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In 2008, The Washington Nationals had the worst record in all of baseball because they had the worst players in all of baseball. That kind of stands to reason, don’t you think?
They ended the season with just 59 wins, thanks in part to their woeful offense, by far the worst in the league.
Club owner Mark Lerner and team president Stan Kasten vowed to place at general manager Jim Bowden’s disposal the necessary resources to at least make the team competitive in 2009.
And for the most part, they succeeded. In trying, that is.
Spring Training found several new players on the roster, players who actually had some real major league talent. The additions of Adam Dunn, Josh Willingham, Jordan Zimmermann, Joe Beimel—and later Nyjer Morgan and Sean Burnett—seemed to infuse the Nationals with enough ability to expect at the very least another 10 or so victories in the win column this past season.
Seven months later, the Nationals ended the 2009 season with 59 wins, the same number as the year before.
How is that possible? How can a team be that much better and yet be just as bad?
The offense, last in virtually every offensive category in 2008, was middle-of-the-pack or better in those same categories this past season.
They upped their team batting average seven points to .258, hit 39 more homers, and scored 69 more runs, increasing their production from 3.9 to 4.3 runs per game.
The Nationals jumped from thirteenth in on-base percentage to sixth (.337). Even their slugging percent was a respectable .337—good for ninth in the league—up 14 points from 2008 when they finished last.
The Nationals walked more and struck out less. They became more patient at the plate, increasing their pitches-per-plate-appearance from 3.73 (13th in the National League) to 3.86 (third).
The team had one of the better leadoff men in Nyjer Morgan and perhaps the most feared middle of the lineup in Ryan Zimmerman and Adam Dunn, who combined for 71 homers and 211 RBI.
No, it wasn’t the offense.
It was the Nationals pitching staff in 2009 that sank their chances for a competitive season, finishing far worse than the previous year’s group who themselves finished last in the league.
They were the worst in the league, and then went downhill from there. That’s the kind of double-whammy that a team just can’t escape from.
The Nationals’ ERA increased by more than half a run to 5.02 as they allowed 36 more hits and walked 252 more batters while striking out 152 fewer players.
The opponents batting average increased six points to .276 (worst in the league) while their on-base percentage jumped by nine (worst in the league). Opponent’s slugging percentage was .450, which was … you guessed it … worst in the league.
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