My Team - Nationals at Kansas City

Proposed starters -

Friday: Gonzalez vs B. Chen
Saturday: Zimmermann vs W. Davis
Sunday: Haren vs E. Santana

(Starting pitchers subject to change)

After getting blown away in game one of the four-game set at Wrigley Field, the Nationals bounced back to take the next three games. The team is inching towards .500 (one game under as of start of play Friday). The team has a three-game set in Kansas City. This series should be fun.

For Kansas City, Chen is the prototypical crafty left-hander - not overpowering but highly skilled at keeping opposing hitters off-balance. Davis is a big right-handed power pitcher who's not afraid to challenge hitters (but with his home stats of 4.40 ERA, 1.60 WHIP and .297 BAA). Perhaps the Nats can break through against this guy. Santana is another competitive guy who throws hard, keeps his team in games normally, but will have an occasional stinker.

In the bullpen, the Royals have Holland, Crow, Collins, Herrera, etc. These guys throw gas for the most part. They can be a bit wild, so allowing them to miss the strike zone would be advantageous to Washington hitters in the late innings.

For the position guys, we've heard the names for years now - Gordon (LF), Hosmer (1B) and Moustakas (3B) are starting to find some consistency at the big league level.  Recent acquisition Justin Maxwell (former Astro/National/Yankee, et al) gives Kansas City more skill and depth. DH Butler is a dangerous hitter, who has doubles power to all fields. Escobar at SS is a pretty good two-way player who can make the spectacular play afield. Watching him and Desmond on the same diamond will be cool for any fan of the game. Escobar has 12 errors, though (Moustakas leads the team with 13).

Kansas City is 9.5 GB in the AL Central, having lost five straight (including being swept at home by the White Sox). Yeah, the Royals would love to stomp on Washington this weekend, to restore hope in their postseason chase. They're a good team.

The Nats continue to make changes. DeJesus only stayed with the team for four days before being sent to Tampa. Suzuki was traded back to Oakland. P Xavier Cedeno has been called up to the big leagues. Even though it isn't 1 September, there are guys coming up to either help the team win today or get a good look in the majors as prep for 14. We shall see...

I expect a great pitchers duel between two stylish lefties on Friday night. Saturday, hard-throwing righties will match fastballs. Sunday, two guys who are former Los Angeles Angels match up. I think Washington wins a 2-1-style game on Friday, gets to Davis early on Saturday for another win, then loses on Sunday as Santana pitches pretty good for 5.2 innings or so before turning the game over to that fire-balling bullpen.