Washington Nationals' J.D. Martin Is Every Bit as Good as Ace John Lannan

(Photo by Sam Greenwood/Getty Images)

In 2007, John Lannan came out of nowhere.

An 11th-round afterthought in 2005, Lannan climbed the minor league ladder quickly, going a combined 12-3, 2.87 before finishing the season with the Nationals where the 22-year-old went 2-2, 4.15.

Since then, Lannan has won 18 games and been the team’s presumptive ace.

Man, if the Nationals could find just one more pitcher to come out of nowhere, 2010 could be a fun year to watch.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet J.D. Martin, the next John Lannan.

It’s not that Martin wasn’t a known commodity in the baseball world. The Cleveland Indians chose the high school pitcher in the first round of the 2001 amateur draft, using their compensation pick for the departed Manny Ramirez.

Martin had tremendous control and a good fastball with movement when he began his minor league career. In his first two seasons in the Indians organization, he went a combined 19-6, 3.17, allowing 2.5 walks per nine innings while striking out 11.

In other words, he was dominant.

However, his strikeouts all but disappeared in 2004 as he toughed through an 11-10, 4.39 season in the high-A Carolina League. His strikeouts per nine innings dropped to six and his arm felt sore towards the end of the season.

There were signs of an arm injury, but it was hoped that an off-season of rest would help Martin regain his strength.

And it seemed to. Ten games into the 2005 season, Martin was 3-1, 2.38 and was again striking out more than 10 batters per nine innings. However, the sore arm returned and he was forced to under go reconstructive “Tommy John” surgery that July.

He returned late in 2006, and over the next three years crafted a record of 15-8, 3.31, with 7.5 strikeouts per nine innings.

However, in 2008, his last year with the Indians, he was primarily a reliever; the team didn’t feel he was good enough, or strong enough, to be a starter any more.

Believing that he could still be an effective starter, Martin left the Indians as a six-year minor league free agent and signed with the Nationals last winter.

He quickly became the team’s premier minor league pitcher, going 8-3, 2.66 in 15 starts with Class-AAA Syracuse.

But he was not the same pitcher anymore. Martin began pitching to contact and threw strikes, lots of them. With Syracuse, he struck out six per nine innings while walking just one, an amazing walk to strikeout ratio at any level.

In nine minor league seasons, Martin had compiled an outstanding record of 56-28 with a 3.29 ERA and yet he’d never had the opportunity to pitch in a major league game.

That changed, however, when the Nationals’ Scott Olsen was lost for the season with a arm injury and the team desperately needed a fill-in arm.

Enter J.D. Martin.

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