I hate to crack on John Lannan, I really do. Seems like a good guy, has had some moments. But the headline on the recent Nationals Journal that shows up on my blog roll - Lannan trying to figure it out - baffles me.
Not the head itself or the post. What baffles is a guy who is a major-league veteran is trying to figure it out. Maybe I'm being a bit too harsh here, but shouldn't he know by now?
If he doesn't, there's a place where he can figure it out. It's called Syracuse. I don't know if he has any options left but if he does and he's baffled, let him go work it out in AAA.
Lannan in general baffles me. We were at the Sunday Orioles game where Capps blew his first save. I told my daughter Lannan is either going to be very good (he was that day) or brutal. There's no in between with the guy. He's either sharp as heck and gives up 1-2 runs or he's awful and is gone early.
He's made 13 starts this year and given up two or fewer runs in five. He's been gone in five or less innings in six.
He had four strong starts after his elbow issues, so I'm guessing it isn't that. But maybe it is, in which case he needs to say something and join Scott Olsen on the DL (will we ever see Olsen again?).
I'd like to see the guy succeed, but right now he's just plain painful to watch.
Odd the way things work out. When we talked about space-holders in the rotation earlier in the season, everyone would have bet on Marquis and Lannan being the two to stick around when the cavalry arrived. Now it looks like they may be the two out of it, assuming more reinforcements come. Detwiler by the all-star break, Wang shortly afterward? What is up with Marquis anyway? Is he don-zo for the year like I'm guessing is the case with Olsen?
If my ears didn't deceive me, I think I heard Jimmy Rigs on the postgame last night mention something about Jordan Zimmermann being six weeks or so away. Can that be right? Lord I hope they don't rush that kid.
5 comments:
I like the new look.
As for Lannan, is this just his regression to the mean? If I'm not mistaken, he has been incredibly "lucky" the last few years to have such good performances with his stuff.
Part of it may be regression, but I doubt it. "Luck" doesn't last for 2+ years. And his "stuff" has gotten worse... his walks are way up and his strikeouts are way down from where they were even last year. Harper has a good summary: http://natsbaseball.blogspot.com/2010/06/lannan-on-edge.html
What's maddening is that we keep hearing that we have an overabundance of starting pitching, but the arrival date for that overabundance continually recedes to the horizon. There are just too many "ifs" with too many of these guys for my comfort.
No doubt Lannan should be in Syracuse figuring things out, and no doubt he would be IF we weren't waiting for an entire starting rotation's worth of pitchers to return from the DL. The only silver lining is that as a lefty Detwiler has way more raw talent than Lannan, and IF he can pull it together could be southpaw that follows St. Stephen and Zimmermann (IF he returns 100%) in next year's hopefully much improved rotation.
I saw the headline and thought you were talking about Riggleman's (non)grasp of the concept of a DH and its effect on constructing a lineup.
Yeah, that's a post for another day. I can't figure out what the hell he's doing with that lineup.
Weren't the Nats off Monday? Playing one game on Tuesday wore Willingham out so bad he needs tonight off?
That doesn't begin to address the DH issue.
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