Jim Bowden’s Reds defeated Sandy Alderson’s Oakland A’s in the 1990 World Series title. If this statement doesn’t make you question the justice in our world, you fail to understand how baseball works. Alderson should be remembered as a baseball savant...Jim Bowden should be remembered as a cartoon. Sandy Alderson ushered in Bill James and Sabermetrics...Jim Bowden once traded Brandon Phillips, Grady Sizemore, and Cliff Lee for two months of a morbidly obese Barty Colon. However, despite this early-nineties atrocity, I’ll attempt to leave the past to rest, focusing instead on Bowden’s latest circus of buffoonery, the Washington Nationals.
“Tonight, Kirby Puckett’s the luckiest man in the world.” My all-time favorite baseball player (the afore-referenced Puckett) once said these very words; unfortunately I have to disagree. Today, each and every National’s fan can take a seat atop that throne, for I’m about to grace them with a set of simple, easy-to-follow instructions to fix Bowden’s mess.
Step One: If doing the same thing twice and expecting different results is the mark of insanity, Jim Bowden can't be far from padded walls, feces-throwing craziness. Want evidence? The Nationals currently possess twin leftfielders. Not the Coors Light Twins circa 2003, either--mediocre twins at best. Acquiring Austin Kearns clearly did not work; why sign Josh Willingham one year later? The answer is irrelevant. At least one of them needs to be traded for whatever they can fetch. And I mean whatever: a rookie ball arm with some upside, a strike-throwing AA spot starter, anything they can get their hands on. That type of deal frees up playing time for useful outfield pieces Elijah Dukes (and potentially even Lastings Milledge), with Adam Dunn remaining embedded in one corner spot.
Step Two: Focus on the bullpen. Despite Jim Bowden’s insistence on weighing a pitcher’s WHIP equally to his eating of Kix cereal on the scale of ‘bullpen building importance,’ he did leave some trading blocks through which he can bolster his relief corps. Two such blocks takes the form of Ronnie Belliard and Willie Harris. Belliard may seem unassuming, he gets on base about 33 percent of the time, and his defense is mediocre, bordering on suspect. In fact, when people speak of VORP (value over replacement player), Ronnie Belliard epitomizes that unknown replacement player. As does Harris, though his versatility is an asset, as is his ability to consistently put the ball in play. And, as fate would have it, the Cardinals may need that replacement player to stay competitive. The Cardinals also boast a slew of young relievers, making Kyle Mclellan, a young fireballer, expendable. If the Nationals were to acquire him, Mclellan immediately becomes their top set-up man. And if he is partnered with the reasonably-effective Joe Beimel in front of closer Joel Hanarhan, you have the makings of a fairly effective bullpen.
Step Three: Develop a plan for the rotation and stick to it. Jim Bowden had the unfortunate habit of giving up way too much (either in the form of money or prospects) for mediocre veteran arms such as Livan Hernandez, Bartolo Colon, Odalis Perez, and Daniel Cabrera. Rather than wasting time with ineffective (and often expensive) veterans, a low-budget club such as Washington needs to develop it’s own pitching depth. First, and foremost, sign Steven Strasburg. Enough superlatives have been thrown around when talking about Strasburg that I will just say this: get him in a uniform as fast as possible. He represents a once-in-a-lifetime building block to a rotation in desperate need of direction. Strasburg could be partnered with Jordan Zimmerman to form a young duo similar to the Neftali Feliz-Derek Holland Texas twosome. Strasburg and Zimmerman should be the easy part, but the rest doesn’t have to be muddy. Stop-gap “ace”, John Lannan has been reasonably consistent, and looks to be a somewhat reliable middle-of-the-rotation guy. After him, the Nats possess a slew of low-ceiling types whose main asset is youth. The law of averages suggests that at least one of the Shairon Martis, Ross Detweiler and Colin Ballester conglomerate should develop into something useful (at this particular moment, Martis appears the most likely). Finally, it’s time to go back to a sore subject, mediocre veterans. While my plan for the rotation is damn good, leaving four starters under the age of 24 is a matter of some concern. A perfect opportunity for our old buddy Livan Hernandez should make his grand return to the nations capital, along with all the pomp and circumstance that will surely ensue. While his effectiveness as a frontline starter dried up before Y2K, no one has ever questioned his ability to fill space (both physically and figuratively); manning the myriad innings left by the tender arms in front of him is a perfect job for Livan.
Step Four: Find a new ship captain. Manny Acta was a nice idea, but nice ideas don’t win pennants, my plans do. Credit him for dropping a "VORP" on Peter Gammons, then roll this season up, place it around his neck, and tell the players that they've been freed from the main weight holding this talented young group down. In actuality, Acta is not, nor has he ever been, the main problem in DC. He has, however, proven to be somewhat of a hothead, evidenced by the ill-advised destruction of his entire bullpen during a single game. Impulsive, hardly well-thought out moves such as this, coupled with the inconsistent treatment of young outfielders such as Dukes and Milledge, represent a mindset that is downright alarming for the supposed leader of the young Nationals. The brass in Washington needs to find a new face that not only embraces the views that Sandy Alderson brought in two decades ago, but also has no preconceived notions of the players in the system. And the name I’m about to suggest is a somewhat unorthodox: Tigers first-year pitching coach Rick Knapp. Knapp is a pitcher’s guy (vital for the young arms in the organization), has worked at every organizational level, was tutored under Jim Leyland, and has recently harnessed the talented-but-inconsistent arms of Justin Verlander and Edwin Jackson (who both have been dominating). Additionally, the simple fact that he has even gotten flashes out of Dontrelle Willis, one of the most enigmatic puzzles in the today’s game, shows that Knapp has all the right stuff to lead a big league club.
The Nationals are at a (perpetual?) crossroads. The primary source of pollution has, at long last, been exiled; now the cleanup begins. They need to begin to embrace today’s philosophies, and assuming they don’t hire me as general manager (which would be the right move), they can at least build this franchise into an 80 win club in two or three seasons by simply abandoning all organization philosophies currently in place, and adopting mine!
