Nationals Say Fare Well To Their Young Arms

VIERA, Fla., Feb. 19 -- If you're looking for the ultimate sign of progress for the Washington Nationals, here is where you will find it: along the row of lockers on the right-hand side of the clubhouse at Space Coast Stadium, where the pitchers sit. In the same locker that a year ago belonged to journeyman Billy Traber, this year sits 21-year-old prospect Collin Balester. The 2007 locker of Rule 5 reject Levale Speigner now belongs to 23-year-old Tyler Clippard. Emiliano Fruto's old locker now houses 21-year-old Ross Detwiler.

A year ago this spring, this stretch of lockers -- reserved for the group of rotation hopefuls who are on the outside looking in -- belonged mostly to cheap retreads and fringe prospects, many of whom wound up starting games for the Nationals. Traber. Speigner. Jerome Williams. Jason Simontacchi. Micah Bowie. They were there, and they contributed, because the Nationals, by some accounts the owners of the worst farm system in baseball, had nowhere else to turn.

The change has been incredibly swift by baseball standards. This year, the Nationals' farm system has made a staggering jump from 30th to ninth in Baseball America's rankings, and the pitchers competing for rotation spots includes some of the most prized arms in the organization -- beginning with Detwiler and Balester, the top two pitching prospects in the organization, but also Clippard, John Lannan and Garrett Mock.

"It's more rookies this year than so-called retreads," pitcher Jason Bergmann said. "Guys like Lannan, Detwiler, Balester -- guys who have come up through the organization, guys who are our guys. It just shows that what we're doing is working. [The front office] is picking the right guys, and the right guys are moving through the system.

"Look at Lannan -- he moves up four [minor league] levels last year and makes it to the [majors] and has success, and the only reason they shut him down was [a limit on number of] innings."

A year ago, a difficult choice in the rotation meant selecting between Traber and Williams -- veterans who had been cut loose by three teams apiece -- for the fifth starter's job. This year, it means choosing between highly regarded youngsters, an organizational sea change that has come about through a concerted effort to stockpile young pitchers, via trades and drafts.

It can be taken as a sign of progress that when the Nationals signed veteran left-hander Odalis P¿rez to a minor league contract on Tuesday, it was merely for the purpose of providing depth, with no guarantees of making the big league roster. A year ago, P¿rez might have automatically become the team's No. 3 starter.

"The difference [this year] is, we open the spring saying, if they all stay healthy, you do have some pretty good choices here," General Manager Jim Bowden said. " . . . We made a decision to give the ball to young kids. We're staying on our plan."

If both are healthy, right-handers John Patterson, 30, and Shawn Hill, 26, both of whom have No. 1 starter ability, will occupy the top two spots in the rotation. Beyond them, lefties Lannan (23) and Matt Chico (24) and right-handers Bergmann (26) and Tim Redding (30) are the leading candidates to fill the remaining three spots, along with the newly acquired P¿rez, who is 30.

But behind them are prospects such as Balester, their fourth-round draft pick in 2004, and Detwiler, their top pick in 2007, as well as Clippard and Mock, the products of recent trades. Even if they must be considered long shots, they are intriguing ones.

"It's cool for us to be over here and getting all this experience, even if we might not be in the rotation this year," Detwiler said. "It's good for down the road. I'm trying to learn as much as I can from these guys, but still compete for a job."

Bowden has floated the idea of allowing one or more of his top pitching prospects, most notably Detwiler, to serve an apprenticeship in the Nationals' bullpen this season -- the way the New York Yankees did with Joba Chamberlain last season, and the way other organizations, including the Baltimore Orioles, once did regularly with top pitching prospects -- as opposed to sending them to the minors for the same purpose.

"I'm not opposed at all to developing [Detwiler] out of the bullpen like the White Sox did with [Mark] Buehrle, and I'm not opposed to starting him in [Class A] Potomac and starting 20 games there," Bowden said. "A left-hander with that kind of stuff, as hard as it is to get lefties in the bullpen, I'm not opposed to a guy developing [in the bullpen] when he's that's close [to being ready] and has that kind of stuff. I believe in that."