Washington Nationals: Team preview and prediction for 2020 season

Washington Nationals: 2020 Preview and Prediction

Personally, I wouldn’t be so quick to toss the Washington Nationals aside considering we’re shaping up for a shortened season with potentially an expanded playoff format. That means if these Nats can simply “get in,” then they’ll be right where they were last year. And with the shortened workload of the regular season, we could very well see this veteran group peak at the right time again.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t have some big concerns with this team heading into 2020.

First and foremost, World series/championship hangovers are a real thing. Not only have we not had a baseball champion repeat in two decades, but the same goes for football where we haven’t seen a repeat champion since the 2003-04 Patriots, as well as hockey where even though the Penguins repeated in 2016 and 2017, the NHL had not seen a repeat champ before that since 1997-98.

Something happens to championship-winning teams the year after they win it all for whatever reason. Everything that went their way the previous year doesn’t carry over into the next.

If that’s once again the case, are Howie Kendrick and Kurt Suzuki going to have ceiling years again at ages 36?

This team had three starting pitchers (Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, and Patrick Corbin) finish in the top eleven in the NL CY Young. Are all three going to have those types of years again? Is Strasburg, who’s notorious for health issues, going to stay healthy the season following his big extension?

These are all interesting questions that will be answered over the course of this year, but the two most intriguing ones are with Strasburg and Scherzer at the top of this Nats rotation.

Stras is the reigning World Series MVP and rightfully so. He was unbelievable all season long going 18-6 in the regular season with a 3.32 ERA and 251 punch-outs (the most of his career), as well as in the postseason going 5-0 with a 0.92 ERA. But injuries have been a big part of his career dating back to when the Nats benched him with an innings limit in the middle of a postseason run because he had just undergone Tommy John.

Now make no mistake about it, Stras certainly looked to have broken those chains and entered a new era of his career last season, but as with team World Series hangovers, we may also see a World Series MVP hangover, especially for a guy who just signed a big extension. There always seems to be some kind of pullback following a championship performance and/or a big contract extension, so it’s a legitimate fear that Stras will fall victim to that narrative.

As for Scherzer, look… Max Scherzer is one of the top pitchers in baseball even to this day. But he’s 35 now about to be 36 in July and one could argue last year wasn’t his typical dominant Max Scherzer year going 11-7 in a season where he missed a good chunk of time with his lingering back issues.

Didn’t he also miss Game Five of the World Series with those same back spasms? I’m not trying to say anything about anything because Mad Max is still one of the greats…………..but do you think possibly, maybe, just a tad that he could be on a bit of a downward slope?

I certainly hope not, but I think this is the time where we’re going to start to see the greats (that I grew up watching, personally) like Scherz, Justin Verlander, and Clayton Kershaw all start to wind down.

I know, I know I’m talking blasphemy. But it’s a real concern of mine, and Scherzer could…………I’m not saying he will, but he could start to regress.

Washington Nationals: 2020 Preview and Prediction

To me, I would say if this Washington Nationals team is going to keep itself in the hunt, it’ll have to begin the process of turning to its youth movement to start leading the pack. Luckily for the Nats, they’re rather well-equipped in terms of their young players with players everybody knows like Juan Soto and Trea Turner, as well as the guys not everybody is acquainted with in Joe Ross, Carter Kieboom, and Victor Robles as the designated future leaders of this franchise.

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We know how high of a ceiling Juan Soto has as the run-producing machine that he is and how multi-faceted a player like Trea Turner has become with a triple threat at the plate, in the field, and on the base path. But what is going to be interesting to see this year is the development of Ross, Kieboom, and Robles.

As far as fielding is concerned, Victor Robles led the majors last season in outs above average with 23. Meaning, he saved the most runs in baseball last year with his wide range patrolling the outfield. Robles isn’t quite the best player on this team as a hitter, but he’s quickly becoming one of the elite defenders in the league and will once again prove to be one of the leaders of this Nationals ball club in the future.

Kieboom was supposed to be the future shortstop of this team until Trea Turner established himself a few years ago at the position, but even so, he’s an extra-base-hit machine who’s had nothing but success at the lower levels. Now, he’s going to have the opportunity to play third base every day and cement his spot in this Nationals lineup for years to come alongside Soto and Turner.

As for Joe Ross, I’m very excited to see what he does this year. We’ve sort of been waiting around for him to pop these last couple of years with the stuff he has, but he dealt with injuries two years ago and last year he wasn’t quite ready to take over a starting gig.

This year, however, is his time. Ross is a rising star in the baseball world who has two knockout pitches of a sinker and slider and high velocity on both. Ross had a brief moment to shine last year in the World Series when Scherzer went down, but he couldn’t quite get the job done. This time around, we’re going to see him cemented into the Nats rotation and he’ll very shortly get himself established as a guy to watch.

So, how do the Nats finish in 2020?

The biggest things for me are that this team is still a bit old, I’m not sure if their two top dogs in the rotation can stay up, and the loss of another MVP candidate (I think snub) in Anthony Rendon is never going to go unnoticed and without consequence. Sure they won last year despite losing Bryce Harper who actually won the MVP, but are they going to keep the train moving two-straight years when they have dropped two of the game’s best in consecutive offseasons?

They have solid veterans around the diamond with Yan Gomes, Asdrubal Cabrera, Adam Eaton, and Ryan Zimmerman with Eric Thames and Starlin Castro added in the offseason. They have the young core I already talked about.

They have some other prospects coming up to keep an eye on like Yadiel Hernandez (who hit 30+ jacks last year in Triple-A), Jacob Wilson, and Luis Garcia. And they improved their bullpen a bit from last season by holding on to Daniel Hudson and Sean Doolittle while also adding Will Harris. But to me, something has to happen this year. There has to be some kind of pullback.

I have the Nats finishing this season in third place in the NL East (87-75 before the delayed opening) and just missing the playoffs. But don’t get me wrong, this team may have its doubts, but it’s still very formidable. Let’s see what they can do post-championship.