Nats' Risky Business

The Nationals live in the future, not the present. They wish you would, too. It'd make their lives much easier. And cheaper, too.

After losing 21 percent of their attendance last season, their second in Washington, the Nats now want to roll the dice with the affections of their paying public. It's a big gamble, one that may be more dangerous than they seem to suspect.

At the same time the District is spending $611 million on a new ballpark, due to open in '08, the Nats plan to field a low-budget team next season, with a payroll of perhaps $45 million, or less than three-quarters of the one in '06. Even though they lost Alfonso Soriano, who made $10 million last season, to the Cubs, the Nats do not plan to use his salary slot. They will spend top dollar, they say, on every aspect of player development. That's judicious, both in a baseball and a business sense. But it's also conveniently economical because, each week, major league salaries obliterate all previous standards for profligacy.

This week in Florida at the winter meetings, the Nats are wallflowers. More important, between now and Opening Day, it is unlikely the team will spend -- or in their view, waste -- a dime on the kind of humble pitchers who prevent a vulnerable franchise from suddenly dissolving into a 50-games-under-.500 joke. Every season, low-rent veteran pitchers such as Esteban Loaiza, Ramon Ortiz, Brian Lawrence and Pedro Astacio are available. All have baggage. Some pan out. Some blow out.

For the past two winters, when the Nats were run by Major League Baseball, such stopgap pitchers were bought, not as part of any long-term plan to be contenders, but simply to give Washington fans a major league product. And it worked. Last year, at 71-91, the Nats were a poor team, not a lousy one. They were better than five others, including the Orioles.

But what will the Nationals be next year? Livan Hernandez was traded for pitching prospects in August. Ortiz and Tony Armas, the team leaders in innings, were not offered arbitration; there's almost no chance they'll return. Of the returning Nats pitchers, Mike O'Connor got the most work -- 105 innings, three wins. John Patterson, if he's healthy, is the ace. After that, you hand the ball to an assortment including Beltran Perez, Shawn Hill and Tim Redding until their arms fall off. At least they'll be able to tell their grandchildren they got an honest shot at the big leagues. But what do you tell the fans?

"I don't think the Tigers are crying about '03," team president Stan Kasten said yesterday, referring to the Detroit team that went 43-119, the second most losses in history, as they rebuilt before reaching the World Series this season.

"Clearly, we are concerned. We are very mindful that people who paid their money are mostly concerned with what they're going to see that night, even the ones who appreciate that there is good stuff happening beneath the surface," Kasten said. However, he also knows attendance will be helped by fans who look on '07 as little more than reserving a place in line to buy tickets for the new park. Season ticket sales are already up. Is that best business practices or cynicism?

General Manager Jim Bowden has also dropped references to 100 or more losses in '07 and the supposed benefit of the high draft picks that go with very bad records. However, when we've discussed his examples, from the recent Twins and A's back to the '80s Mets, the case for being Absolutely Awful isn't compelling to me. If you're rebuilding, it helps to lose 90. Worse than that serves no purpose. And, once you've made your peace with such losing, it's hard to calibrate how low you'll fall. It's a dangerous game.

The Nats' new owners may not fully appreciate the risk they are taking. Baseball has many levels of "bad." How lousy can a Nats team be, and for how long, before the potential fan base, which seemed huge when 33,708-a-game turned out in '05, starts to dwindle? Can that shrinkage become permanent? For that matter, does Kasten understand the depth of ill will that Washington harbors toward baseball after 33 years of being played for suckers? By August there might be more people watching the stadium construction than are watching the Nationals.

The Nats' brass seems too confident by half. A winning team in a beautiful park in a market as big and rich as Washington will solve everything, they believe. Only that ultimate prize -- a contending team in '09 or '10 -- matters a whit. Everything else will quickly be forgiven and forgotten. So why waste an extra $5 million to $10 million now just to avoid being an eyesore in '07? Does anybody really care if the Nats replace Ortiz and Armas with pitchers like the Orioles' Jaret Wright?

Few in baseball have more experience or a better track record than Kasten. He's probably right to believe that if you win and provide a good "fan experience," tons of people will come. And if you don't, they won't. In either case, '07 won't matter.

But what if he's wrong? The proper analysis of any plan includes focus on worst-case possibilities. Never assume victory.

So far, the new owners have kept faith with their new fans. Improvements at RFK, especially in food quality, were promised and delivered. When trade offers for Soriano at the July 31 deadline were unpromising, the Nats grasped that their fans would appreciate watching him play out his amazing season. Manny Acta made a fine first impression as the new manager.

Few in Washington blame the Nats for not competing on Soriano's $136 million contract. However, for one-twentieth that amount, the Nats could shore up their pitching. If they don't, the Nats are playing a high-stakes game in which they bet that Washington fans are sophisticated or patient enough -- or gullible enough -- to embrace a horrible team that didn't have to be bad. The Nats have a respectable everyday lineup and a solid bullpen. If the Nats go 56-106, it was a war of choice.

In the long view, would such signings be a one-season-only waste of millions? Yes, you might as well build a cash bonfire. On the other hand, would a town that is spending $611 million appreciate such an act of civic good behavior? Absolutely. Would Nats fans grasp that the Lerner family pumped money into the '07 team even though the new park virtually ensured massive attendance in '08? Without a doubt.

The Nationals should rethink what now appears to be their plan for radical inactivity in '07. You don't damage a team's fundamental morale or ruin your relationship with your fans by losing 91 games. But there is some number of defeats -- and it's a lot less than 119 -- that may cause the Nats far more damage than they imagine possible. When you're building -- long-term or short -- penny-wise is almost always pound-foolish.