Nationals: Why Max Scherzer Is This Year’s Jacob deGrom

This year, despite leading MLB pitchers in fWAR, Washington Nationals ace Max Scherzer features a pitiful 2-5 record, making him this year’s Jacob deGrom.

Washington Nationals ace Max Scherzer is hands down baseball’s best pitcher. He ranks top 5 in K/9 (11.87), K% (31.8), and has the best overall FIP (2.30) in MLB. And despite all of this, his record is a measly 2-5, good for a W-L% of .286.

On Memorial Day, we saw more of the same from Scherzer when the Nats took on the lowly Miami Marlins at home. Despite tossing six scoreless innings, after handing a 2-0 lead over to the bullpen, the Nats surrendered the lead and ultimately lost the game.

This has been the story of the season for Max Scherzer and the Washington Nationals. In fact, after yesterday’s loss, Jon Heyman Tweeted the following:

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Last season, New York Mets ace experienced a similar situation when he featured a sub-500 record at various points of the season despite being undoubtedly the best pitcher in the NL. For Scherzer, so far, the outcome is worse.

Through the team’s first 10 games last season, deGrom actually had 4-0 record despite the team being 5-5 in those games. As we have already noted, through 10 games this season Scherzer is just 2-5 and the Nats are 2-10 in games that he pitches.

With the Nationals featuring a 22-32 overall record, placing them 9.5 games behind the first place Philadelphia Phillies in the NL East and 8.0 games behind the 2nd Wild Card, they’re suddenly hit with the decision to rebuild. This has raised the question of the Nats potentially trading Scherzer in the near future.

This is without a doubt the quickest route to a speedy rebuild. With plenty of teams vying for Max Scherzer’s services, this places the Nats in a good position to ask for quality players/prospects in return.