Nats’ reliever Brian Bruney walked home Cubs’ shortstop Ryan Theriot with the winning run in the bottom on the 10th inning on Monday night at Wrigley Field, leaving the Nats on the short end of a 4-3 contest. Bruney has had a tough go of it as a Nat: he has walked twelve hitters in 9.2 innings, while giving up seven hits. “It wasn’t my night,” Bruney said after the game. “The guys played good. I was only the one out there throwing that baseball when the run scored. I put this one on me. Unfortunately, this is not a good feeling to have in a locker room full of guys [playing hard] and you go out there and walk a guy to win the game. I’m obviously not happy with myself. We have to dig back in and grind for the next time.” If there was good news in the game, it is that the Nats were able to battle back from a 3-0 third inning deficit, with timely hitting from catcher Wil Nieves.

Neither starting pitcher was particularly sharp. Cubs’ starter Carlos Silva walked in a run in the fourth inning, while Nats’ starter John Lannan walked the pitcher (Silva), in the second, to force in a run. But Lannan settled down to pitch six complete innings, what counts as a quality start. “I fell apart in the second [inning] and that can’t happen,” Lannan later told reporters. “The goal is to finish the game strong. I’m sick of having those mediocre innings when things get away from me. I never walked three in a row and I walked the pitcher with the bases loaded. That’s disappointing. I’m just battling every game so far. I’m not going to force it, but I’m waiting for it to click and have a strong outing from start to finish.” Nieves said that Lannan has yet to find his sinker.

The game — played in frigid and windy conditions — featured the second relief appearance of former starter Carlos Zambrano, who pitched an inning and two-thirds. MASN commentator Rob Dibble speculated on Zambrano’s troubles, saying that the Cubs’ ace looked like he was pushing the ball, and that he might be in pain. Zambrano has battled shoulder problems on-and-off since 2005, but the Cubs say there’s nothing wrong with the righty’s arm. And Cubs GM Jim Hendry dismissed reports that Zambrano’s demotion to the bullpen was a tactic designed to pressure him to give up his no-trade clause.”It has nothing to with what he gets paid, there’s no agenda at all except he was the best fit at the time,” Hendry said. “And I think we know now that’s the truth. He’s capable of doing it, and that’s a good thing.”

Well, maybe. But it’s going to be tough for the Cubs to pay a tweeky inconsistent starter what they owe Zambrano, even if he turns out to be effective as a middle reliever. The Cubs are due to pay the righty $17.875 million in 2010 and 2011, $18 million in 2012 and the former ace has a $19.25 million player option in 2013. Zambrano’s name has come up in trade talks before: most recently in a much-speculated swap with the Yankess and, at the end of 2009, as a part of a trade with the crosstown White Sox for former Padre Jake Peavy. It seems unlikely that Zambrano’s troubles this April would make him as attractive for some teams as he was during the off-season, but there’s no doubt that if the Cubs actively asked around theyd’ find some takers. Zambrano, meanwhile, is under the impression that his stay in Chicago’s bullpen is temporary, pending the Cubs’ search for an 8th inning setup man. On Monday, Zambrano (6.85 ERA) said he was “okay” with his new role.

Sure.

Scott Olsen’s seven inning gem against the Dodgers has Nats fans (and the Washington Post) oohing and ahhing about the team’s new attitude. “Instead of saying ‘Get ‘em tomorrow,’ the Nats have finally assembled a tougher, more irritable group that actually does it,” Post columnist and leading baseball pundit Thomas Boswell writes. Boswell goes on to note: “It’s not just the Nats’ record that is different this spring. The Nats themselves are. They’re starting to resemble the first gritty crew that brought baseball back to D.C. after a 33 year wait.” Tougher? More irritable? Gritty? My first reaction was to scoff: forget irritable and gritty — we need front line guys who can throw strikes. Please, please, please Tom (I know you’re the best, or close to it), but you know (and I know, and it’s no secret) that a rotation of Lannan, Stammen, Olsen and Hernandez are not going to get it done.

But in studying yesterday’s box score, I began to question by own cynicism. The difference in the Nats 1-0 win yesterday (a beautifully pitched game, if ever there was one) from any of their wins last year was obvious. For right there, in the middle of the line-up, were two players the Nats needed, but didn’t have, in the ’09 campaign. When Mike Rizzo signed Ivan Rodriguez and Adam Kennedy in the offseason, he not only filled two special needs, he added two gamers to the clubhouse — players who not only know how to win, but want to. While Rodriguez and Kennedy went a combined 0-6 yesterday, their role on the team has been indispensible, providing much needed leadership to a crew of talented, but young, players. Mike Rizzo added a caveat: “We’re a long ways from where we want to be.” Yeah, true. But you’re also a long ways from where you were.

The difference between the ’09 and 2010 Nats becomes more obvious when you go through the line-up of the Chicago Cubs, whom the Nats face in Chicago starting tonight. The North Side Drama Queens are a team of head cases and disasters-waiting-to-happen: Alfonso Soriano’s penchant to drop flies in left field is damn near agonizing, the perpetually petulant Carlos Zambrano has been demoted to the bullpen, the perennially injured Aramis Ramirez is a fracture away from putting the Cubs in the cellar and Kosuke Fukudome is overpaid and (undoubtedly) on the trading block. I know, I know — the Cubs just swept the Brewers and can hit the hell out of the ball. But the name of this game is pitching, and the Cubs don’t have it. Forget the starters (or don’t — if you really believe that Carlos Silva is the answer), and focus on the bullpen. The line-up of Berg, Grabow, Gray, Russell and Marmol is a patched together crew of rookies and semi-veterans (like Marmol) who have yet to prove they can hit the strike zone. Put another way, we would be justified in saying that the Cubs bullpen collapsed in the first two weeks of the season, but we’d be wrong. It had nothing to collapse from.

Cubs fans are on a death watch. Nats 320 has an outstanding interview with Cubs blogger Joe Aeillo of View From The Bleachers, and while Joe sounds positive enough, you can almost hear the ‘Oh-God-wadda-we-gonna-do’ tension in his voice. Joe talks about Uncle Lou’s bullpen problems and notes that Zambrano has been “the weak link” in the rotation so far this year, but the icing comes when Nats 320 asks about Soriano. “I’ll give you $20 right now, straight cash homie, if you convince the Nationals to take him back,” Joe says. That’s a deal we can pass up: we’ll keep Willingham. Soriano, the bullpen — they’re all problems. But the real problem facing the Cubs is down the road in St. Louis. The Cubs don’t have anyone who matches up with Chris Carpenter, Brad Penny or Adam Wainwright. I can’t stand Penny (he should just rob a 7-Eleven and get it out of his system), but the former Dodger bad boy is pitching brilliantly — with three wins and a 0.94 ERA. That’s a record that Zambrano can only dream about.

The Cubs haven’t had a team since Mark Prior and Kerry Wood were five outs away from the World Series. Remember? Prior was a USC power pitcher with Cy Young stuff and Woods struck out 20 in his rookie season. And then . . . and then, in the 8th inning of Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS a little pop foul that should have been caught did them in. It was their last shot. Neither Prior nor Wood have been the same since; Prior became a surgeon’s dream and is now out of baseball and Wood is in Cleveland, dealing with a cranky back. Looking at Prior (a shoulder, an achilles tendon, a hamstring, another shoulder), you can understand why Mike Rizzo wants Stephen Strasburg in the minors — and why he insists that any member of the Washington club have a winning attitude. Put another way, the problem with Cubs comes down to this: Carlos Zambrano throws the ball in the mid-90s and is capable of a 20-win Cy Young season. But wouldn’t you rather have Livan Hernandez?

One game a season does not make: and that’s a damn good thing. If the Nats loss at home during their opener is any indication, then fans of the Anacostia Nine are in for a long season. Starter John Lannan was shakey, the bullpen (with the lone exception of Jesse English) seemed to revert to last year’s form, and Nats’ batters just couldn’t get around on Roy “Doc” Halladay. At least in the case of Halladay that’s no surprise. The former Blue Jay was masterful in seven complete innings of work, while Lannan lasted just three-and-two-thirds.”Philly is a tough team to stop once they get the momentum,” Lannan said after the game. “The momentum kept on going, and I couldn’t stop it. I felt good at first, it’s just that the fourth inning got me. I felt good the first three innings. I wanted to have a different story for Opening Day. It’s the first game of many, and I’m not going to let it tell the story for this whole season.”

Aside from the stadium-bulging and excited home town crowd (with Phillies’ fans sprinkled liberally throughout) — and the ceremonies surrounding the actual game — the day was only marginally memorable. It actually began the night before with Washington’s obsession (and the trade of a major player from that other game), and continued into the early afternoon, with the sports media’s focus on America’s current sports megalomaniac. In Boston and New York (and Chicago, Anaheim and Atlanta), those kinds of stories would be footnotes: a sure sign that Washington will need a winner to command the kind of loyalties enjoyed by the “Nation,” the “Empire” and the “Halos.” We’ll get there, but if Monday is any indication, it probably won’t be this year.

The good news is that with the opener out of the way, Nats’ fans can now focus on the real story: whether the bullpen will show appreciable improvement over ’09 (at least Jesse English looks good), whether the platoon in right field will really work (it won’t), whether Ian Desmond is “the answer” at short (we won’t know for awhile), and whether the starting five (sans Strasburg, at least for now), can reel off some wins.

Those Are The Headlines, Now For The Details: Bad news for Cubs fans — Carlos Zambrano is still Carlos Zambrano. The Venezuelan rolling pin made Lannan look like an ace. The “Big Z” gave up two homers, hit a batter and made a throwing error as the Sluggies fell to the Chops 16-5. At least he didn’t destroy the water cooler. Lou said that he never imagined that Chicago would give up 16 runs on Opening Day. It was God-awful. Atlanta’s version of “the real deal” hit a dinger in his first at bat and the boys over at “Baseball Tonight” just couldn’t stop talking about it. They said (as ESPN rolled video) that Henry Aaron has “passed the mantle” to a new slugger — new Atlanta outfielder Jason Heyward. Well, maybe. But it might be a little early . . .

John Kruk on Placido Polanco: “He’s the best number two hitter in baseball,” he said, “with the exception of Derek Jeter, who bats first” . . . Peter Gammons is fitting in nicely in his new gig, as an on-air commentator for the MLB Network, but he’s still a homer for his favorite team — and player. That said, he still issues some thoughtful insights. Last night Gammons described Frank Robinson as “the most underrated great player” of his era; that’s a new and interesting baseball category that demands some thinking. Gammons’ new category might, for instance, include the overlooked Mickey Vernon — who’s hardly rated at all. Gammons added that Robinson was overawed by the attention given to Willie Mays and Hank Aaron. Yeah, that’s right. And Mickey Mantle.

Any team can have a bad century, but the former White Stockings, Colts, Orphans and, now, Chicago Cubs are in line for a major league unprecedented 101st season without a championship. The Washington Nationals may well have put the final nail in the Cubs’ coffin for this season on Tuesday night with a 15-6 clobbering of the little bears at the friendly confines of Wrigley Field. The Nats’ onslaught was led by two home runs from Josh Willingham — including a touch-em-all that landed beyond the left field wall on Waveland Avenue — and a grand slam dinger from a struggling Elijah Dukes. After the game, the usually reticent Dukes said that he was “waiting for something that moved” from Cubs reliever Aaron Heilman, a Mets castoff with a suspiciously high ERA. And he got it. Dukes, who has been taking so much batting practice that he had to sit out two games after injuring his thumb in the batting cage, accounted for five RBIs while walking twice. Dukes, whose BA has been see-sawing all season, has a fairly hefty RBI total: it now stands at 51. And it’s true — Dukes has been hitting the ball with more confidence and authority (and to the opposite field), after being recalled from the minors.

Elijah Dukes Accounts for 5 RBIs (AP/Nam Y. Huh)

Washington righthander Garrett Mock pitched 5.2 innings for the win, his third of the season. Mock looked good, if not overpowering, with a snappy fastball, but was lifted by interim manager Jim Riggleman for reliever Tyler Clippard. Clippard and Saul Rivera closed out the game. Riggleman’s habit of pulling starters early was on prominent display at Wrigley — he has a history of pulling the trigger on his starters, a habit he developed when he managed in Chicago, his first managing job. Mock was clearly upset by the decision, showing his irritation on the bench. In fact, there’s no reason why the young righthander couldn’t have gotten the third out in the fifth, particularly with the Nats leading (at that point) 9-1. In all, Mock threw 89 pitches, 59 of them for strikes: hardly an elbow shattering experience.

Down On Half Street: Bill Ladson is reporting that the Nats have signed Livan Hernandez to a major league contract. The team has sent Collin Balester to the minors to make room for Hernandez. On MASN after the conclusion of the Nats-Cubs tilt, Ray Knight described the news as “a potential coup” by Nationals’ General Manager Mike Rizzo. Nationals pitchers can use the steadying influence of a veteran presence like Hernandez, Knight said. He added that the Nats also want to set a standard of winning, with important games coming, and Hernandez knows how to win. Hernandez was a fan favorite when he was with the Nats. The official release from the Nats reads, in part: “He will make his first start on Wednesday at Chicago (NL), while J.D. Martin (2-3, 4.76) will start Thursday’s series finale at Wrigley Field” . . .  Is ”ambitioned” a word? In a column in the Washington Post this week, I thought I read Chico Harlan say that a Nats’ pitcher had “ambitioned” to be a pitcher all his life. So is it? Is “ambitioned” a word? I admit, I have efforted to find out, but I’ll be damned if I can find it in the dictionary . . .

The horror; the horror: I have gotten sliced and diced from Chicago Cubs fans, dozens of whom have written (well, okay, three of whom have written) to say that the Cubs are still young and tough and plenty fast and that they don’t need to be totally rebuilt. They point out that the North Side Drama Queens are set at shortstop (with Ryan Theriot), at second (with Jeff Baker), in left field (with Jake Fox), at catcher (with Geovany Soto) and have some new former Ahoy pitchers on the mound that will be the new guns of the future — in Tom Gorzelanny and John Grabow. Yeah, okay. Gorzelanny looked particularly effective tonight, giving up only three runs in one inning of work . . . so I’ll stick with my two interlocking predictions, contradictory as they might seem: if the Cubs make the playoffs this year (and I don’t think they will) then they’ll win it all — since this will mark the first year after the end of the Merkle Curse (alright, that’s lame, but you never know) but if they don’t win it all, then the Nationals will win the world series before they do. And frankly, I think the second prediction is a pretty safe bet.

The Nationals roll out of Washington after suffering a signal defeat at the hands of the Milwaukee Brewers — another “might-have-been” in a home stand of might-have-beens, with the brewmeisters’ winning a 7-1, a veritable sudzing of the Anacostia Nine at Nats Park on Monday afternoon. In many ways this was a typical outing for Collin Balester: that is to say, it was not good. Balester was only marginally better than during his previous outing (when he couldn’t get out of the second inning versus the Rockies), because last night he actually lasted into the sixth against the Brewers. When headed for the third time throught the crew’s line-up, Balester fell apart — with the scorebook telling the tale (in order): double, home run, single (wild pitch), walk, walk, single (relieved by Bergman), single, single (relieved by Villone), fielder’s choice, strike out, strike out. The butcher’s bill? Six runs, seven hits (including a home run), two walks and a wild pitch.

It was difficult for Jim Riggleman to put flinty light on such an embarrassment, so he didn’t try: “If I had a crystal ball, I would not have sent him out there for the sixth inning,” he said. But the Nats’ bats were also to blame: the team left twenty-one on base over the course of nine (that’s more than two an inning, for those of you who are counting) and couldn’t take advantage of a less-than impressive Yovani Gallardo, who seemed (at times) almost indifferent to his fate. The big blast for the Brewers came off the bat of Ryan Braun, whose soaring 6th inning tumbler landed six rows from the plaza up in the left field stands. Excepting for that up-in-the-zone pitch, the Nats seemed to master the smooth swinging Braun, who registered three strike outs. That Nats are now off to “the city of the big shoulders, the hog butcher of the world,” where they face the other worldly Cubs, owner of an embarrassingly high salary structure to go with their embarrassing won-loss record.

The headline of the Cubs website reads: “Zambrano returns to kick off critical homestand.” Yeah, it’s critical alright. It’s critical for those who want to have a future in Chicago next year. For the rest of us, the question of whether the Cubs will have a place in the post-season has already been answered — and the answer is “no.” When the Cubs have needed to produce the most they have flopped: they are 5-10 over the last fifteen and most recently lost an embarrassing three of four in Los Angeles. To those stinking Dodgers no less. When they most needed to gain ground on the Cardinals (and if not that, to gain ground in the wild card race) the Cubs actually lost ground — with the rest of the league racing away from them. They are eight games behind the Redbirds, and 7.5 behind the Colorado Streaks in the wild card. Their recent road trip was a disaster: they were pathetic against Colorado, horrible against San Diego (as in the San Diego Padres), and outclassed against the Trolleys. It actually looked, in the city of dreams, as if the slugs had thrown in the towel. One Cubbie’s blog notes: they now have as much chance of making the post-season as O.J. Simpson does of being a useful member of society.

After spending the last twenty-four hours pouring over Cubs’ statistics, we here at CFG have come to the following conclusion: the Cubs are just not very good. The problem starts not on the field, but in the dugout: Carlos Zambrano spends most of the time fighting himself, Milton Bradley is a whiner, the front office decided to trade away Mark de Rosa (who was only the key to the team), Rich Harden’s reputation as “the sore armed Harden” is well-earned and the lovable free-swinging Alfonso Soriano is not so lovable when he goes into a pout and hits .194 in 67 games. Fans of the North Side Drama Queens have reacted accordingly: their blogs are filled with stories about new movies, recommendations that the front office participate in the “cash for clunkers” program and they now run tutorials on why Mark Prior is a symbol of why Cubs fans are left to wallow in their own despair. Remember Tinkers-to-Evers-to-Chance? Well, my friends, it’s time to relive those halcyon days.

This isn’t a ball club, it’s a novel.

So here (“Chicagoland fans”) is whatyaoughtado, but it’s painful: you clear the decks and you start over. Not like the Nats! We weren’t slow and old, but we started over anyway. That’s not true for your team. The Cubs are slow and old and they need to get young and fast. Carlos Zambrano could be a very good pitcher, but he’s worn out his welcome. He has to go. The best pitcher on the Cubs staff is Ted Lilly and he’s a gamer. Sadly, he’s 33. So he stays. But I would trade Harden. In spite of his enormous value, he’s one bad pitch from a blown shoulder and I would also cast a jaundiced eye on Ryan Dempster. He hasn’t proved he can pitch in the big games and he’ll never again be as good as he was last year. Aramis Ramirez must stay, of course, but you have to wonder if the injury he suffered this year will recur with increasing frequency. So you think I’m wrong? Well I’m not. You think you have a pitching staff? Really? Well, you don’t: you have episodes from “As The World Turns.”

Now then, on to the infield. Mike Fontenot is a good second sacker, he really is, but he’s not a .300 hitter and never will be. The Cubs need one, to team with shortstop Ryan Theriot — who’s the heart of the club. The Riot is the Cubs future. Fontenot isn’t and neither is Zambrano. Stop talking about how they teamed up at LSU. This isn’t LSU. It’s the majors. And get rid of Derrick Lee. Derrick Lee is a good hitter, but not a great hitter, no matter what you Cubs fans say, and he’s 33. He’s lost a step. Sooner or later (and probably sooner) he’s on his way to the junior circuit where fans can ooh and ahh about his value as a DH. “Oh Derrick, oh Derrick.” Listen, Derrick would look terrific in an Oriole uniform. They love guys like Derrick in Baltimore. And trading Derrick to Baltimore would clear the way for Micah Hoffpauer at first base — and it’s about time. Aramis Ramirez stays at third, of course, because when he’s hitting the Cubs win. But Aramis needs to stay healthy. Cross your fingers.

Let’s see, that leaves Kosuke Fukudome, who’s a hell of a ballplayer. Of course, when he didn’t turn into Mickey Mantle the Chicago press dumped all over him. But when you compare him with, say, this guy, you realize what you have. And fine, you can keep Soriano, so long as you realize who he is (and who, after all, would take his contract?), but understand that he only has about three holes in his swing (an outside slider, an inside slider, a high fastball). I would trade Bradley (if you can), despite the paltry return he’s likely to bring on the market — because the last thing any team needs is a head case.

And that’s the biggest problem with the Cubs. No fan, anywhere, wants to believe that their team doesn’t give a damn. And certainly that’s not the case with the Cubs. Milton Bradley and Carlos Zambrano and Alfonso Soriano want to win as much as the next guy — maybe even more. But that’s not the perception among a lot of Cubs fans, and it’s not the perception among fans of the game outside of Chicago. The Cubs-as-headcase has come to define the franchise. That’s the truth. And there’s only one way to change that perception. Clear the deck, get rid of the deadwood, the old, the slow, the head cases — and to keep the team’s youngest, toughest and most highly motivated players. No matter what their statistics. That means changing the franchise face from Milton Bradley to Sam Fuld. It means keeping a .283 hitter with no pop and no experience  — and trading a grizzled veteran with a high OBP. Because sometimes perception is reality – the kid who gives a damn is a hell of a lot more valuable than the veteran who doesn’t. And that’s always true. No matter what the stats say.

Sam Fuld

Despite Nats 3-1 Loss. The Nats were outpitched in their dual against Carlos Zambrano and the Cubs Friday, but Jim Riggleman remained upbeat during the post-game press conference. The shape of the new “Riggleman era” in Nats’ baseball is now becoming apparent: the new skipper will attempt to infuse the Anacostia Boys with a new sense of purpose by accenting the positive. Saying he would attempt to keep from being negative, Riggleman vowed to stay away from words like “frustrating” in describing the state-of-the-team. “I can remember thinking I don’t even want to use those words,” he said. “It projects negative stuff.” Later in his post-game briefing, Riggleman was even more emphatic, while breaking his own rule: “[The team is] frustrated with the record, and they’re anxious to turn it around,” he said. “And I can tell you that. We will turn it around.”

Changing the culture of negativity is one thing, tweaking the line-up is another. Evidence that Riggleman understands the team’s weakness was apparent in the first inning, when he signaled a hit-and-run with Ryan Zimmerman at the plate. With Nyjer Morgan at second and Nick Johnson at first, Zimmerman swung through a 3-2 Zambrano offering. Morgan, running with the pitch, was called out while trying to take third. The classic strike-em-out-throw-em-out play killed a Nats’ rally, but Riggleman’s intention was clear: he wanted to keep Zimmerman from hitting into a double play, which has become a habit for the third sacker. Still, Riggleman was adamant: the Nats had played a good game, with Craig Stammen weathering successive on-base problems and early inconsistencies to pitch a solid six innings. The Nats waited for the departure of Zambrano, but couldn’t solve the Cubs’ bullpen. “To me good baseball is good baseball,” Riggleman said. “Sometimes you don’t hit good or you don’t pitch good, but you do a lot of things good. You play the game well.”

Playing the game “well” is what the Cubs did last night, which was a kind of model for what they had planned all year: their starters (Zambrano, or Lilly, or Harden) keep them in the game, Carlos Marmol pitches the eighth and Kevin Gregg closes it out. In between, one of their boppers (like Aramis Ramirez) puts one in the seats while their up-the-middle “LSU connection” do their wizardry around second. The model worked last night, but it didn’t work so well in the first half of the season, when the Cubs of ’09 appeared to be the Cubs of old — non-lovable losers who haven’t won anything much since 1945, and are without a world championship since 1908. The history weighs heavily. In the 8th inning of last night’s game, the chant coming from Cubs fans (let’s go cub-bies) was answered by one from a Nats fan sitting several rows behind me — nine-teen-oh-eight!

Down On Half Street: I attended the game with me droogs last night (here they are, once again) and received an earful from one of them — a Mets fan, no less — who pointed out that it wasn’t that long ago that the Nats could claim to be a good team. “They had a closer, a hitter and a couple good pitchers,” he said. He’s right. It might seem eons, but the 2005 Nats finished at .500 with a line-up Brian Schneider, Nick Johnson, Jose Vidro, Jose Guillen and Vinny Castilla. Livan Hernandez was performing miracles on the mound and Wil Cordero, who is now out of the game, was the closer. Those were the days . . . Even so, loyalists have to believe the Nats are still only a closer, a bopper, a veteran pitcher and a second baseman from respectability. Which is true, of course, for nearly every team in baseball . . . 

We’re likely to see more tweaks in the Nats line-up. The one way to keep the strike-em-out-throw-em-out first inning that we saw last night from becoming a habit would be to move Alberto to the second spot and move Zim down, perhaps to the fifth spot. The Nats need to find a way to move on-base machine Nyjer Morgan into scoring position without always having to depend on him to steal a base . . . Ronnie Belliard pinch hit on Thursday and again last night. Why are the Nats still in love with this guy? . . . Gonzalez is 10 for his last 20 and is laying claim to the second base job. He was at shortstop last night because Cristian Guzman was complaining about foot pain. “Fredo” is hitting the hell out of the ball, his triple against the Cubs on Thursday was one of the most impressive scorchers registered at Nats Park this year. Add his name to the list of “can’t touch” Nats, which includes John Lannan, Ryan Zimmerman, Nyjer Morgan, Jordan Zimmermann, Adam Dunn, Jesus Flores, Josh Willingham (mmmmm, well, maybe not) and (perhaps) Craig Stammen. I would put Sean Burnett on the list. That leaves Nick Johnson and Cristian Guzman as the most likely candidates to be packing their bags before the trade deadline . . . The Nats are apparently waiting for the right offer for Johnson, hoping his stock will rise in the next week. But there are reports that Mike Rizzo might be asking too much for Johnson and some “buyers” who might need Johnson could very quickly become “sellers” — especially if they keep losing 11-0.  

MLB Network’s two hour special — 30 Clubs/30 Report Cards — provided a good snapshot of who’s where with a little less than half-a-season left. There were few surprises: the Trolleys are the class of the National League, the Redbirds are the team to beat in the NL Central, “the Nation” and “the Empire” remain the flagships of the AL, the Belinskis finally have competition in the AL West and no one (but no one) thinks the Nats will improve. Former Rangers General Manager John Hart’s on air analysis was sobering. ”I’m not going to beat a dead horse,” he said — and then went ahead with the whipping. Not only has the team little talent, but there’s little talent for Mike Rizzo to call on in the Nats’ farm system. ”I don’t see a lot of good young players waiting in the wings to come up,” Hart said — a statement that debunks the sometime-narrative that the Nats’ development program will soon yield major league-ready ballplayers to the Anacostia Nine. It just ain’t so and John Hart isn’t the only one who thinks so — Baseball Prospectus ranked the Nats’ farm system 29th, which is (if you’re counting), next to last in all of baseball.

What’s so astonishing about Hart’s assessment (little talent — and none coming), is that it’s difficult to see how the team can appreciably improve in the second half. They just have to play better, no matter who’s on the field. This means, as Hart made clear, that new manager Jim Riggleman has to instill a culture of discipline and pride in the players. Easier said than done. “I really look at the fundamentals, that’s where it starts . . .” Hart said. ”This is a club that fundamentally hasn’t been able to get the job done.” He added: “If you look at their pitching staff they’ve got a bunch of guys who are under 25 which is a good thing, they don’t have a lot of power in that staff, so you have to catch the ball if you’re going to compete . . . how did they get here? I think they overevaluated some of their people; I think number two, I haven’t seen a sense of urgency.”  

Hart’s assessment is the harshest I have heard, reinforcing the on-air and in-the-stands complaints about the product the front office has provided. The overriding complaint, in truth, has nothing to do with the team’s talent, but with the players’ desire to win. This is what Hart’s statement about a “sense of urgency” means: forget the on-the-field talent, the Nats are playing like they don’t care — which is the worst thing you can say about any team in any sport.

Down On Half Street: The Nats open against the North Side Drama Queens tonight at Nats Park. Next to the Nats (and the New York Chokes), the Cubs are probably the most dysfunctional team in the game. Cubs GM Jim Hendry traded away all-world utilityman Mark DeRosa, signed bad boy and galactic whiner Milton Bradley, and has continued to coddle “isn’t he cute when he’s angry” underachiever Carlos Zambrano. The baseball gods then intervened to punish Hendry: Aramis Ramirez went down with a shoulder separation, second baseman Mike Fontenot started hitting like Mike Fontenot, Alfonso Soriano started hitting like this guy and, most recently, the answer to all the Cubs woes — Geovany “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” Soto — has been sidelined due to an oblique strain.

The result is that all of baseball has gotten to see the Cubs farm system in action – and, unlike the Nats, the Cubs actually have one. Itsy-bitsy Sam Fuld has replaced Soriano in left field, drain plug Jake Fox is the interim catcher (we have an interim GM, so why not an interim catcher?), potential powerhouse Micah Hoffpauir has been able to show his stuff, oldster Randy Wells has pitched like Zambrano oughta, Kevin Hart has finally been allowed to audition for the rotation and permanent minor leaguer Bobby Scales (who?) has shown Hendry that he should have brought him up from triple-A years ago. Cubs fans have watched all of this with something akin to Jean-Paul Sarte’s view of the universe: hell is other people, or in this case — hell is Milt the Moron lofting the ball into the bleachers after two outs. “I haven’t seen that one before,” Lou said, “I’ll be honest with you . . . I mean, do we need to teach math?”

Okay: none of this is pretty, but you’ve gotta admit, it sure as hell is entertaining.

I would add this caveat. The Cubs aren’t dead. They’re a solid team and should they ever reach their potential (with a middle of the line-up order that is among the best in baseball), they’ll catch the Cardinals and end up in the playoffs. Certainly, Tony LaRussa knows that — it might be the only reason the Redbirds are willing to trade half their farm system (and — unlike the Nats — they also have one) for Roy Halladay.