The Nationals lost in Milwaukee on Wednesday afternoon, 7-3, and have fallen to a season-worst eight games below .500 at 14-22.
They haven't won a series since April 16-18, when they took two of three from the last-place Giants at home. Since then, they've gone 5-14 and that's the worst record in baseball in that stretch. This isn't a bunch of fluky bad luck. They've been playing that terribly. The run differential in this woeful 19-game stretch is negative-35.
A lot of the season numbers don't look good at all. In fact, the Nationals haven't been good at much of anything.
They entered Wednesday's game with the following rankings in the NL (remember, it's 15 teams)
Runs: 10th
Average: 9th
OBP: 9th
Slugging: 10th
OK, so that's not a particularly good offensive team. They've dealt with injuries to Anthony Rendon, Trea Turner, Ryan Zimmerman and Juan Soto. Brian Dozier has been terrible at the plate and Soto has taken a big step back.
The disaster that is the bullpen has been well-documented. Before Wednesday, the Nationals still ranked last in the majors with a 6.57 bullpen ERA. Opposing teams had been slashing .283/.376.446 against them. There were seven blown saves in 12 chances (only the Royals had a worse conversion percentage).
It's not just the bullpen, though. I already mentioned the offense. And some of the pitching woes -- definitely not all -- stem from a brutal defense.
Heading into Wednesday, the Nationals were dead last in the majors in defensive efficiency, converting only 65.2 percent of the balls put in play (home runs aren't considered in play, for those who aren't aware) into outs. The league average is 69.5 and the Astros lead the way at 73.7 percent.
In terms of Defensive Runs Saved, only the Mariners (negative-30) -- who use multiple DH-types in the field -- ranked worse than the Nationals' negative-28.
So the Nationals still have their trusty rotation, right?
Well, sort of. The 4.19 rotation ERA ranks 14th in baseball.
The top-end trio of Max Scherzer (3.78 ERA, 119 ERA+), Stephen Strasburg (3.71, 121 ERA+) and Patrick Corbin (3.71, 121 ERA+) has been good but not great at run prevention (*clears throat* -- check the defensive numbers above). The two back-end guys have been terrible.
This sums up how bad things are: The Nationals have won just one of Scherzer's eight starts. It was a total team effort here, too, not just on Scherzer for any mediocre starts.
The bad times were all on display in Milwaukee during this sweep. It's been a miserable six weeks for the Nationals.
