Ruiz Homers in Victorious Rubber Match

Make sure this season to check out Walter's self-poor beer wall, which includes 24 different items, visit www.waltersdc.com for more information. Now, K-Bare Ruiz from the left side is a switcher runner. Young go swing and a line drive to the right field corner. That is down and off the bullpen fence for extra bases. Young the third being way home. The relay from Kishal to the plate, not in time. Kips past the catcher, heading for third is Ruiz. The throw there is not in time. Ruiz able to double young home and then get to third when the throw skips past the catcher. Preball to strike out. Here's the pitch. Swing a line drive right center field, Walnar Chase. He can't get it. It's by him. This one's going to split the outfielders and go all the way to the wall. Tana will score. Young is right behind him. Ruiz takes a wide turn and holds it second. But the go ahead to run double. Nationals four, twins three. Ruiz has two doubles and three RBIs this afternoon. Because I've been working really hard with the Hing kosher and they've been helping me a lot in every single day and I'm grateful with them. And the three ones swung on it highly air to deep right field. I've been going back to the corner way back. It is going to be down the line and an other ratio is bullpened. Bang, Zoom goes, K-Bat Ruiz. And what a day he is having. A run scoring double on the third, a two run double on the fifth and a tie breaking lead off home run on the bottom of the seventh. It's the national six and the twins five. K-Bat man, that's a huge game from him. Such a big spot every time he came up there, he had two doubles at home run. Happy for him, happy for us of course. And welcome to Natschad. I'm Al Goldie, host of the Al Goldie podcast. I'm joined by Washington Nationals inside our Mark Sookramit of NatschDernal.com. Mark is at Nationals Park. Were the Nats at last have won a home series in Major League Baseball's 2026 regular season. A seven five win over the Minnesota twins at Nationals Park on Thursday afternoon to win two out of three games in the series and conclude a three and three home stand. So that's now our 18 and 26 and 13 at home versus 12 and 7 on the road. And yes, I did say 18 and 20. The Nats are just two games under 500. This installment of Natschad is brought to us by a great friend of Natschad. Mason Calfys, he is the top legal recruiter in Washington DC. Mason has been with us since our first season. You can reach him at 2024863535. So if you watch this series or if you have been listening to this podcast during the series, hopefully both the series between the Nats and twins in a lot of ways became a battle of catchers. We have the twins number one catcher Ryan Jeffers being very productive in this series. It felt like the Nats could not get that guy out. But the Natsch two catchers ended up being key in the Natsch two wins in the series. The 15 to win over the twins on Wednesday evening drew Millis as the Natsch starting catcher and number eight batter two for four with the two run homer and a double and the seven five win over the twins on Thursday afternoon. Cape Bear Ruiz as the Natsch starting catcher and number eight batter three for four with a solo homer a two run double and an RBI double Ruiz and Millis shades of young gomes and Kurt Suzuki in terms of a dynamic Natsch catching duo mark Millis and Ruiz over the final two games of this series came up so big. Remarkable just remarkable and unexpected. I think Tuesday night I was kind of railing against Cape Eruiz after the first game of the series in which he made five outs on 10 pitches. Not one of them a ball every single one of them was a strike because he at least swung at it or was a called strike for those two to turn it around that way they did the last two games is nothing short of remarkable. You hope it's sustainable. Maybe not to this level but if they can just get anything out of those guys it's a huge plus because we've discussed just how little they've gotten out of their catchers through the season's first six weeks. It does show you like there is something there they obviously both got to this point because they have shown an ability to hit if not at this level at least in the minor leagues before. So to see it come together like that for them I'm sure that's just a huge confidence booster for both of them and I think they probably took some pleasure in the fact that they both did it that it wasn't just one or the other but that they both did it on back to back days. It is funny how baseball can work right I mean the cliche of things being contagious and we know like logically speaking that's not a thing and yet it seemed to be a thing over these last two games it is something though when you look at especially like the lineup for this game Jacob Young in the seven spot Cape Eruiz in the eight spot Nassim Nunez in the nine spot I mean can just one of these guys get going to any degree if you start to get at least some production from the bottom of the order people the offense all of a sudden looks so much better you get you know a lengthier lineup and the onus isn't so much on the James Woods is and CJ Abrams is and you know people like Curtis me and Jose Tena out producing what you know you would reasonably expect them to be doing it just makes a big difference when somebody toward the bottom of the order can produce in the last few games the Nass obviously got that one you saw they scored what all but one of their runs came from the six through eight spots in this game you had four hits of walk a hit by pitch all coming from those guys in the bottom of the order and even Nunez though he didn't get a hit had a sacrifice fly in a sacrifice punt so if you're getting productive at bats from the bottom half of your lineup it does make a difference and you know it's among the reasons that they have been one of the better scoring teams in baseball that I know the individual numbers haven't looked great but they usually have gotten something from different parts of their lineup aside from really this homestand until the last couple of days we hadn't seen it so to get anything especially the catchers I mean they've complemented the improvements they've both made defensively and specifically with pitchframing and they do rank well in that regard and I don't want a short change that because it's been such a problem Mary for such a long time but you can't tell me that that's more valuable than just producing a little bit at the plate and what they have done the last two nights I think is even more valuable than anything that they have or going to do as far as pitchframing is concerned so they both felt it they know they need to be better than this they've both really been working on a lot of things it was just nice to see them have those results and see them smile these are two generally positive upbeat people and I can only imagine how much it's been weighing on their minds as they've struggled really to a level that's beyond even just like bad but like so bad of the point that you wonder can they can they remain big league players or not you know two days not going to save everything for them but look at their OPS's at the start of the series and look where they are now they both raise them like a hundred points of peace. Yeah Miller especially because you know he obviously doesn't have as many played appearances as a release that is funny how that goes so the Nats as a whole just eight runs in four games now 22 runs over the teams last two games right the 15 to win on Wednesday evening this 7-5 win on Thursday afternoon a game in which the Nats did well offensively again seven runs eight hits which were home run three doubles in four singles four walks three for seven with runners in scoring position and Cape at Ruiz was a machine. He is an at starting catcher a number eight batter three for four solo homer two run double RBI double eight total bases for RBI he in the Nats two run third had a first pitch RBI double to right field to cut the Nats deficit to two one Ruiz in the Nats three run fifth had a full count to run double to the right center field gap to put the Nats up for three Ruiz in the Nats two run seventh a lead off home run to right field for a six five Nats lead the Nats needed offense as this game went on and Ruiz kept providing that offense he came into this game with just six extra base hits over 69 played appearances he in this game had three extra base hits over four played appearances go figure and it has been another rough season for him there's no doubt about that his OPS even with what he did on Thursday afternoon is at just 633 his on base percentage is 233 he has one walk over 73 played appearances that is hard to do man one walk over 73 played appearances but on Thursday afternoon he was superb and you know look his reputation is that this is a good guy who wants to do well he just has not done well so to see him do well good for him I was happy for yeah I think everybody was and I think the real key to it at least in the last two at bats the first at bat the double it was on the first pitch but after that he actually worked the count which is I know is a novel concept but this is a guy who as we know will swing at everything he has the ability to put the bat on the ball almost anywhere and that's often to his detriment well in his second at bat he actually takes three balls to start the bat gets ahead in the count three oh eventually it goes to three two and he hits the two run double and then in the last at bat takes three balls fouls off a pitch so he's at three and one and then finally gets a fastball over the middle and did the damage with it and what they've tried to tell him and convey to him and it's not a new message by any means I mean Davey Martinez and Darnel Coles were given him the exact same message the last several years but it was just be more selective look for your pitch especially early in the count if you take a strike on the edges, that's okay. You're probably not going to to hit that ball that well to begin with. If you get it right over the plate, go after it. If not, wait it out. Don't be afraid to swing with two strikes. Well, he showed in this game that if you do wait it out and be a little bit more selective, you can ultimately get a pitch somewhere where you can do real damage. And so to see him actually hit the ball with some force for a change and do that three different time. And these weren't cheapies. They were all legit well struck balls. That's such a breath of fresh air. And you just hope that somewhere in the back was mind. He retains that message and can stick with it and doesn't revert back to the guy who, as I said, in the first game of this series, made five outs on 10 pitches. That's just not going to work, especially when pitchers know you swing it everything. They're not going to give you anything good to hit early in the count. You've got to force them to put it over the plate. Yeah. And by now, I think we've seen enough of K-Bare Ruiz to kind of know that this is who he is. I don't know that he, all of a sudden, blossoms in 2026 when we've been watching him here since 2021 and he kind of is who he is. But it's an interesting scenario here for the Natsa catcher, because they make the trade for Harry Ford. Ford gets demoted to AAA prior to the start of the regular season. He's not doing so well at AAA. So even if he does get called up at some point this season, it's going to be a while because the Natsa going to wait until he starts doing well for AAA. And then he's going to have to keep doing well for AAA for a while. It's not like he's going to have a good week and then they're going to call him up. So at this point, the soonest we would see Harry Ford at the major league level, you're probably talking multiple months into the season. So K-Bare Ruiz is kind of here. Like he's one of the guys. It's him and Drew Millis. I brought up Riley Adams. Maybe Adams at some point replaces Millis. But Ruiz would seem to be actually in a bizarre way, fairly safe as one of the Nats top two catchers for the immediate future. Now long term, different conversation, but like a month from now, two months from now, he probably still will be one of the top two catchers for the Nats in terms of guys getting regular playing time at the major league level. - Yeah, agreed. If Harry Ford was batting like 250 at AAA, he would have been up here already. That's how bad the others have been. Not that they want to rush forward at all, but he hasn't done his job until he has not pressed that issue at all. And I wonder if deep down maybe one of the issues is that for several years now, is that Ruiz with the contract has just felt secure. And so I'm not saying he's doing it intentionally, but subconsciously, you know your set. You know that there isn't anybody else that's about to force you out of that job. And so you can get kind of relaxed out there. And I hope, and it's a delicate thing to do, but I hope somebody has conveyed to him like, hey, just because you've been here the last several years, doesn't mean you're guaranteed to be here through the remainder of that contract. At some point you do have to produce, we did go out and acquire somebody that clearly they believe is going to be a long-term solution for them, even if he's not here yet. You don't go and trade a controllable young reliever like Jose Ferrer for Harry Ford, unless you are really certain that Ford is going to be your guy in the long term. So if you're Ruiz, I think you do have to maybe feel some pressure and use that in a good way to say, I'm not as secure as I probably think I should be or that I have been in the past. Well, I better start producing or else my job may be in trouble no matter how much money I make. I'm not sure he's felt that up to this point and maybe he's feeling it now, maybe he's not. But if there's any that going on through his head, I think he could channel that actually into a good thing. - Yeah, and some people respond well to that kind of thing. I mean, it is funny though, when we talk about the contract, I mean, it's what, eight years, 50 million, right? I mean, it's a little more than six million a year. I mean, it's not some burdensome contract and most teams would eat that contract if the guy was really struggling. We know things here are a little different. The other thing too, and we talked about this when the Nats traded for Ford, but with most teams now going with two catchers playing regularly, there still would be room for Kate Bitt Ruiz if he did develop into the player who the Nats acquired him to be. So like, Harry Ford could be the number one catcher, Kate Bitt Ruiz could be the one B catcher. Like, you'll find room to play both guys. You can designate, hit one of the guys. The Baltimore Orioles for all of their problems right now have two catchers who are producing at a very high level and Adley Rutchman and some well-besyle. The O's are finding plenty of plate appearances for both guys, one guy catches the other guy, D.H. So, you know, if you're Kate Bitt Ruiz, it's like, okay, they got Harry Ford. I don't know how you interpret that in any way other than they want Ford to be the guy for the future, but there's still an opportunity for me. I just have to earn my time here moving forward more so than maybe I previously had to. - Yeah, you started the show by mentioning Kurt Suzuki and Jan Gomes. Those two guys split the job essentially 50/50. That year and the numbers were great. And then that's happily took everything they could get from them. And I probably kept both of them fresh and they were both veterans. That point they probably needed it a little bit more than maybe the younger guys would. But I think Blake P. Tara just for what I gather, even if they had a guy who was so clearly the number one catcher, I don't think they would do the Davey Martinez approach and catch him 120, 125, 30 games. I think they believe that that's a position that needs regular rest. And so maybe there'd be a few more catching back to back whereas like this year it's basically been every other day. They've alternated aside from once or twice, it's just been every other game with Ruiz and Millis. So you're right. Even when Harry Ford comes up here whoever is joining him at that point is probably going to catch close to 50% of the games at worst 40% of the games. They're still going to be opportunity for that person to make a difference. (upbeat music) Are you a law firm partner or associate stuck on an underperforming team while your competitors are passing you by? Is your law firm still living in 2019 and pretending everything is okay? Meanwhile, the whole firm is having the same bad luck as Josiah Gray is having. Unlike James Wood, you've got options and you don't have to stay on a 60 win roster. Long time that's Chad Sponsor. Mason Calfys is the best legal recruiter in the DC market. Mason and his team at Zenith Legal Specialize in placing partners, associates, and senior government lawyers at top firms in Washington DC and across the country. Mason and his team have placed attorneys and more than half of the Amblau 100. And while you might be reading doom and gloom in the legal press, the reality is that many practices are red hot, antitrust, private equity, and real estate among others. Plus, Zenith Legal has something that no other legal recruiting firm offers a proprietary app that lets you track exactly where you've been submitted and helps Mason's team match you with the right opportunity faster and more precisely. You can make a smart move right now, make a call to the bullpen. Mason Calfys will hope you find and negotiate a better deal for your career and future. Call Mason today, 202-486-3535. That's 202-486-3535. And the pitch. Swinging a line, driving a right field. That's gonna be a base hit. Wood waited for it to drop. Now comes down the line to score. The second is Lyle, he'll stop there. Right, Phillip Alpin, feeling on a hop and then stumbling to his knees, but no further advance for the runners. Curtis Me comes through with a base hit to right and drives in his 15th run of the year, a second of the game. And the nationals have played it two year in the bottom of inning number seven. It's now Washington seven. That's Minnesota five. Few other notes with the Nats off fans in this game. Curtis Mead, again productive when called upon. He was in that starting first baseman and number three batter one for four. RBI single also got an RBI via a Fielder's choice grounder, but Mead and that Nats two run seventh. One out opposite field RBI single to right field on a one two pitch for a seven five Nats lead. Mead over 94 played appearances OPS 758. Nats game for James Wood. He is in that starting right field or a number one batter, one for two with a double and two walks also got credited with an outfield assist his OPS now back into the 900s at nine oh eight. I tell you one of the really nice things about this Nats offense is the pension for scoring runs as games go on. And it's not just one of these deals where the Nats score early and if they don't score early, they're done like this season. We have seen this team score in a variety of innings and so often we have seen the team score in the latter innings and to see the two runs in the bottom of the seventh, you know, we go into that half inning with the game tied at five and then that's come through with those two runs like we've seen that a good bit from this offense this season and that has been really nice. Yeah, I think back to several years now where you could tell two innings in is it gonna be a good night or a bad night for them. And I don't feel like that's been the case, you know, they were shut down the first two innings this game. They still score seven runs on Wednesday night. They're literally shut down nine up nine down for three innings by Bailey Ober and they end up scoring 15 runs the end of the night. So that is a good sign of some progress where they are making the adjustments, figuring things out the second time through and certainly figuring things out against opposing teams, relievers it, but only a few exceptions. I feel like they've done a pretty good job against opposing bullpen's this year and it's not necessarily a case of oh, once the other team gets to their top guys in the seventh, eighth and ninth game over, that hasn't really been the issue. They've still had productive at bats and in often cases done better in the late innings and that's a nice trend to see it shows. I think the matchups that butares trying to create with his lineups where you're trying to balance out the lefties and the righties, the willingness to bring in guys off the bench to pinch hit late in games and just some mature approaches and some knowledge these guys have picked up along the way that if they see something, into the first time up or second time up, they're now applying that the third fourth time up. Well, the NASDAWing pitcher in the 7-5 win over the twins at Nationals Park on Thursday afternoon was Jake Irvin. He allowed four runs in five innings. He gave up eight hits, which were a home run, two doubles and five singles. He did suffer from some bad luck. Some of the singles were a result of weak contact. He issued a walk and a hit by pitch. He recorded just two strikeouts. That was unfortunate. Irvin, as we have discussed, has been doing much better in terms of generating strikeouts, but just two strikeouts in this game. And what's interesting is that he threw a lot of strikes, threw a lot of pitches, threw a lot of strikes. Five innings, 92 pitches, but 63 strikes, just 29 balls. But the twins fouled off 24 of Irvin's pitches. So a lot of the strikes were foul balls. Irvin was not putting guys away. His outing ended in a bad way. Irvin's outing ended by him giving up a lead off homer by Ryan Jeffers to left field in the top of the six to cut the NASDAW 5-4 of the homer win. The projected 432 feet per stat cast. And this to me is key. Irvin could have allowed more than four runs. He benefited from two big outs on the base pass. Center filled a Jacob Young throughout Cody Clemens at home for an 8-2 double play to end the twins two run second. And Austin Martin got tagged down in a run down between third base and home played on, guess who, Ryan Jeffers, a two out opposite field double to right field on an 0-2 pitch to end the top of the third. What did you think about how Jacob Irvin did in this game? Yeah, I want to get to the defense later. But Irvin, this is a weird start, I think, for him. You had, I think there were three of the hits he gave up had an exit velocity of 70 miles an hour or less. So there was some weird fluke-ish stuff. On top of that, there's two ground ball singles that were just hit in the right spot because they had the infield shifted around. And so there was some bad luck. But as you pointed out, he just could not put hitters away. But he'd get to two strikes. And then the next thing you know, it's another three, four, five pitches before they had bad as over. You said 24 foul balls. 20 of them came in the first three innings. That's a ton of foul balls. And yes, you can give some credit to the twin-sitters for doing that. But I think that's also a sign that maybe the stuff wasn't crisp enough to induce more swings and misses. Something that Jacob Irvin has been better at this year at getting swings and misses and strikeouts. And he just did not have that in this game. So he was kind of fortunate to get to that point without more damage inflicted against him. He starts the sixth inning. I get it. It's a right-handed hitter. There's left. He's coming next. So you're going to wait to make the move and let him face one batter. But I don't know. Letting him face Jeffers who had been good all series, like you said, just because of the righty, righty matchup, that almost felt like a foregone conclusion that it wasn't going to go well. And it really didn't go well because it was a lead off homer. And then it went ahead and made the move. So not Irvin's best. He did benefit from some help behind him. Yes, there was some bad luck. His final pitch on that home run was 88.1 miles an hour. That's not good. And it was trending down in that direction over the course of the afternoon. I think that's a case where you forget about the matchup. You say, he gave us five. You got through it. It wasn't real pretty. Let's just go to the bullpen. No matter if it's lefty or righty. Yeah. And for all of the discussion we have had about Irvin in noting some of the improvement, look at his numbers here. Eight games all starts, ERA 522. I mean, his ERA is over 5. Whip of 136. The strikeouts do remain up. That's good. But like we said in this game, the strikeouts were back to being down. So regarding the defense, terrific outfield assist by Jake Young. Irvin ready inside target Ruiz. The 2-2 delivery. So we have a fly ball center field moving in on his Jacob Young. He's closing. He gets there. He makes the catch. He tries to score. Youngster of the plate is there. The tag is in time. He is out. And it's a double play. And then on the other play, James Wood got credited for the assist. But that was a really smart play to induce the rundown between third base and home play. That was an impressive play by the Nats there. Now the pitch hit in the air toward the right field line. It's troubled. It's down for a base. Wood feels the ball falling into foul ground. Fires are thrown along the first base line. Marked around third slips. Now he breaks to the plate. The throw to house running in toward the plate. The throw to Ruiz running him back toward third. Now flip the ball to Abrams chasing him back toward the plate. And he tags him out to end the inning. Yeah. If you were scoring at home, I know many of you do. That was officially 9-4-5-2-6. And I want to focus on the 4 in that. That's not seen in Nunez as the relay man. James Wood did a good job getting the ball, getting it into him. What Nunez did, your instinct in that spot is to throw it to the ball. The plate, thinking you're going to have a plate, the plate, or at worst, you throw to the plate and the runner stops and you've held him at third. What he realized in that split second is that the runner had gone too far around third and was caught now in No Man's Land. By actually throwing behind him, instead of throwing to the plate, they were able to get him in the run down and ultimately tag him out. I think that's a really heads up play by Nunez in that spot. Yeah, they probably hold him to third regardless. By throwing behind him, it actually created the run down situation where you could tag him out and help Irving get out of that inning. The other one, just a great throw from Jacob Young. We don't talk about his arm as much. It's all about his range in center field. I think he's gotten better and better with his arm. Yeah, it was shallow center field, but he lined himself up well and he put it on a dime to re-whease to put the tag down. And then that inning, very nice to see good quality defense from a team as we've discussed, has not always played such clean defense so far this season. I'll call the here to tell you about window nations by 4get4free sale. But before that, the window nation look into the future to to pitch and Cruz lifts it into left center field. And this one's going to be a problem. It's down for a base set. Franklin comes in and scores. Ford gets the stop sign at third and Cruz is in the second with an RBI double. Window nation has a great offer for listers of the Natschat podcast. The buy forget4free 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 ends soon. So call 8669DNation or visit windownation.com now to book a consultation. And tell window nation that you want the deal that you heard about from Algoldi on the Natschat podcast. Big pitch here for Rebalto. He comes in, he kicks, he delivers the picks, swung on and missed, struck him out with a slider and pounds that right hand and fist into his glove as he heads from the nationals dug out of the first base side. Big moment delivered Orlando Rebalto ending the top of the sixth inning. Good relief pitching from the Nats in this win over the twins on Thursday afternoon. Ford Nats relievers combined to allow one run in four innings. Richard Love Lady tossed two thirds of a scoreless and hitless inning. Though he in the top of the six face five batters got just two outs. He issued two walks and to hit by pitch. He threw 16 pitches just seven strikes nine balls or Landel Rebalto. He officially allowed one run in one inning off giving up a two out opposite field double by Ryan Jeffers. There's that name again. This double was in Tendell man's land and right field on an O2 pitch in the twins one run seventh. But Rebalto began his outing by getting a big out came into the game. Top of the six bases loaded two outs. That's up by four Rebalto generated a full count swinging strike out of the twins number one batter byron Buckston for the third out PJ Poole and officially tossed a scoreless inning with two swinging strikeouts. He to the first batter he face gave up a two out full count RBI double by X Nat Josh Bell off the left field warning track to tie the game at five in the top of the seventh. And then Gus Varlin very impressive one in a third scoreless innings with two swinging strikeouts for a four out save you know each of five different relievers has at least one save for the Nats in this regular season. But your saves leader your role aides leader and saves for the Nats if I can channel that from back in the day. That's Varlin four for six on saves and his strikeout to walk ratio 16 strikeouts three walks in 14 and two thirds innings he was pumping strikes in this game throwing hard. Varlin is showing some things here and he looked especially good in this game. How do you spell relief L V A R L A N D? That's how you spell it. He's been fantastic for them and unexpected spot. Nobody had him leading the team in saves. I don't believe coming into the season and he has become kind of their lockdown primary guy especially with Clayton Beater on the I L still that's a Minnesota native so that was nice for him to get that against his hometown team. I also want to mention Rebalt that that was a huge strikeout a huge spot to put him in to face Byron Buckston a elite lead off hitter for the twins comes into the bases load in what's a really tight game at that point strikes him out on a three two slider at the knees that was a good big time at bat and a great moment for Rebalt who we haven't seen a lot of him but I'm seeing better stuff from him than we had in the past. He ends up giving up the run but that double by Jeffers that last double was just a cue shot off the end of the bat. Nothing he could do about it and then it was PJ Poon who allowed the runner to score you know the inherited runner. So Rebalt a really good and a big spot there and then Varlin he's been money for them at the end of games. I don't know if that's going to last but ride the hot hand while you've got it. It's been nice to see. I just looked this up the role aides relief man award existed from 1976 to 2012 I didn't realize the award went into the 2010s but it I feel better about it now. I wish it was still around. That was such a staple of our childhoods. - Oh, yeah. I can picture the commercial in my head and the sound of the jingle that went with it. - But you can get relief with roll aids. Roll aids spells relief. - I do remember it's still had been around since I've been covering the sports. It's not just with me as a kid. I don't know who sponsors it right now if there is a sponsor for the. I mean, there is a relief man of the year. Oh, you know what they change it? If there's a Trevor Hoffman award at a Mariana Rivera Hoffman for the NL Reliever Rivera for the AAL Reliever. Let's give it back to roll aids. Come on. - Yeah, let's make some money off this MOP. Like, come on, learn from the NFL. You gotta monetize every little thing you got. All right, so the Nats get the series win. First home series win of the regular season and now comes a six game road trip beginning with a three game series at the Miami Marlins. Dozens will be in attendance. So the Nats have listed the following starting pictures as probable for the series. Game one Friday night 710, Foster Griffin, Game two Saturday afternoon 410, Zach Letel, and Game three Sunday afternoon at 1215, a Peacock game, Cade Cavali. So Griffin Letel Cavali. This will be interesting to see how the Nats do here. The Marlins are not having a good season. No surprise there. And Foster Griffin, as we have discussed, has been the Nats best starting pitcher and other opportunity for him. Come Friday night in Miami. - Yeah, I think it's actually really intriguing matchup for that opener Griffin, of course, how good he's been. And the Marlins are sending a rookie out there. A top prospect, Robbie Snelling a left hander who's gonna make his major league debut. He has been like a top 50 prospect. I think the last couple of seasons. So I'm really curious to see just how he looks and how the Nats face him. And then the Sunday finale, Cade Cavali and Sandial Contra. And I know he's not peak Sandial Contra from a few years ago, but that's still a big name. And we know how good the stuff can be. So for those of you who have forked over the money for peacock or we'll get to this over the weekend. You can also watch that game on NBCSN. Most cable systems have that channel. They are simulcasting most of the peacock games. So you don't necessarily have to get the streaming option for that, but it'll be the first game of the season that is not televised by Nationals TV. And it's a pretty good pitching matchup, potentially Cavali and Al Contra. - Yeah, absolutely. Looking forward to that. A shout out, a happy birthday dad from Evan and Aiden. All three listen to Nats chat every day and the podcast is a big connective tissue for the family while the sons are both away at college. Well, we appreciate that very much. And we say happy birthday. And thank you for listening to the Nats chat podcast. By the way, the morelins are in the midst of a three game series against the Baltimore Orioles. Game three is Thursday evening. The official attendance for games one and two of the series. Tuesday evening, 6,600 Wednesday evening, 6,600 seven. When we joke about dozens will be in attendance for Nats morelins, like it really isn't that much of a joke. These attendance figures are pathetic. And this is nothing new. I get that. But you know, I know there's been some conversation about attendance in Nationals Park being down and it is down, but you're still looking at some fairly healthy attendance figures for the Nats from a standpoint of like 17,000 plus on Wednesday evening. This game on Thursday afternoon, not as good about 13,500. But like, man, it never ceases to amaze me how horrible. The attendance numbers in Miami are and it doesn't seem to ever change. And you know, you look at like what we have right now. And you're talking about 6,000 in attendance for an M.O.B game. That is just incredible to me. Must've been a bobblehead night for them to get that many. There, I don't know. Yeah, it's not good. I've covered as we've discussed way too many games there. I have still yet to see a single fan seated in the upper deck at Marlon's Park or whatever it's called, Lone Depot Park now. And I know the teams haven't been good, but I mean, there have been years where they've been competitive. They've made the wild card round a couple of times and it just does not generate the interest there. Whatever good will they've occasionally built up there in their history has not been sustained. And it's a word of caution. It's a very different market than DC, of course. So I don't want to make too many comparisons here. But I think one of the chief complaints and one of the biggest reasons why they have not been able to stay in anything there from a fan standpoint is that in spite of the fact that they do often have very good young players, homegrown players, they typically get traded before ever even hitting free agency. And yes, the team doesn't win with them, but they don't commit to anybody in the long run. Even when they gave John Carlos Stanton a 13 year extension years ago, everybody knew he wasn't going to make it through the whole thing. And they wanted to trading him to the Yankees. It's really hard to develop longstanding relationships with your fans if you aren't retaining your own players and showing that you're also making that long-term connection. And I think it is a word of caution for the nationals right now. We're a few years away from this all coming up. But if the new administration, even if they're successful in the new way they're going about it, if they think they can just be the Tampa Bay race, and that means they can trade James Wood and CJA Abrams and who knows who else when they have multiple years left before becoming free agents. You may win games, but it's going to be hard to establish a good, continuous, successful fan base when you have that kind of player movement. Fans want somebody to latch onto that they know is their own guy. And especially having already been through this with the previous generation of the star players who didn't stay here long-term, I really hope, I know it's an ownership issue, but I also hope from the front office standpoint, they recognize that and push as much as they can to try to retain players in the long run, because that's how you establish connections with fans and maintain good crowds. If you're constantly turning over that roster, even if you're win games, it's hard to draw well. I think Tampa Bay is a good example of that. And certainly Miami has shown that they can't draw at all when they don't win or retain their players. Yeah, winning draws, but stars draw to the Marlins at one point head as they're starting outfield. Stanton, Yelich, Ozuna. Yeah, it's funny to look back on that and see what happened with all three guys. This installment of "Natchchat" brought to us by Mason Califist, top legal recruiter in Washington, DC. It's been with us since our first season. You can reach them at 2024863535 on "Natchtals Radio Highlights" on "Natchchat" or courtesy of 1067, the fan for Mark Cercerman, Amal Goli. Thank you for listening and we'll talk to you next time on the "Natchchat" podcast. Presenting the 1983 National League Rollade Relief Band of the Year award is Mel Good, Senior Vice President of Warner Lambert, Maker Rollade. Rollade never forgets what relief means. That's why we're so proud to recognize the league's top relief pitcher with this award. This year in the National League, Rollade's felt relief, Al Hollen. Thanks, Mel. And thanks for relief. For men and future guys, I'm going to spell my name, R-O-L-A-I-G-S. That is great to know Rollade. I appreciate that relief pitcher.