Live Q&As

Yes, I agree.

I'll put some offensive stats in a post later. But RGIII's passing __by early measure__ is No. 1-2-or-3 in the league for completion percentage, avg-yards-per-attempt, etc. And the rushing offense is No. 1, just ahead of the 49ers.

However, let me start by saying that Pro-Football reference.com has a nice stat for measuring team strength called Simple Rating System. It includes strength of schedule. You can use it yo predict future games. If you use it with hindsight, it would "predict" that the Skins would be 3-4 now, as they are.

If you look at it for future games, it sees lots of very close games. But it also has the Skins fin ishing 10-6!

I'll give more later.

I thought the Skins public reaction was a total cop-out. Paraphrase: He was double-covered, but they 'made a play.' In other words, don't blame the coaches 'cause we had him "double covered," so what else can we do? But don't blame the players because it was just a great play by the Giants.

Give me a break.

Who won the Super Bowl last season? The Giants.

Who was the Giants receiving leader in receptions (82), yards (1536) and touchdowns (9)? Answer: Victory Cruz.

Was anybody CLOSE to Cruz in receiving yardage for the Giants either last year or this year? Answer: NO! This season, BEFORE the 77-yard TD catch, Cruz had more TD catches (6) than ALL the other Giants receivers COMBINED (5).

Is Cruz known to catch long TD passes. Lets see, he had one of 99 yards last year. THAT'S PRETTY LONG! He already had one this year of 80.

So, with less than two minutes to play and a 23-20 lead, the Redskins have to stop ONE PLAYER before they stop anybody else: Victor Cruz. He's their No. 1 responsibility.

The Giants did NOT make a "great play." Cruz ran free. He just sprinted down the field. Eli did not hit him perfectly in stride. The ball had a tad underthrown. Fine pass. Not knocking it. But Cruz had to reach back, not out in front of him. He was so open that he didn't even have to break stride to adjust to the ball. 

So, the Giants made a correct "read" __as ESPN showed this morning. And they made a good offensive play.

The Redskins made a horrible "that-can't-happen" play to lose the game. That is one of the worst "WTF!!!" game-losing long-pass plays in the last two minutes that I've seen in 50+ years of Redskins games. Yes, there have been plenty of them. But it's got to be in the Bottom 10 worst-bombs allowed. Second and 8. Hey, lets just throw a bomb down the middle and maybe our best receiver can just get open deep for an untouched 77-yard score.  

It's not a play you shrug off with "they won it."

I understand: The Redskins were weak at safety before they had injuries and a full-season drug suspension. But that is all the MORE reason that you don't let Cruz BEHIND you.

Maybe the Skins are just so banged up and weak-to-begin-with in the secondary that they have to play "tendencies" and hope they don't get caught wrong, as they were by Cruz. I sympathize.

But there is ONE WAY you don't lose in that situation __getting beat over the top by a receiver who had 1500 yards last year, is on a 1400+ paace this year and has almost as much yardage this year as the next TWO Giants combined.

What does it remind me of? What is the worst way to lose a winner-take-all post-season game in MLB? I guess my answer would be: walk eight men, seven of whom contribute to five free runs for the other team and cap it off by walking the potential tying and winning runs in the 9th inning.

The Skins need to stop watching the Nats.

Texas, to me, was worst because they lost three in a row to Oakland to blow the AL West, then lost to the Orioles in Texas in the WC/WC. That's a four-way parley. And they had the experience of being in the last two World Series and a veteran lineup.

I guess the Reds take 2nd place for losing three in a row, all AT HOME to blow their DS. I think you get more discredit for losing a streak of game than for any one blown game.

But give the Nats credit. That was a very bad blown game. The more I look for past comparables, the more it stands out. Though it's far from unique in post-season. (It's unique among the 82 winner-take-all post season games. There have been no other blown 6-run leads.)

A couple of disasters, for much higher stakes, so they'll be remembered a lot longer: In the '02 World Series, the Giants led the Angels 5-0 going to the bottom of the 7th. That's the famous game where Dusty Baker (who's waved in a reliver) calls starting pitcher Russ Ortiz back to the mound so he can give him the ball for his trophy case because he'll be the winning pitcher in the Series. The Angels' David Eckstein (brother of Nats hitting coach Rick) sees it and goes crazy on the bench: Look what they just did! Angels come back to win 6-5, then win Game 7, 4-1.

Also, in Game 4 of the '96 World Series, the Braves led 2-games-to-1 and had a 6-0 lead in the 5th inning with Denny Neagle (16-9, 3.50) pitching. Atlanta, which started the Series with two wins IN NYC loses the last four in a row.

Yes, there's Game 4 of the '94 Series when the Phils led Toronto 12-7 in the eighth __hey, that's worse than blowing 7-5 in the 9th, isn't it...well, maybe?__ then Mitch Williams torched the joint, the Jays won 15-14 and went on the win the Series. If they'd held the lead, it would have been 2-2 in games.

Anyway, there are worse blown leads than 6-0 in the 3rd, like the Nats. Tampa Bay blew a 7-0 lead in the bottom of the seventh in Game 5 of the '08 ALCS and lost 8-7. BUT they won the whole ALCS and went to the Series.

So, the Nats loss is "not so bad after all," is not the way I'm leaning. But maybe part of that is because maybe they would be in Game 7 of the NLCS TONIGHT at Nationals Park vs the Giants to see who goes to the Series.

Come on, hard not to have that in mind tonite4. You can bet plenty of Nats will if they can bring themselves to watch.

This is too negative! Lets have some balance here! positives

Noi. The Cards were not going to PH that early in the game even though they were behind.

The Kozma-Storen matchup was based on Storen's amazing <.160 batting-average-against RH hitters. He eats them alive, as well as almost any pitcher in baseball. Davey said (last week) that he didn't want to walk the bases full and risk walking in the winning run. What he didn't say is that a .167 pitcher vs a rookie hitter ought to be an overmatch.

It wasn't. 

The Nats glass is WAY more than half full. They just won the NL East and led MLB in wins! Are ya kiddin'? Just teasing. The Nats didn't handle the BIG pressure of a winner-take-all game well at all. Though they stood up to an elimination game just fine. That's the usual progression. It's easier to play well when you are desperate. "Gotta win, gotta focus." But the double-edged win-or-lose with everything in the balance is a much tougher psychological problem. On a small scale, it's like the way you see EVERY good basketball team that EVER fell behind by 20 points suddenly "get hot" and cut the lead to five. That's "desperattion focusing the mind." But once you can win OR lose, you tend to tighten up again. There's no question several Nats tightened up. But you knew that was going to happen at some point __or I did. I certainly mentioned it enough in these chats. It was VERY important for them not to have their problem on a BIG scale, like not winning the NL East. That would have doner lasting damage to some players, I suspect. Maybe not. But that's a huge blow. Because they had such a great win in Game Four, I doubt Game Five will have much carryover effect __except to make them more determined.

As for the Redskins, if you put an 8-8 tyeam around RGIII, he will make it a 10-6, 1-5 or 12-4 team. I don't know which. But his value is enromous. After the New Orleans wins, everyb ody went pretty crazy but I think I was one of the crazier, writing that RGIII would be the most important Skins player since Sammy Baugh.

A few times I wondered if I'd lost my mind. But you have to type what you think. When you're wrong, just say you're wrong. Well, after those three plays in a row yesterday __the 4th-down scramble pass, the run down the right sideline and the beautiful "touch bomb" to Moss for the go-ahead TD, you gotta cross your fingers for old Sammy B. In a couple of years (or months), how good is Griffin going to be?

Okay, so we can be optimistic, let me explain the Simple Rating System __yeah, it's called "simple" because it's not physics. But Pro-Football reference is part of the same site as the great Baseball-reference.com.

The SRS incorporates won-lost record, point differential and strength of schedule (I believe). The best SRS is the Bears at 15.4, but that's suspect because they've only played five games. The more data, the more reliable (or the less unreliable). Next is  S.F. at 11.3 __meaning that all other things being equal, they are 11.3 points better than an average team on a neutral field. The Texans are second at 11.2.

The Skins are +2.1. Next week, they play the Steelers who have played a very weak schedule (-4.3 to the Skins +1.7). The Steelers SRS is -2.2. The game is at Pittsburgh. So, if you want, give the Steelers 3 pts for that. Add it all up: Skins SRS +2.1, Steelers SRS -2.2 and Skins +3 for home field = +1.3 pts.

Obviously, this is a guesstimate. I don't endorse it in any sense except to get a very broad brush pitcure of how the Skins might do against the rest of their schedule. I won't give the exact numbers because it seems to imply I think they mean something! But the Skins would favorites over Pittsburgh, Carolina, Phila (home), Balt (home), at Cleveland, at Phila (!!??) and Dallas home. They'd be underdogs at Dallas and vs Giants at home.

If the Skins lost 30-0 next week, all this would be blown sky high and SRS would probably say they finish 6-10, not 10-6.

But I wanted to make you feel good.

The $36M cap hit really hurts the Skins ability to put a solid team around RGIII this year AND next year. And the injuries just get more and more brutal. People keep going down and nobody is coming back __not Garcon so far, that's for sure. Glad that Cooley gets another shot. But teams will be able to game plan better for the Skins in the weeks after an in jury because they know the weakened points to attack.

But RGIII __whose completion % is now 70.4 (!!!) and whose QB ratiung is 101.8, not even counting his 468 yards rushing (a pace for 1,070!)__ has just been insanely good so far. His three intercep[tions in  189 passes is very good. Because the Skins run options, and because RGIII has coughed up the ball when clobbered a couple of times, he does have 7 fumbles (three of which he recovered).

RGIII BY HIMSELF constitutes a half-full glass. What can you add to him? Right now, the Skins defense is as bad as its offense is good. And, imo, RGIII is m aking the skill players look far better than they would with any of the last 136 Skins quarterbacks.

Griffin did throw a very easy Int yesterday. And he lost a fumble. So, for the sake of not going too far over the moon, there is that. And when he's hit in the pocket he's not big enough to rip away from tacklers like some 6-5, 240-pound QBs. If you get to him before he can use his speed, he can be sacked. But he reads defenses so well that few teams want to blitz him. Who was the last rookie you could say that about.

But, please, if he stays healthy __knock on wood, head, everything else__ this guy has a chance to be historic. His numbers right now are neck and neck with Rodgers  P Manning foir best in the league __and that's just in passing efficiency, not rushing.

Wow! Nice dig. I'd forgotten it was 7-5 when the fans stormed the field with two outs in the top of the ninth. My dad and I were in the third base stands. No, I didn't run on the field. Hondo hit a homer. Because the Yankees were given the win by forfeit there were no winning or losing pitchers. So Dick Bosman lost a "W."

I'm not sure about what the official "final score" is. Baseball-reference lists it as 7-5 Nats, but with an asterisk for the forfeit. I'll look at your Povich link later. Thanks.

This is the Nats biggest issue, by far. Bigger than any free agent signing. This is a generally weak free agent class, imo. Those who are good have some serious odinjury, age or makeup issues. Aside from Josh hamilton, LaRoche is the best LHed power bat. He sure picked the best possible year to be slightly above his previous best __but not out of line with his career norms. Per 162 games, LaRoche has averaged 27 homers and 93 RBI for his career. But nobody except Cal Jr actually plays 162 every year. So, it's lower. But LaRoche hit .271 with an .853 OPS this year and his career numbers are .268 and .820.

This is really a tough call. He and the nats really like eachother. His defense helps everybody. His LHed bat gives balance to a lineup that needs it. OTOH, a lot of the Nats RH hitters don't have much troulke hitting RHed pitching. So the "lefty power bat" angle isn't as big as it seems. But it's big to Davey. Lots of rival teams said the Nats were tough because of their L-R balance in both pitching and hitting.

The Nats have exclussive negotiating rights with him until 5 days after the World Series. That's the time frame in which they really need to try to get this done if they seriously want him. Once you're "free" and in demand, few players end up coming back to their old teams. Yes, you can spend the LaRoche Money in some other way. But he certainly is a good fit, probably for at least two years. His best "comparisons" are to LH hitters with similar numbers at 32 who aged well, like Paul O'Neill and Tino Martinez. B ut there are a lot that didn't age well or still hit when they were healthy, but didn't stay healthy.

The only LH power bat in the farm system is Skole (3rd baseman) __minor league Nat player of year. But that requires a LOT of extrapolating.

OTOH, there are a ton of pretty good free agent pitchers who couldadd length to Strasburg, Z'mann, Gio, Detwiler. A few (in no order): Peavy, Dempster, Greinke, Lohse, Marcum, Saunders, Ervin Santana, EJackson, Correia, Harden, Kuroda, McCarthy. And a dozen more. Peavy will get mentioned with the Nats. I kind of like Dempster as a fit. Doubt thyey'll go hard after Greinke. We'll see. Way too early to know.

Davey will be the manager next year. This isn't "news." It's common sense. Everybody wants it to happen. But I will say that the Nats tend to make many decisions more slowly than they should. OTOH, if they acted quickly, maybe they'd have extended Riggleman and they wouldn't have Davey. Ah, irony. Right now Jim Leyland doesn't have a contract for '13 and he's in the World Series.

This will get done. Relax. But the sooner really would be the better.   

I watched the play in real time. It's a good rule. And it's good to make it clear cut. If you step out, you're out for the rest of the play, no matter whether you were pushed or did it on your own.

Hamilton is fascinating __in the abstract. In reality, you have an exceptionally close clubhouse that has grown together and will get better together. (The Nats have "characters." They aren't bland.) When I saw Hamilton's dropped fly in center and his fuss with Ron Washington in the last loss to Oakland, my gut feeling was, "I wouldn't  touch that guy with a 100-foot pole."

I'll cut the length of that pole down to 10 feet. But it would still be a mighty long pole.

The Nats afford to subtract Jackson, Lannan and Wang, too. You need at least 7 starting pitchers, and some say eight, so that you end up with five as the season goes along and you almost alwsays have injuries.

Next year, the Nats lineup may have less injuries, but maybe the rotation has more. You absolutely can't count on 150 starts from your top five pitchers __as the Nats got this year. The Nats shouldn't think of themselves as a 98-win team __that's too aggressive. You need more margin of error in your planning. They need to come to camp with two established starting pitchers in addition to SS, GG, JZ and RD. If one of them is Jackson, okay. They should remember hos essential the Lannan insurance policy was. In a more normal season, you might have seen Lannan for 20+ starts.

Morse doesn't get the respect he deserves because he looks like a wild swinger and doesn't walk much. But he keeps hitting (.294 in 4 yrs in DC). You can't get full value for him, imo. Also, the Nats love Moore. But, again, he only has limited ABs at AAA (but 10 HR in no time) and limited ABs in MLB (but 10 HR in no time).

Throw Rendon into the mix at some point. It's a complex puzzle. But a very nice one. The Nats depth almost everywhere (with Alex Meyer, the RH pitcher in the wings, too) and compare it to a rebuilding team like the Skins who cover their eyes after every injury. Amazing that, three years ago, the Nats were far lower __in every respect__ than the Skins are now. Things can change fast. 

They were weak when they were at full health.

My son and I, and a few friends, watched the game yesterday. Someone said, "Watch how easily Eli reads the Redskins defense. He just looks for 'No. 23.'"

The Skins have allowed 2299 passing yards __that makes them the worst by 269 yards! IOW, they have given up a full EXTRA GAME worth of passing yardage over the NEXT WORST team.

In the same number of games, they have given up more than a THOUSAND more passing yards than the 49ers. And the Skins also are tied for the NFL lead in most TD passes allowed.

BUT they are only third worst in total defense! To be fair, four teams have given up more point-per-game than the Skins and the defense has also scored some points. More important, the Skins rank FIFTH in the NFL in takeaways (16). That makes up for a lot of yardage sins.

But it doesn't make up for letting Victor Cruz get BEHIND you in the last two minutes from 77 yards out... Don't get me going again.

McCatty went out. I think before the Descalso at bats.

I'll have to double check that. Because Descalso hit the first pitch to tie the game. And you always assume the visit was to remind the pitcher that "Babe Ruth is dead. Throw strikes." 

We all know the answers. Skins have a bad defense. Injuries are part of it. But they have an amazing offense thanks to one player. Some of us grew up on this with Sonny J. It's very exciting. It's a heckuva lot better than what we've been watching in most of the last 20 years when, every couple of years, I have to write a different version of the column that say, "The Redskins have one of the three lowest-scoring offenses in the NFL in the last 18 years."

Everybody throws up their hands and says, "I didn't know we were that bad. Are you sure?"

Once you have a frame of reference for just how bad something really is, then it annoys you even more. At least that problem is solved. Only one thing will be remembered about the Redskins this year: A player who might become one of the greatest of his generation came into the NFL. How good was he? How fast did he get even better? What is his ceiling? Was he used properly so that the Skins had at least a chance of keeping him intact until they could put a team around him?

Bad call. It was a "leg tap."

I suspect that line has been used before. But it never gets old.

However, Hall does __get old, that is. He's still a "play maker." How long does one counter-balance the other? 

ALL season the two "sleeping giants" in baseball were the Tigers, because of their obvious talent and the addition of Fielder, and the Cards, because their run differential was so much better than their record and their experience could make them tough in September and October.

Well, they both woke up.

We could have two 88-win teams in the World Series. That would mean that two teams that tied for 11th __eleventh__ in wins in the regular season will play for the title.

If the Nats were a team from 1,000 miles away, I'm pretty sure what I'd think about them. I'd think that they were a perfect illustration of why the 162-game regular season is for baseball fans and the post-season is for the sport to make money off a TV extravaganza that measures who hot, experienced and/or lucky.

It's almost like two different sports. You have to make your peace with it. Some teams __like the 14-first-place-finishes-in-a-row BRAVES__ refused to admit that post-season was just a very different animal. They never got the dominant closers that they needed and kept losing with a Mike Reardon.

Rizzo gets it. That's why he's built his team around three power-arm starters in SS, GG and JZ. That's the post-season formula. And, yes, they need to find out if the back end of their bullpen is good enough the next time around.

But the Nats 98 wins and division title are a seperate and valid distinction __just a different method to measure excellence. Next, you have to see what needs to be tweaked for the different sport __October Ball. For example, you can't walk 29 Cards in 44 IP!

Tigers have all RH starting pitchers.

Bothe Cards and Giants do BETTER against LH pitchers.

So Tigers have a big edge __on paper__ against either team.

Some Cards, like Carpenter, are running on fumes. The Giants rotation may be less roasted and toasted, so better able to cope with Tigers and DH. But Detroit will be a b ig favorite __just like the Rangers were in '10 when NOBODY picked the Giants.

He helps. RGIII makes anybody look better. I'd say Chris DESERVES to play with Griffin for a while __as a reward for all the lousy QB's that he made look better than they were.

Check!

You're right.

And they were really impressed by the increased crowd volume late in the season and especially in the last two playoff games.

I hate to admit it, but I was shocked. I thought a DC baseball crowd might reach that decibel level in '14. I guess people know when there is something worth getting excited about and I underestimated 'em. Sorry.

A lot feel that way. Imagine what it's like __exhausting is one of the words__ when a team does what the Cards have: win the DS in the ninth inning of Game Five, then go the full seven games in the NLCS and THEN (maybe) go to the World Series.

Just the DS plus NLCS ride, one after the other, is fairly amazing. I suspect Nats fans will probably experience it __not for sure, but probably__ in the next few years.

Go BEFORE the first exhibition game. There are lot of drills, BP, you can get close to pitchers throwing side sessions (some at 95 mph on this team). And anybody who shows up BEFORE there is even an exhibition game to watch is assumed to be a True Fan and gets plenty of autographs (with conversation and appreciation, too).

1) I don't know.

2) I don't know.

Very important. Once you get team chemistry, you don't say, "How did we do that?" (Because it's always partly accidental. What you say is, "Somehow, we got 'it.' For cryin' out loud, don't mess this up."

This is another example of The Game that the home team has won EVERY TIME since 1975 __except the Mets vs Cards in the NLCS a few years ago and the Nats...ohhhh...pretty recently.

If you come back home, down 2-1 in a 5-game series or 3-2 in a seven game series, then WIN TO FORCE a winner-take-all game, the home team has an incredible record of winning. BUT from '45 through '75, it ran the other way! Nobody knows why.

I suspect Cain and the Giants conform to the pattern and win, though baseball writers will be torn between the easier travel of St. Louis-Detroit and the charm of S.F.

Oh, but he was "double covered." If that's double coverage, what does WIDE OPEN look like?

Correct premise. Correct questions.

My crystal ball, however, remains cloudy.

Can't disagree with much of that.

Especially the "fun" part. I think we were kind of due for that, right?

"Everybody" said that RGIII, Strasburg and Harper were going to be at the center of a lot of good times. Looks like they were right. And we get to find out how much more we get from Ovechkin and, maybe, Wall, though I don't think it's fair to hold him to that standard. Just let Wall try to become a very good guard.

Good points.

What the Cards said was true. Or true enough. But you seldom hear it said.

I've covered a lot of those "comeback" post-season series and losing after being up 3-1 is considerably harder to take than blowing any one game. You can rationalize one game, or in the Nats case "one stroke away on five pitches." It's tough to say the words, "We had three shots and we couldn't win any of them."

I bet they would NOT. And I bet the Rams wouldn't make the trade w the Skins, either.

What world are you living in!!!??? It's over. Waaaay over. RGIII is a once-a-generation QB in DC. And the Nats JUST won more games than any team in baseball.

Anybody who thinks this is anything but a VERY good time to be a Washington sports fan has some serious cognition issues. This is CLEAR. Open eyes. Enjoy. Don't demand the Super Bowl or World Series every year "or else I will be disappointed and say we are cursed."

That's a good point. And I'll let it be the last word.

See you next week.