Throughout the offseason, The Nats Blog will look back at every player’s 2012 season to summarize and analyze his performance, and we’ll look ahead to his possible role in 2013. We’ll go from #1 Steve Lombardozzi all the way to #63 Henry Rodriguez until Spring Training. Enjoy.

In January of 2012, pitcher Gio Gonzalez hung up his Oakland Athletics cap and exchanged it for a Washington Nationals one after an offseason-defining trade. Eight months later, Gonzalez’s longtime battery-mate, Kurt Suzuki, followed him to D.C. in a less glamorous but equally influential trade.

After leaning heavily on Jesus Flores and other Minor League call-ups throughout the season when injuries plagued the Nationals catching staff, the team needed a fresh, Major League-caliber catcher to call their games through their pennant race and into the postseason. After trading minor league catcher David Freitas to the A’s, Suzuki became that catcher, and he performed exceptionally for the Nationals in their most crucial period.

Suzuki played in 43 games with the Nationals, and put together an offensive slash line of .267/.321/.404 in 146 at-bats. Behind the plate, he made just five errors all year (three with the Nats), and allowed only six passed balls (two with the Nats). He also threw out 28 base stealers, which ranked in the top ten of all Major League catchers for the season.

Next Year: Suzuki’s contract extends through 2013 with a vesting option for 2014, which will apply if he plays in at least 113 games in 2013. He will also most likely fill the role of starting catcher for the beginning of the season, and possibly beyond, until Wilson Ramos is able to make a full recovery from his two knee surgeries. Either way, the Nationals look to employ two very talented players behind the plate.

Up Next: #25 Adam LaRoche

If you're ready for a Question of the Week that will blow your mind, we have it in this week's podcast. (Hint: It's about Bryce Harper and Giancarlo Stanton.) We talk about the Adam LaRoche signing and what it means for Michael Morse. We heap praise upon Mike Rizzo, talk about the projected Nats lineup, and a lot more. Join us for one of the last offseason versions of the podcast this year. Spring training is just a few weeks away!

Throughout the offseason, The Nats Blog will look back at every player’s 2012 season to summarize and analyze his performance, and we’ll look ahead to his possible role in 2013. We’ll go from #1 Steve Lombardozzi all the way to #63 Henry Rodriguez until Spring Training. Enjoy.

The bittersweet feelings of many Washington Nationals fans over the current Adam LaRoche-Michael Morse debacle of not having enough room on the field to keep all their favorite players first surfaced this summer with Rick Ankiel. On July 19, which also happened to be his birthday, Ankiel was designated for assignment by the team to make room on the active roster for Drew Storen to come off the disabled list.

The pitcher-turned-outfielder brought his bazooka of an arm to Washington in 2011 and was the everyday centerfielder for the majority of that season. But in 2012 with the emergence of Bryce Harper and Tyler Moore and the improved performance of Roger Bernadina, Ankiel was reduced to a member of the Goon Squad as a late-innings defensive replacement.

Despite his defensive contributions, when the time came to make room on the roster Ankiel was the choice to DFA because of his dwindling offensive production. He was striking out too much for a pinch hitter, holding the seventh-most strikeouts on the team (59) with only 158 at-bats. The six other players with more strikeouts had between 400 and 600 at-bats. He finished his time with the Nationals with a slash line of .228/.282/.411 a WAR of zero according to FanGraphs.

Ankiel was well respected by Nationals management and by his teammates – Harper called Ankiel one of his biggest mentors – so the decision to cut him was a difficult one. But the good news for Nats fans is that when your team is faced with hard decisions like this, when it is allowed to be more selective with the players it fields, and when “sufficient” is no longer an adjective worthy of describing its players, that means your team has entered into a new era.           

Next Year: Ankiel is only 33 years old and is still a legitimate Major League player. Although the Nationals outgrew him, he still has a great chance of landing a Minor League deal with another team to start the 2013 season. His 10 years of experience could prove invaluable to another team looking for a veteran clubhouse presence.

Up Next: #24 Kurt Suzuki

Throughout the offseason, The Nats Blog will look back at every player’s 2012 season to summarize and analyze his performance, and we’ll look ahead to his possible role in 2013. We’ll go from #1 Steve Lombardozzi all the way to #63 Henry Rodriguez with about two posts per week until Spring Training. Enjoy.

When a team has already watched four of its catchers limp off the field and onto the disabled list in the first two months of the season, that usually isn’t a good sign for the fortunes of that team. But because of players like Jhonatan Solano, the Washington Nationals were able to continue their dominance of the National League East with their fifth-string catcher behind the plate. 

When Solano was called up on May 29 – just eight days after his younger brother Donovan came up for the Miami Marlins – he went to work right away. He got his first Major League hit in his debut against the Marlins with his brother watching from the dugout and his family cheering from the stands, haphazardly clad in mismatched Nats and Marlins gear. 

Solano’s success at the plate continued through his time with the Nationals. He went 11-for-35 with three doubles, two home runs, six RBI’s and a stolen base.

Behind the plate Solano was just as effective, making no errors, allowing only two passed balls and throwing out three of eight base-stealers in 12 games before he also fell victim to The Curse of the Nationals Catchers on July 19. 

Although he wasn’t with the big club for long, his ability to skillfully play his position at the Major League level when Nationals Park had become a graveyard for catchers was key to the Nats ascendance in 2012 and spoke incredibly well of the depth of the Nationals farm system. 

Next Year: 2013 will likely be Solano’s eighth year starting his season at the Minor League level because Wilson Ramos and Kurt Suzuki have the position locked up for the Nationals. However, based on his performance in 2012, Solano has proved that he is a viable choice for a Major League catcher should either of those two players become injured. 

Up Next: #24 Rick Ankiel

The Washington Nationals' quiet offseason was granted some new life on Tuesday as the team re-signed their 2012 first baseman Adam LaRoche. It was a drawn out process between LaRoche and Rizzo, but ultimately, everyone knew that LaRoche had limited options.

LaRoche’s deal is for two years at $24 million, which is an extremely reasonable rate for arguably the best first baseman in the National League last season. There is an option for 2015 with a $2 million buyout, and the Nats stockpile of corner infielders (Tyler Moore, Anthony Rendon, etc.) seems to indicate a buyout is already the likely outcome. But on to the immediate ramifications of the deal.

The Nats seemed to know they would be re-signing LaRoche from day one of the offseason, and that patience paid off. They got a power hitting left-handed bat, for exactly the deal they wanted, who is still in the heart of the lineup without immediately putting pressure on Bryce Harper to fill that role. They also have one of the absolute best defensive first basemen in all of baseball on what should be the best defensive infield in baseball when you consider LaRoche, Danny Espinosa, Ian Desmond, and Ryan Zimmerman.

Inevitably, when you get something good, something bad must come. LaRoche’s re-signing likely means the end of the Michael Morse era in DC. With a stacked outfield of Harper, Denard Span, and Jayson Werth and a fully solidified infield, there’s no place for The Beast to go. It’s not often you see a .300 hitter with significant extra-base power unable to crack an MLB lineup, but that’s exactly Morse’s situation right now. Oh, how far the Nationals have come in just one season.

I fully expect Morse to be traded in the next few weeks, and unfortunately for the Nats, they have absolutely no leverage in getting something good in return. Every team in baseball knows he’s not a bench player and that the Nats don’t have a spot for him. It’s possible that they would consider keeping Morse around until spring training as an insurance policy in case an outfielder, or LaRoche, gets hurt, but it seems unlikely. There should be enough teams clamoring for a player of Morse’s caliber.

At the extremely reasonable cost, I do believe that the Nats made the right move in signing LaRoche, but I say that with mixed feelings if and when Morse is finally traded. Morse is really the first player to provide significant personality to a team on the rapid rise to success. Between the brilliant “Take On Me” walk-up song/sing along at Nationals Park,  The Cobra before walking into the box, the helmet slap rounding first base on his home run trot, and even his awkward jumping-in-place catches in the outfield to end innings, his personality will be sorely missed for fans and players alike.

Elation followed by despair. It’s the feeling that DC sports fans have become all too familiar with in the last three months. It started with the Washington Nationals NLDS Game 5 collapse and ended with the Washington Redskins loss to the Seahawks in the NFC Wild Card round. But how similar were those games, really?

Now, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to compare two different games from two different sports. But humor me for a moment. On that fateful night in October, the Nats had the game all but locked up through the first half of the game. They scored six runs in the first two innings. Unfortunately, they saw their lead get whittled away by reliever after reliever.

Last night, the Redskins did much the same. They came out with two quick touchdowns but then Robert Griffin III reinjured his knee, and it was never the same. The Seahawks scored 24 unanswered points to walk away with the victory.

The feel of these two games were incredibly similar. I was at Nationals Park for Game 5, and although I was watching the Redskins Wild Card game at home, you could feel the fan’s pain after watching the lead slip away. And it all culminated with RGIII’s brutal injury. If you’re a fan of both teams, you probably had that same pit in your stomach twice in the last three months.

Both teams were dark horses to make the playoffs to start the season, though the Redskins probably had the worse odds. Sure, the Redskins saw their lead disappear after the first quarter and dealt with an injury to their franchise player. For me, I truly believe the Nats loss was worse. The Nats had a lead through eight and two-thirds innings; they had the Cardinals all but wrapped up with their best reliever on the mound. After they won the division with the best record in all of baseball, they had higher hopes and expectations.

The goal of this post isn’t to say that Nats fans had it worse. I actually hope it makes you feel hope and optimism for the seasons to come for both teams. The pain from Game 5 is just starting to subside for me, and I expect those of you who are diehard Redskins fans will have the same kind of mourning period. But keep your chin up. Your team has shown they can compete in the playoffs. Here’s hoping both the Nats and Skins have deeper playoff runs in 2013.

As 2012 comes to an end, it only seems right that we take a moment to remember what this past year really meant to the Washington Nationals and baseball in DC. When the season started in April, expectations were high for the Nats. They were the first Nats team that had a real shot to finish over .500, and they even had a chance to finish third in the NL East, which would have been their best finish ever.

Talk about exceeding expectations. The Washington Nationals finished the season 98-64, which was good for the National League East Division Title, the best record in the NL, and the best record in baseball. They spent 149 of 162 days in first place in the division, and they were never one game below .500.

Built on pitching and an offense that got better as the season wore on, this team was one that brought excitement back to baseball in the Nation's Capital. We will all remember where we were when the Nationals won their first division title in team history, where we were during the first playoff game at Nationals Park, and where we were when Jayson Werth hit his masterful NLDS Game 4 walk of home run, the celebration for which is pictured above.

There are so many other great moments to remember from 2012, and I hope you'll share your favorites with us in the comments and on Facebook and Twitter as a way to ring in the new year. Happy New Year to you and yours, and be safe. We have lots of baseball to watch together in 2013.

Throughout the offseason, The Nats Blog will look back at every player’s 2012 season to summarize and analyze his performance, and we’ll look ahead to his possible role in 2013. We’ll go from #1 Steve Lombardozzi all the way to #63 Henry Rodriguez with about two posts per week until Spring Training. Enjoy.

Drew Storen has been the topic for many, many offseason conversations because of his complete meltdown in the ninth inning of Game 5 in the NLDS with the Washington Nationals just two outs away from advancing to the NLCS. Even as I type that, it still makes me nauseous.

Nonetheless, Storen is still considered an integral part of this team for years to come, and for good reason. Why? Because you can't judge a player on one game, even if it was a crucial one, and Storen is still really, really good. It's easy to focus on just that one inning that caused many of us to avoid baseball for several weeks or even shed a few tears. But look at his body of work after returning from his elbow surgery during the regular season, and it tells the real story.

Storen struggled a bit after he came back as he got used to pitching with his newly sewn up elbow, but boy did he ever settle in quickly. He finished the 2012 campaign with 30.1 innings under his belt, an impressive 2.37 ERA, and an even better 0.989 WHIP. Both are marked improvements over his 2011 numbers, a season in which he earned 43 saves and was considered among the closers in baseball.

In the wake of the NLDS disaster, I spoke with many friends, family, and fellow fans who had some terrible things to say about Drew Storen. I understood the overall feeling of frustration, even though some of the comments crossed a line. I didn't watch an inning of baseball until the World Series after the Nats were unceremoniously ousted. However, when people asked me what the Nats would do with Storen on Opening Day 2013, the answer was simple. If the Nats have the lead in the ninth inning on Opening Day, Drew Storen will be in to close. And Nationals Park should erupt with support.

Next year: Drew Storen will be the Nats closer from Opening Day until their season ends. Period. Obviously that assumes health, but Storen is the only true closer the Nats have had since Chad Cordero.

Next up: #23 Jhonatan "The Onion" Solano