St. Louis Cardinals against the National League: Washington Nationals

There was disappointment, drama and distraction across the board in D.C. last season. The entire coaching staff was removed, and the Nats are turning to an old foe to turn things around. The St. Louis Cardinals face Washington seven times in 2016.

2015 Record: 83-79 

Notable Departures: SP Doug Fister, SP Jordan Zimmerman, RP Drew Storen, IF Yunel Escobar, SS Ian Desmond, 2B Dan Uggla, OF Denard Span

Notable Newcomers: OF Ben Revere, 2B Stephen Drew, 2B Daniel Murphy, RP Oliver Perez, Manager Dusty Baker

Against St. Louis in 2016: 3 games April 29-May 1 @STL, 4 games May 26-29 @WSH

The Outlook: 

The 2015 baseball season began with high hopes and plenty of buzz in the nation’s capital. In the organization’s 11th season since moving from Montreal, the Nats were considered favorites to win the World Series with 6-to-1 odds over the likes of the Dodgers (8-to-1), Red Sox (12-to-1) and our Redbirds (14-to-1). Nobody expected the whirlwind of a season that was coming in D.C.

In hindsight, it is easy to say that the Nationals could have seen the storm of a season that would ensue from the very start. After all, the Nats lost the likes of Stephen Strasburg, Yunel Escobar, Anthony Rendon, Jayson Werth, Denard Span, and Drew Storen to injuries in Spring Training.

In their Opening Day matchup against the Mets, Ian Desmond committed two errors that led to three New York runs in a 3-1 loss. Max Scherzer picked up the loss to Bartolo Colon, despite his 0.00 ERA. The Nats stumbled through the month of April, committing a league-worst 24 errors, nine of them belonging to Desmond alone.

The Nats rebounded in May and June to the tune of a 33-21 record over those two months. The Nats were 3.5 games ahead of the Mets on July 1, and seemed to be in control of the National League East division.

On July 29, the Nats traded for Phillies closer Jonathan Papelbon, despite the success of Drew Storen in the closer role throughout the season.

The Nationals would go on to get swept by the Mets in August and September series’ that were of major importance in that NL East race. The Nats would end the year playing 40-45 baseball, while the Mets finished the last three months of the year with a  50-34 record en route to winning the NL East by seven games.

That Nats finished even further out in the Wild Card, finishing 14 games behind the Cubs for the second Wild Card spot.

Then, of course, there was the Jonathan Papelbon drama that may have been the nail in Matt Williams‘ managerial coffin in Washington. With the Nats eliminated from playoff contention, the newly-acquired closer went into meltdown mode.

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Papelbon would end up missing the final seven games of 2015 serving two different suspensions. The first came from Major League Baseball after they determined that he had intentionally thrown at Baltimore third baseman Manny Machado. The other one was a result of that ridiculous fight that Papelbon started with National League MVP Bryce Harper after he felt that Harper hadn’t run out a pop up as hard as he could have.

Papelbon remains on the Nationals roster heading into 2016, mainly because he is a difficult guy to trade. At 35-years-old, Papelbon doesn’t have the dominant stuff he once had. He is set to make $11 million in 2016, and he has had issues with people on each of the three separate teams that he has been a part of.

If the Nats can get past all of the 2015 drama and show some mental toughness and resiliency, they have the talent to compete in the NL East in 2016. Their starting rotation has the chance to be good, despite losing Zimmerman and Fister in free agency.

Their ace, Scherzer, threw two no-hitters in 2015. One of those should have been a perfect game, had Yunel Escobar not committed a throwing error in the sixth inning of the night cap of a double header against the Mets on October 3. Scherzer struck out 276 batters in 2015 to the tune of a 2.79 ERA.

The rotation fills in with talents like Strasburg and Gio Gonzalez in the middle of the rotation and closes out with Tanner Roark and Joe Ross who turned in respectable 2015 campaigns.

The Washington lineup is anchored by 2015 National League MVP Bryce Harper. Baseball’s tenth-highest scoring offense will fill in with talents like Anthony Rendon at third, Ben Revere in center, Ryan Zimmerman at first and newly acquired Daniel Murphy playing second base.

Will more tempered expectations heading into 2016 lead to a looser Nationals ball club? How will they handle tough stretches that will happen with the types of personalities that they have on that roster?

What will new Manager Dusty Baker bring to the table for the Nats? The three-time National League Manager of the Year certainly knows baseball. Will he be able to keep control of his team, something former Manager Matt Williams clearly wasn’t able to do?

Next: St. Louis Cardinals against the National League: Miami Marlins

The Cardinals won the season matchup with Washington 4-2 in 2015. I like the Cardinals to win two of three in St. Louis and three of four in D.C. to take the season series five games to two in 2016. The Cardinals have a 51-31 record all-time against Washington, and I look for that winning trend to continue in 2016.