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Washington Nationals: The franchise all-time bracket

By Bill Felber

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 26: The Washington Nationals logo in centerfield grass before a baseball game against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Nationals Park on July 26, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images) *** Local Caption ***
WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 26: The Washington Nationals logo in centerfield grass before a baseball game against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Nationals Park on July 26, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images) *** Local Caption *** /
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(Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images)
(Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images) /

The Washington Nationals are the defending champions, but they may not be the best team in franchise history. Several teams of recent vintage can challenge.

The 2019 Washington Nationals are the defending World Series champions, and that distinction alone makes their 2019 club a worthy candidate as the best team in franchise history.

At the same time, the Nats have had several strong entrants in recent seasons, a byproduct of the most recent decade easily ranking as the best in franchise history.

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The single common flaw of those pre-2019 teams was an inability to come through in the big post-season moments.

Putting together a Nationals-Expos all-time bracket begins with the consideration of the most recent decade. Aside from the 2019 champions, at least four other representatives of the decade can be included without doing any damage to the franchise’s overall history.

The four best non-champions are the teams of 2012, 2014, 2016, and 2017.

That leaves three additional spots for the pre-2010 era. There are two obvious candidates, the 1981 Expos that played for the National League championship and the ill-fated 1994 team. That club, fans will recall, held a comfortable lead in the NL East when the season was aborted due to the strike.

The final position goes to the best  Expos-Nats team not already included, the 1996 Montreal club.

Related Story. Boston Red Sox: The franchise all-time bracket. light

The format is identical to previous bracket challenges. Each matchup in the tournament is decided based on seven criteria. You can think of each as a ‘game,’ the winner of four games advancing. The seven criteria are:

  1. Game 1: Regular season winning percentage.
  2. Game 2: Post-season winning percentage
  3. Game 3: Team OPS+
  4. Game 4: Team ERA
  5. Game 5 (if necessary): Team WAR
  6. Game 6 (if necessary: Fielding percentage above the league average for the season in question.
  7. Game 7 (if necessary): The standard for Game 7 is Hall of Famers or likely future Hall of Famers.
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