The Washington Nationals never seem to have a good bullpen and I wanted to explore why that is
The Washington Nationals bullpen has been a disaster to start the season. They have the worst bullpen ERA at a staggering 6.92. The bullpen WHIP is at 1.92 and they have walked 38 batters. I wanted to explore why the bullpen is so bad and why the Nats never seem to have a good bullpen.
Not About the Money:
My first thought about why the Nats have a bad bullpen was that they just didn’t spend the money. However, when I explored this theory, it did not hold up. Yes, there are some examples of expensive bullpens being good this season.
For example, the Mets have the third best bullpen ERA and spend a hefty $37.9 million on their relievers. However, there are a number of bullpens that cost less than the Nationals $16.4 million dollar pen that are having success.
The San Francisco Giants have the second best bullpen in all of baseball. However, they are paying less money for it than the Nats are for their calamity of a bullpen. The Diamondbacks are only paying $13.3 million for their bullpen, and their unit has the lowest WHIP in the league. The Mariners, who have a top 5 bullpen are only paying $11 million to their relievers.
Now the question is how are these other teams getting so much more bang for their buck than the Nationals? It is all about finding diamonds in the rough and developing them. The Nationals had been showing some promise in that department the past couple years with guys like Kyle Finnegan, Hunter Harvey and Robert Garcia emerging from obscurity. However, they haven’t found any gems so far this season and most of the veterans they have brought in have been disastrous.
Finding Gems:
There is an art to finding undervalued relief pitchers and different teams go about it different ways. For example, teams like the Giants and Mariners have a lot of young guys with breakout potential.
A lot of those guys have hit this season for the Giants. Randy Rodriguez, Erik Miller and Hayden Birdsong have not allowed a run for the Giants in 23.2 innings combined. They make $780,000, $770,000, and $765,000 respectively. If you combine those three salaries it comes out to $2,315,000, or less than the $3 million the Nationals are paying Lucas Sims.
Why is it that the Nationals have such a tough time finding these gems, while other teams can stockpile cheap arms. Even if we accept that the Nats need to explore more in the veteran market, they can find better and cheaper options.
The Diamondbacks have a lot of veterans in their bullpen, including guys they got for cheap this offseason. Shelby Miller and Jalen Beeks are both having very good starts for the Snakes and they both got paid less than Colin Poche. Yes, it is early, but it looks like the Nats picked the wrong guys.
Historic Problem:
Even when the Nats were at their dominant best in the 2010’s, the bullpen was usually creaky, especially early in the season. It seemed like Mike Rizzo had to scramble to put together a bullpen at the deadline every year.
There is no better example of this than 2019. The Opening Day bullpen that year was Sean Doolittle, Wander Suero, Matt Grace, Trevor Rosenthal, Kyle Barraclaugh, Justin Miller, and Tony Sipp.
That thing had to be totally remade on the fly in the middle of the season. Doolittle and Suero were the only ones who were on the World Series roster, and Suero only pitched two innings all playoffs.
You have to credit Mike Rizzo for finding guys like Daniel Hudson and Tanner Rainey, but he did not build a good enough bullpen to start that season.
The problem has continued to this day, as Mike Rizzo is still struggling to build a bullpen. Like Barraclaugh and Rosenthal, it seems like Sims and Poche are dead on arrival. Both can’t find the zone and just aren’t getting outs.
While it is unlikely the Nats will be flipping prospects to get a guy like Hudson at this years deadline, they need to find a guy like 2019 Tanner Rainey on the farm to stabilize things. The Nationals also need to be aggressive picking up guys on waivers. They found Robert Garcia and Hunter Harvey on waivers.
While none of those guys are going to be sure things, they are in the Minors or on waivers for a reason, there is no downside in taking flyers. It will be hard for them to be worse than the guys they have now.
I would also like to see the Nats start to trust guys like Jackson Rutledge and Cole Henry. They should be put in the positions Poche and Sims are being trusted with right now. I really liked how Rutledge threw the ball yesterday in his first two innings. However, Davey put him out for a third inning, and his stuff did not look as sharp. That should be something the team learns from. Rutledge should be a one or two inning pitcher from now on. After all, there is a reason he is not starting anymore.
There is no excuse for the bullpen to be this bad. It is not a spending thing, Mike Rizzo just picked the wrong guys. You can find guys for cheap and turn them into very good relievers. The Nationals are just not doing that well enough.