drama of a game that tests its players at so many levels so continuously.
For example, the Nats lost 4-3 in 14 innings on Tuesday and left 17 men on base. To maximize irony, the Reds won on a hit by a pitcher with a career average of .000. Since baseball's grind resembles the working stiff's workaday world, the Nats had to come back to the same Great American Ball Park for another game just 13 hours later -- to get clubbed 12-3.
Baseball doesn't help you back up to your feet. You have to do that yourself. Whimpering doesn't help. The schedule maker just sends you to St. Louis for three days. You have a choice: Show up or fold up.
That's where the Nats find themselves. And, because they have scored more than five runs in a game only once since May 7, they know exactly what to do. Well, in theory. They need to relax at the plate because they are all trying too hard.
So (all together), "relax!" they scream at each other.
See, isn't that helpful?
The malevolent core of all slumps is that the harder you try to escape, the worse they get. That's why old-time managers sometimes ordered their teams to go get drunk or else pulled lineups out of a hat.
So, it's time to panic, right? The Nats are doomed to revert to the '04 Expos and lose 95 games.
Actually, no.
Focusing on the immediate and obvious does not generally produce a knowledgeable fan. The trends that matter in a long season require a broader view than a week's games. For example, hard as it is to believe, right now nothing structural is actually wrong with the Nationals. All of the core parts of the team are in working order, though there's rubble everywhere else.
The current starting rotation, all reasonably healthy, of Livan Hernandez, Esteban Loaiza, Tony Armas Jr., Tomo Ohka and Patterson has a combined ERA of 3.68 in 38 starts. Most teams would take that. The bullpen of Chad Cordero, Luis Ayala, Gary Majewski and Hector Carrasco has an ERA of 1.87 in 82 innings. Tucker is back. That's 10 useful pitchers. If Hernandez's gimpy knee blows out, the whole building will probably collapse. But until then, this is a perfectly good pitching staff.
What about the Nats' offense? The team's best hitter, Jose Vidro, was hurt two days before the Slump arrived -- hardly a coincidence. And he won't be back for a couple of weeks.
While Vidro is missed, most teams have a key player injured after nearly 50 games. Who stays whole? On Tuesday, the Nats actually fielded their Opening Day lineup, except for Vidro. And Jamey Carroll, hitting .275, is as good a utility replacement as any team could want. So, if the Nats claim injury as an excuse for their hitting slump, it won't wash.
So what's happened to the spunky Nats who left the town abuzz with a 23-18 record last week? The truth is mundane but, in a way, reassuring. In April, the Nats hit over their heads. On one day, five regulars were between .300 and .380. Riiiight.
Now, where are they? Every significant Washington player, except shortstop Cristian Guzman, is hitting so close to his normal level that -- with just one 0-for-4 or 3-for-4 game -- you could adjust everyone's batting average, slugging average and on-base percentage to exactly where they should be. Even platoon players fit the mold. Every hitter is back at square one.
In spring training, Robinson said, "This team is going to play a lot of 4-3 games." That has proved true. When the Nats hit decently, especially in the clutch, they play better than .500 ball. When they hit poorly, as they have recently, they play worse. But, so far, the team's consistent ingredients -- overall pitching, defense, morale and managing -- have held up as expected.
The Nationals' test this season may be their ability to cope with their obvious flaw -- an offense that is adequate to the team's 75-to-85-win aspirations, but barely so. Will team slumps, like the current one, drive 'em nuts? Or will they ride 'em out?
A bad team collapses in the face of hard times and loses almost every game until it finally bottoms out. Last year, the Expos had streaks of 0-8, 1-9, 1-8, 0-7, 1-6 and 1-7: a combined 4-45. That's how you kill a season.
Every team "goes bad." The trick is not to go absolutely and totally terrible. That's the exam the Nats face now.
Odd as it sounds, if they went 4-6 in the next 10 tough games, it might be one of the best parts of their season, not one of their worst.
This is the kind of crossroads where the old Expos fell apart.
And it's the sort of place where the new Nationals might want to begin a different history.