Good Pitching Leads to Elusive Home Win

Tuesday night is open mic night at Walter Sports Bar. Hi, my name is Jack and this past Tuesday I went to the Walters open mic night. I brought my guitar and my voice and played and sang four cover songs for everyone in attendance. It was a lot of fun and I definitely go back again. Open mic begins at 7 p.m., located just across the street from the ballpark. - Left hand header against the right-hander Henderson. New yes again, edges to the lead, two balls, two strikes. Now he runs. The pitch swung on, belted a right center field. Freely caught the run, going way back to the warning track and it's off the wall and play. New yes speaks for third. He's being way too. Tana heading for third. The throw there, not in time. New yes scores on a triple off the wall and right center field by Jose Tena. And the nationals take the lead here in the bottom of the fifth inning. It's Washington, two in Milwaukee, one. - Fitzpatrick ready. He brings it home. Swing a ground ball through the trot and infielding out and a left field for a base in. Abrams scampers into score, not seem New yes drives in another. It's the nationals three Milwaukee one. Nice ball game for New yes, two for three, two RBI singles. He tied the game in the fifth. He gives the nationals the insurance tally here in the seventh. - And welcome to Natschette, a Malgoldi host of the Algoldi podcast. I'm joined by Washington, nationals inside remarks. Socrimateofnatschegerdal.com. He's at nationals park and the Nats have gotten themselves a win at nationals park a three to win over the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday afternoon, avoiding a three game sweep. The Nats in LB 2026 regular season get to 16 and 19 just born 12 at home versus 12 and seven on the road. This was another underwhelming offensive performance by the Nats, but some good pitching by the Nats in this game as the opener strategy again was employed and the opener strategy again turned out to go well for the Nats. We had a step forward outing for Zach let tell was at lengthy, but it was a step forward outing and some good work by Nats relievers beyond pooling and let tell, especially Mitchell Parker. Mark, this is not, you know, an overall great series for the Nats, but good to get this win and maybe just maybe the Nats off the off day on Monday can salvage this homestand here. Four and 12 at home that does sound a lot better than three and 13. Yeah, it sounds a whole lot better than that. And you know what else sounds really good. Al is three and two thirds innings of one run ball from Zach let tell he needed that the team needed that now they went and deployed the Miles Michaelis plan with him, the opener in front of him and then the another bulk reliever beyond him in Mitchell Parker, but we've seen this strategy work when the pitchers are fresh and available. They can do this. They knew they had an off day coming up on Monday. So Blake Beter was very aggressive in his usage and it all worked. That's how you would like for this to go. You'd like to score a few more runs of course, but short of that the pitching staff did exactly what you would hope from them in this game and a feel good game for Zach let tell. I know it doesn't cure everything. It doesn't mean he's suddenly back where he needs to be, but he needed something like this or it was going to get ugly or real quick. So we did not learn that the Nats would be using an opener for this game until Sunday morning. Do we know when that decision was made to use an opener for let's tell in this game? I believe it would have been made after Saturday's game and they realized the pool and was going to be available to them the way they wanted. And I think it's important to note here we'll get into the specifics of it, but he didn't just open he threw two full innings. The Brewers had a bunch of left handed hitters in their lineup. And I think they even tried to counter this a little bit by moving some of them down. So pool ends up facing eight batters and four of them are left handed. And because there were a couple of them further down the lineup, I think that encouraged them to go in with the plan of having him face all of them no matter how long that took even if it was two full innings. So I think in order to do that, they had to know that pool and was truly fresh and wasn't needed Saturday. So if the game called for him on Saturday, they would have brought him in that probably would have changed the plan. So my guess is that this is what they were hoping to do all long, but didn't know for sure they could do until they saw how Saturday's game went. See, so that's interesting to me. So they wouldn't purposely hold pool and out of Saturday's game. Like if they felt like they wanted to use them, they would have used them on Saturday and not held them out for the purpose of opening on Sunday. If it was a winnable game in the spot made sense to use them, you know, I'm looking back at was you know, foster Griffin going six innings made a big difference. And then Lord for two or ball to four one. And they were behind. So it never really came up. But sure, if there was a scenario where maybe they needed him late in the game to match up against lefties or if the game went extra innings, something like that, I think their preference was to stay away from him in that game knowing they could then use him in this case. I think what I've noticed from this coaching staff in particular, if they have a shot to win a game, they're going to go for it and not worry so much about what it means for tomorrow. They'll figure out tomorrow tomorrow. And we've seen what that looks like. That sometimes means bringing in a new picture, sending somebody down, you bring in somebody just for a day, they'll do that. But they don't want to sacrifice a realistic shot at winning a game that's right in front of them just because they're trying to save up for something that may happen a day or two later. Well, PJ Poolein is doing well in this role of opener. And he on Sunday afternoon was especially good. Poolein tossed two scoreless innings with two swinging strikeouts as he tossed the perfect top of the first and tossed a scoreless top of the second, despite issuing a walk in giving up a double. And then starting pitcher Zach Latel came into the game as an adds a bulk man. And while Latel did not necessarily consume a whole lot of bulk, he was a lot better than what we have seen here from so far. One run, three and two thirds innings got pulled by manager Blake Buterra at just 41 pitches, just 23 of which were strikes. He threw 18 balls. But like we were saying, Latel was in such a bad place that you take one run and three and two thirds innings and you're like, OK, that's good. That's progress. Were you surprised though that Latel got yanked after just the 41 pitches? No, I wasn't. I said they went the full miles. Michael is planned for this game. That's exactly how they've done it with him. And let's tell how to great, you know, quip afterwards, somebody asking what was his emotions at the end of it. He says, I wanted to stay out there. I wanted to pitch more. But he said, I understand I'm in no position to be complaining about usage right now. Yeah, I wanted to keep going. But him in no place to, you know, obviously, talk about users right now. So fully acknowledging in a self-deprecating way, the state of his game at the moment. And so while he, of course, wants to be out there longer and is capable of throwing more than 41 pitches, he had-- he knew he couldn't take any issue with Buter's decision to pull him there. You know, we've seen this with Michael. It's where you kind of break it down and have him pitch the bare minimum possible. And if that goes well, maybe next time you extend him a little more, a little more beyond that to the point where Michael has actually did start a game the other day. So I think that's where they have to go now with LaTelle. It doesn't mean they're giving up on him entirely. But you need to put him into the most advantageous spot where he has a chance at some success. Let him feel good about himself and do that. And then you build off of that. If they were to leave him out there and it went south on him, then you've kind of ruined the whole point of all this. So I think it was the right move to make because they had the other arms because Poolein had gone to innings themselves because Monday is an off day. Just minimize it. Get a good outing from him. A feel good outing. Get him out of there. Let him now progress moving forward. And let the other guys finish this game. It's just so funny. You have two members of the Nath starting pitching rotation who essentially are being babyed right now. And the two guys being babyed are the two veterans. The two guys who were supposed to be the innings eaters. But Miles, Michael, and Zach LaTelle, Kate Cavali's not being treated this way. Foster Griffin's not being treated this way. Jake Irvin is not being treated this way. Be interested to see, you know, this has become essentially the way Michael is now is handled. Although we did actually start his last start. Be interested to see if this continues with LaTelle or if he goes back to actually starting when he is due up to start. But I do want to highlight P.J. Poolein. He in this role of opener is doing well. You put out the stats on X during the game. So it has only been Poolein who has been used as an opener by the Naths here. As much as the strategy has been employed, Poolein has been the only reliever actually utilized as an opener. What you're looking at now is five starts, quote unquote, six in a third innings. One run allowed. So that works out to any already at 142 whip 0.95. The opener approach, at least from the standpoint of how Poolein is doing, has been great so far. I give the guy a lot of credit. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, it's interesting to know here. It's not like he's only facing left-handed hitters. He's usually facing often like just as many right-handed as he did in this game. It was four of each. He's been much better against left-handeds in general this season. In his traditional relief role, he's thrown 11 innings and his area is 491 with a whip of 155. So he's clearly doing better in the opener role. And that's usually against good hitters. I think he's very comfortable having done this now. So there's no surprises to it. He knows what his routine needs to be to get ready for it. And I'll admit, I figured going into this one, that the plan was going to be face maybe five hitters in total, because it was originally going to be left right right. And then Bryce Tarrang was scratched late by the brewers for an illness. And so they had Luis Renjifo lead off, and he's a right-handed hitter. So he ends up going right, right, right. First three batters retires aside on 15 pitches. So now you're going to bring him back for the second. I thought he'd face the first two hitters who were lefties. He ends up going strike out walk and I thought that would be it. Instead he stayed in, he faced the right-handed hit and lockbridge gave him a double, but then two more lefties after that and got them pop up strike out. So credit to Butera for having that plan going in and knowing how many lefties were still to come and being willing to let pool and maybe struggle a little bit by putting a right-handed hitter on base and getting to a jam, but he got himself out of it. He, you know, through 36 pitches, that's a good amount for a lever no matter what the situation might be. Now, you can't keep using him all the time like this. You either got to save him up for that opener job every five days or maybe find one short relief appearance in between. If you're going to throw him that much, it does kind of limit his availability otherwise. But the fact that they have love lady who's been pretty good also from the left side, Parker as another leftie who can give you length, I think it affords them the luxury of doing this when they feel like it's necessary. In the past, they really couldn't do this because they didn't have enough quality left handers in their bullpen. And I'm not going to say all these guys are super quality, but they're getting the job done right now and pool and is available for this because they have other arms for later in the game. And what I continue to wonder is, will it only be pool and who is used as an opener here or do we eventually see any other natural levers used as openers and to go back to what we were talking about a few minutes ago. So let's say Poolyn had pitched on Saturday was unavailable for Sunday, but the Nats still wanted to use an opener for Zach Letel on Sunday. Would the Nats have used somebody else as an opener? Would the Nats really have just said, "Oh well, we only use Poolyn as an opener. We don't have him." So Zach, you've got to go out there and actually start the game. I think it's so interesting how it has been like this where it is only Poolyn who has been used as an opener. You've got to think somebody else would be capable of doing it at least once, even on short notice. You say, "Okay, hey, Gus Vorland or somebody like that. Could you go out there and just give us an inning to get things going here, but so far we have only seen Poolyn." Yeah, I think they're very comfortable with Poolyn, obviously. And as I said, they have the other lefties that they want for later in the game. So let's say that scenario you just described happened and Poolyn had to pitch on Saturday. Would they open with love, lady? I'm going to guess probably not because they would have felt like they needed him to match up later in the game, which they did. He was the final guy on the mound facing some lefty hitters at the end of the game. I think the interesting one, and you mentioned like Vorland, okay. Would they ever use a right-handed opener in front of a right-handed bulk guy? That's not so much about the matchup. That's saying we don't trust this starter to face their best hitters, whatever side of the plate they're on. Would they go to that extreme? I'm going to guess right now they would not. But if you were ever in a real important situation and you just didn't have that faith or trust in your starter, especially if it's somebody who gets in the first inning troubles all the time, maybe then you would try it with a right-handed pitcher. But I think for now it's Poolyn, and if he's not available, they'll go ahead and start the regular starter. And we saw that happen with Michael's last time where we thought, oh, maybe they'll use the opener form and know the Metz lineup didn't really match up right for that so they went ahead and started Michael's in that game. Algoldi here to tell you about Widow Nations by 4 Get 4 Free Sale. But before that, the Window Nation look into the future. Anderson with that over-the-top delivery unloads. Breaking ball hammered down the left field line out toward the foul pole. It is a fair ball. It's a home run. A line for the Dylan Drew's wrapped around the foul pole. Make it three to one red wing. Window Nation has a great offer for listeners of the Natschat podcast. The Buy 4 Get 4 Free Sale during which you could replace all of your home's windows and get half of them for free. Plus you can get your windows with no money down and no payments or interest for two years. The sale end soon, so call 86690Nation or visit windownation.com now. To book a consultation, 86699 Window Nation or windownation.com to book a consultation and tell windownation that you want the deal that you heard about from Algoldi on the Natschat podcast. Jones off second. Here's the pitch flag on Miss H. struck him out with a sweeping breaking ball and a curly W's in the books. Love Lady with a fist pump of the high five with K-Mat Ruiz closes it out to get the save. And the Nationals take the final game of this series with the Brewers. And they win the season series from Milwaukee 4 games to two. A curly W in the books, the final score, the Washington Nationals 3, the Milwaukee Brewers 2. Nats in this game used three relievers beyond using reliever PJ Poole and as an opener and using starters, Zach Lytel as a bulk man. Mitchell Parker, two perfect innings, two swinging strikeouts. Gus Barland officially allowed one run in two thirds of an inning and Richard Love Lady officially tossed a two thirds of a scoreless inning for the save as we continue to play the game of who might get a save for the Nats today. The answer on Sunday was Richard Love Lady. I want to say this though about Mitchell Parker. I know it hasn't always been greatness with him as a reliever, but he has looked a lot better as a reliever and we are seeing him strike guys out and he in this game, you know, in a lot of ways was the most valuable pitcher for the Nats in this game. Now Poole and did well too, but Parker, I mean, six up, six down, two swinging strikeouts, really good stuff from him. Yeah, I agree. And this is, if you're going to pull Lytel after 41 pitches like they did, then you better get multiple quality innings from the next guy up. And that was Parker. So that worked out perfectly. You're right. The overall numbers maybe aren't spectacular, but he looks better to me in this role than we've seen him recently as a starter. I think he can go in there knowing he's only going to face guys once. He can attack them a little bit more. You know, it's maybe a little bit better matchup for him. Doesn't have much time to think and prep in advance, which might be good for him. It's still not quite enough body of work to like make any real declarations long term, but they may have found something here with Mitchell Parker as a way to have him be a useful member of a big league pitching staff, not in a rotation. And you know, they're not using him as a matchup lefty late in the game. You know, he is going to give you two or even three innings. And so far pitching those middle innings is like the bridge guy. If you want to call it that, I think he's been very good at this. And I think there's a chance that this becomes more of a permanent role for him. By the way, and I mentioned this on the last installment of the podcast. So Max Crannick, the reliever, we on Friday had the reports that the Nats are signing him. His agency on Friday morning actually put out on X that he's signing with the Nats. Though I'm not yet announced that signing, but that is still happening, right? We just haven't had the official transaction. Correct. It was all pending a physical, which I don't know if that's taken place yet. Maybe it has not. And with him, I'm also told he's coming off some injuries. So I don't think this is somebody we're necessarily going to see in the big leagues right away. Whenever that signing becomes official, he may go to the miners and still be working on getting himself to be a hundred percent before coming back up. Now they cleared a 40 man roster spot on Saturday with the CNL Perez outright. And I know you and Tim talked about that and just to confirm what you were all talking about. He was on waivers before he pitched the other night. So that doesn't happen often, but you have to give the time for that to play out for other teams to have a shot at claiming him. Sometimes a team might say, well, we're just not going to use him because that they went and pitched him and all worked out. And he cleared waivers and he's still in the organization, but off the 40 man roster. If you thought that was the move to clear a spot for Max Kranik, that's not at least not yet. They actually picked up another guy that they announced early on Sunday during the game. And that is Zach Kent, a right hander who's claimed off waiver from the twins. He's been with like four different organizations in the last year. He's been option to triple A already. So he's on the 40 man roster, but not in the big leagues or anything like that. We'll see what comes to that. Eventually they are going to have to clear a spot for Max Kranik whenever that signing does become official. The Nats offense in this three to win over the Brewers on Sunday afternoon. Not good. This was not a good series for the Nats offensively, but the Nats of course did win the game. But three runs, seven hits, a triple, a double and five singles. One walk, two for nine with runners in scoring position. We had Luis Garcia, Jr. leaving the game. He was an at-starring first baseman and number two batter, over two, remove from the game. Due to right wrist soreness, but we did get some good production from CJ Abrams, not seem new Nyes and Jose, ten Abrams as an at-starring shortstop and number four batter, two for four, two singles and a stolen base. And his speed caused all kinds of problems for the Brewers in this game. Abrams in the Nats to run fifth, lead off infield single to the right side of the infield despite having been down in the count at 1.12. And he had to steal a second base Abrams in the Nats. One run, seventh lead off first pitch single through the right side of the infield. And he advanced the second base on a block by reliever Brian Fitzpatrick on a pick off throw to first base as the speed of Abrams induced the block. And so you look at CJ Abrams now. His OPS is at 9.40, 50 points better than the OPS of outbuilder James Wood who has cooled off a bit did not have a particularly good series. But in terms of qualified Nats Abrams number one at 9.40 with the OPS James Wood is at 8.90. But seeing the speed. of Abrams in this game. And what it caused, you know, there also was this on that first single, the infield single, the Brewer's picture stumbled coming off the mound. And I don't know if that was a function of the speed, but maybe it was Abrams as quick, you know, maybe the picture is rushing to get to first space, but you really saw in this game what kind of damage his speed can inflict. It was critical, I think, in both of those situations. The infield single, as you said, to beat that out. The Nats first base runner of the game. By the way, they were having a perfect game throwing against them, not only four innings, but after what happened the other night with Mizraowski, you're always worried what might be. So he hustles down the line for that. And then I think that's stolen base. I think it was really important what he did. There's two pick off attempts prior to that. Now we know the new rules say if you pick over a third time, you have to get him out or else it's a buck in the runner automatically gets second base. So everybody knows once he's done the twice, well, hey, you've got free reign, you can just go for it, but you got to be careful with that. You can't give it up too quickly and take off too soon. You end up getting picked off and then that's, you know, that's allowed that counts. So what he did is he waited just long enough and then still got a huge jump on that one where the throw went down, but it had no chance of getting him out. So it was a really astute job by Abrams of recognizing he picked off twice. I've got to go here, but just make sure he's going to the plate before I take off to not take any chances with that. That puts him in position to score on the new year single. And then two and a half years later, I agree. I think it's a different picture in the game now, but you know they're thinking they're worried about him. And you saw the pick off attempt from the left, he gets called for the buck. The first base umpire stew sure water. I've never seen a buck call like this. He just like waved him off as if it's like get over the take second base and like turned his back and walked away like don't even try to argue with me on this one. It was the classic left hander stepping towards the plate and throwing the first and so many of them get away with that over the years. And this one was so obvious that there was no argument against it at all. And I think that's absolutely a product of Abrams, the threat of Abrams running. Yeah, Abrams making a big impact in this game. Not seen Nunez. He is an at starting second base mid and number six batter two for three two RBI singles. So some really nice two strike hitting by Nunez. He and the Nats two run fifth had a one out RBI single to right center field to tie the game at one despite having been down at 1.02 and Nunez in the Nats one run seventh RBI single through the left side of the infield on a one two pitch for a three one Nats lead and Jose tenna. He is an at starting D.H. and number seven batter one for two with an RBI triple. He and that two run fifth had a one out RBI triple off the right center field warning track for a two one Nats lead despite having been down at 1.02. So just enough offense in this game. You know, you look at where the Nats are at offensively here lately. We've been talking about this. So the Nats over the three games in this series totaled just five runs. The Nats now have scored three runs or less in six of the teams last ten games. This is masked a little bit by the big outburst. We had a few games ago. The 14 to win at the Nats this past Wednesday. But you know, the offense has calm down. And I think that was one of the nice things about Sunday afternoon that that showed they can win when the offense isn't great. You know, the pitching actually in a lot of ways carried the day here. The fielding was a bit better too. It was good to see that although we did have it happen with James Wooden the ninth will get to that. But good to see the Nats win and you know, the offense calming down. But just enough here to get the victory. Just enough is the key phrase there. And we understand that, you know, many of these guys batting in the bottom half of the lineup on a daily basis are not typically offensive threats. Not seem new Nyes is, you know, high on that list. You've got to just be able to come through in situations of consequence where they won for 11 with runners in scoring position during Saturday's loss. In this case, you have Nunez come up twice with Abrams scoring position. What is the situation call for contact and get the ball out of the infield and he did it in both cases. It was a two two pitch. So two strike RBI single in the fifth another, you know, it was the infield was in in the seventh with Abrams on third and he pulled the ball and got it right through the gap between the drawn in third baseman and shortstop good situational hitting from him. They don't need this guy to have a huge OPS. They know what not seem new Nyes is. They know that he's going to make a big impact in the field and on the bases. But if he comes up in a big spot with a runner in scoring position, he's got to give you a productive at bat and sort of see him do that twice in this game. I think was was really good. It was good to see Tena who isn't playing a lot, but I give him credit. He's coming through very often when he hits RBI triple. Remember, he had the pinch hit Homer in Chicago last weekend. And I just want to give a real quick shout out. We don't do this often. K. Bear Ruiz at the plate. He had a line out in this game and then in the eighth inning, he hit a lead off double to deep left field. And I noted the exit velocity 106. For K. Bear Ruiz, that's a rare occurrence. They hit a ball with that kind of authority. Good for him. I don't know if that's a sign of anything moving forward, but boy, that had to feel good. He needed something like that. He very much needed something like that. K. Bear Ruiz is a slugging percentage of 323. I mean, he's not hitting, but he's especially not hitting for any real power. His OPS at 538, Drew Melis is OPS is 405. I mean, it is just brutal with the ads have gotten offensively from the catching positions. Two balls, two strikes, the pitch. Swing it on and drive in a right center field. That's a base in for Nunez. Abrams around third. He will score the throw going in a second base for the centerfitter Garrett Mitchell. Nussie Nunez comes through with a solid line drive, singled in a right center field. Drives in his 11th run of the year. And the ads have tied the game with a couple of hits here in the bottom of the fifth inning. It's now the national's one of the brewers one. Defense was a big topic after the loss on Saturday. Manager Blake Buttehrer, during his post game press conference on Saturday evening talking about perhaps changing things up in terms of how the ads practice defense before games. We're going to just start pre-game work and we're going to try something a little bit different. Sure enough, we did see some change. Come Sunday. No official errors for the ads in this three two win over the brewers on Sunday afternoon. But right builder James Wood in the brewers one run nine did lose a routine fly ball in the sun for what only ended up being a single by Gary Sanchez. So this happened with one out Sanchez was not hustling. So we only got a single. That's one of the games. So you know, it wasn't a too bad. What happened here. It was a weird thing too with wood because his hat fell off. And I don't know if the hat falling off was what led to him losing the ball in the sun. He was wearing sunglasses. So you know, you would like to think the sunglasses would be enough to find the ball, but would lost the ball, but a rough defensive moment there. But overall the difference in pre-game preparation defensively. What stood out to you when you saw what you saw on Sunday? Yeah. So I watched what they did on Sunday morning. And first of all, the fact that they were doing like real infield drills on a Sunday morning is kind of rare. Not for them, but for like across baseball very often the quick turn around to a day game, especially Sunday mornings. They don't take full BP. They do very little guys are kind of on their own to get themselves ready for the game. So the fact that they were out there on a Sunday morning is a little bit notable in itself. What I liked was what they were actually doing in which was this. They had all the infielders lined up. You had Blake butter actually the one with the fungo bat hitting the balls to them, ground balls to them. And he would call out the situation, like runner on first one out, man on third infield in whatever that might be. And then he was hitting the ball to them and they're doing it with a little more force than you would normally see in a fungo bat, like trying to simulate more of like game speed. The thing they did that I really liked was and it wasn't on that first drill, but later on he did. Tyler Schmarslock, who is their field coordinator, and it was a lot of the defensive positioning and just just coordination of everything they do defensively. He had a stopwatch. And from the time Nutera hit the ball to the time the throw was caught at first base. He's calling out what it was 4.1, 4.4, whatever that is. And noting whether that would have been good enough to get a runner out of typical average runner. And then at some point he said, okay, faster runner, 4.0. So they had to like purposely work a little faster and try to get it to first base before four seconds was up to beat a theoretical fast runner. I liked that part of it, kind of speeding it up and presenting a real tangible situation of understanding how quick you need to be and precisely have to be to get a good runner out. So there's always so much you can do with this. And I'm a little skeptical about how much difference just working harder is going to make a team better. Like you can claim that more work makes you a better defensive player. Sometimes it's just, are you a good defensive player or not? You can't turn bad players into good players. So I don't know if it's all for show or if there's anything actually to it. I did at least like, if you're going to do this, I liked the approach they took to it. It wasn't just we're going to take more ground balls. It was going to take ground balls with a purpose and a little bit of a timer and try to simulate something that's a little bit more of like a real game situation. I mean, we know what happened in the exhibition season. The defense was not good and so that there have been defensive problems in the regular season isn't shocking. I guess doing something is better than doing nothing. And if nothing else you are imposing on the players, the idea of hey, this is a problem you got needs to be better in this regard. But yeah, I don't know that the defense of problems or due to guys like not trying hard enough or not focusing hard enough. Like it just may be that they're just not very good defensively. And you know, when we talk about what Paul Toboney's trying to do here and trying to change the culture and you know, install this new process, you know, to the lowest levels of the miners, I think this really has to become a thing of like developing good defensive players. This team for years going back to when the Nats were good has struggled defensively. And you know, I think a lot of that is just like an organizational thing of like, are you getting good defensive players or you developing guys in a good way defensively? That does not seem to be the case here because for so long, I'm talking like a decade plus this team consistently year in year out has had big time defensive issues. And it looks at least so far like that's happening this season. I mean, coming into play on Sunday, the Nats were dead last in M.O.B. and viewers to 32, the next worst total was the Tampa Bay race at 25. And that's had seven more errors than the next worst total. And with the understanding that errors aren't the best measure of defense, that still is a jaw dropper that you're seven errors worse than the next worst team in the majors. Yeah, it's kind of like we talk about our BIs and important. No, it's not the best way to determine something. But if you have a lot of RBI's, you're probably a pretty good player. If as a team, you have a lot of errors, you're probably not a very good defensive team. So it's one way of measuring it, but it can be instructive, especially ones that much more than anyone else. But you know, I agree. Like you can work with guys and that's great. Like there are things you can do to help guys get better with their techniques and to keep them mentally engaged so that they, you know, make the plays. But not seem new. Nia's came to the Nats as a great defensive player. They didn't make him into one. Luis Garcia came to the Nationals as a bad defensive player. They're not going to suddenly make him into a good one. And if he wound up with another team, I don't think he would suddenly become a gold glover in the field. You can only work with what you have. And I would say in the long run, it would be more imperative for them to really prioritize defense when it comes to drafting and scouting and that. And yes, you start working them with them at a young level in the lower minors and keep doing that all the way up. They are really trying to be very consistent with their approaches all the way through. That stuff does make a difference in the long run. But you can also only make so much out of what you're given. And if the guys are not, you know, elite defensive players, you're not going to turn them into them just by working harder every day with them. So no game for the Nats on Monday. Next up for them is a three game series against the Minnesota Twins at Nationals Park. And the Nats have listed the following starting pictures as probable for the series. You know, we have to say that now we can't just say these guys will be the Nats starting pictures because you never know with this team with the process and the opener strategy. But you are probable Nats starting pictures for this series game one Tuesday evening 645, Cade Cavali game two Wednesday evening 645 miles Michael is game three Thursday afternoon 105, Jake Irvin. The Twins are not doing especially well. You would like to think this is a series that Nats could win. You'd like to think this is a homestand that the Nats could come out of going three and three. Of course, we don't know with the way things have gone for the Nats at Nationals Park so far. But in theory, especially with Cavali pitching in game one, this would seem like a winnable series for the Nats. It would. I've given up trying to assume anything anymore with this team, especially at home because how often have we thought, Oh, Hey, this is the homestand where they're going to get better. This is going to save their season because they got the Rockies and the Marlins for seven straight days. Well, how that workout for them last year. So I don't want to get too worked up about that. I'll just say, I think there's an opportunity for Cade Cavali on Tuesday night to really continue what he has done. Obviously, back to back 10 strikeout games. That's a huge step forward for him. Not saying he's got a strikeout 10. But if he can be in dominant form again, that helps lead credence to the idea that he is really taking a step forward and becoming the ace of this team. You hate to have him suffer a big regression back to where he was a little while ago. He's been pounding the strikes on, but more importantly, he's thrown quality strikes and that leads to all the strikeouts. So I would like to see him continue that set a good tone for the series and just really start to establish, Hey, Cade Cavali. He's the leader of this staff. He's the guy who is taking off before our eyes and becoming a front line big league starting pitcher. And I mentioned Louise Garcia Jr. leaving the game due to the wrist soreness. This is concerning enough to where he's getting an MRI exam. Yeah, the MRI and you do that just to be sure. Apparently, he was feeling it on the swings, not in the field. It was the second up bat that it really acted up on him. And so they pulled him from the game and going to take a look at it. We'll see. You hope it's not anything all that serious. But we know that Garcia's value to this team is with the bat, not the glove. So if he can't swing or can't comfortably swing, I would think they would rather be on the cautious side there and give him 10 days off if they had to, as opposed trying to force the issue just because, oh, we got to have him in there at first base for us. So we'll see what that says. But they have the off day that's helpful. They give him some time to both to get the MRI, find out what it says. And then if they do need to bring somebody else in like an Andres Chapparo, we'll see if they make that move. Well, the Nats have dealt with some injuries, especially in terms of relief pictures. But the Nats have been remarkably healthy when it comes to position players. So hopefully that continues here. But, you know, at some point, you're going to start having some injuries with these position guys. I mean, that a single position player is on an interdless for the Nats. And I can't even recall like a guy sitting out again because of like some sort of minor element that doesn't land on an interdless. Like it feels like for the most part, everyone has been available for every game at least as far as we know. Right. And as much as we've talked about the pitching staff and all the changes and all the new arms coming in, they barely done anything offensively. You know, Chapparo was sent down and they, you know, added me that that's pretty much all they've done from an offensive standpoint, a position player standpoint since opening day. And we're 35 games in. That is a surprise to me. I thought we have a lot more movement in that regard. And I think if I remember, this is the first player to come out of a game due to injury so far this season. Maybe somebody, especially on the pitching side has like reported soreness after the fact, but to actually come out of the game, injured, we haven't had that happen yet. Yeah, a lot of good injury luck for the Nats so far from a position player standpoint. You tell us what you think. Hit us up on exit Nats underscore chat. You can find us on blue sky at Nats chat podcast. You can email us Nats chat podcast at gmail.com. You have a website. You can check out to natschatpodcast.com in which you can purchase a Nats chat podcast t-shirt. All nationals radio highlights on Nats chat or courtesy of 1067 the fan for Mark Zurgerman on algaldi. We thank you for listening and we'll talk to you next time on the Nats chat podcast. Something a little bit different today before the game. Maybe a little bit less reps and more focused on specific situations and more game like where we didn't stopwatch going. Guys had to make decisions in the moment. Just some things and our whole goal here with everything we do is to make sure our practice is harder than the games. That way we challenge these guys as you know when it doesn't necessarily count the way when they get in the game it almost feels a little bit slower. Line drive that is a fair ball that's all kind to a trouble down the line. Back hand by Antuna's away we're on king that's going to tie the ball game on the two-hour double down the line and left by Kaden Wallace.