I like hating on the Washington Nationals because I think they are most poorly run franchise in Major League Baseball. Jim Bowden, the GM is absolutely awful and makes bad decision after bad decision. For example, why was Ronnie Belliard signed to an extension? Or Christan Guzman? Or Dmitri Young? Or how about the fact that Bowden is being investigated for impropriety regarding taking a cut of signing bonuses from international players? Or maybe that the team just wasted $20 million on Adam Dunn who will not help the team NOT finish in last in their division over the next two years and may hurt the development of some of the only young prospects that the Nationals have. Then there is that the Nationals are the only team that has gone to arbitration this year, and not only that, but they LOST the case.
So the latest news, that the tenth best prospect on the team, Esmailyn Gonzalez who the team believed was 19 years old is actually Carlos Alvarez Daniel Lugo a 23 year old. Oops!
The Nats signed Gonzalez/Lugo in July of 2006 to a $1.4 million bonus, the largest the team has given to an international player. At the time, team president Stan Kasten equated the signing to when the Braves had signed Andruw Jones and Rafael Furcal in the mid-90s as showing the Nationals were going to be competitive in signing the best players.
Gonzalez put up excellent numbers last year in the Gulf Coast League, but looking at his numbers with this new information they are much less impressive, “Those are great numbers,” a scout told SI.com, “but you should be hitting that well if you’re that much older than your competition.”
And of course, the signing was engineered by Jose Rijo, special assistant to Bowden (and also subject of an investigation regarding impropriety with bonuses) and a man named Basilio Vizcaino, who helps prepare young players in hopes that they eventually sign big Major League deals and reward him with a percentage of a signing bonus.
Way to go Nats, but hey, you might only lose 90+ games this year instead of 100, so there’s that…
[MLB.com]
The Slanch Report 
Hey, getting 100 walks and 40 homers with around 90 ribbies for 20 million isn’t bad. Actually, it’s quite good.
That said, I hope Jim Bowden chokes on Emilio Bonifacio.
Dunn’s avg. stats for the next 2 years will be:
150 games/season .240 avg, 75runs, 28hrs, 85rbi, 100 walks, 180k’s
I know he has done better and with scrubby reds teams, but who is going to protect him or get on base or dive him in on the Nats? At least the Reds have had a decent/avg. offense of late. The Nats are just offensive.
Would you rather, for 10mil a year, have ploddy k-machine Adam Dunn, or all-D luck machine Gary Matthews Jr.
Makes the cheap-ass Abreu deal look pretty tasty, hmm?
Another question, how come Raul Ibanez is getting paind 3 times as much as Abreu for less overall production, equally poor D, while being several years older? Silly phillies…
my issue is that a team like the Nats, which has no chance of producing a good team for several years should spend their money on developing cheap young good players. Instead of giving Adam Dunn 20 million to finish on a last place team, why not have paid Aaron Crow, their first round pick who is likely to be a top 4 pick again this year and should be working his way through their system, instead, they blew it and are gonna cheap out on either strasburg or cheap out on the #10 pick that they got as compensation for being bad negotiators
i think dunn will still hit his 35-42 hrs no matter what, but whats the difference when no one provides him protection, the pitching staff has an era of 5+ and the rest of the offense is anemic?
give ME $20 million, it’ll be about the same in terms of affect on the team
slanch, stop asking every professional sports outlet for money. or a job. it’s not going to work…
…or is it???
ON ESPN’s HIT NEW REALITY SHOW: A SLANCH FOR ALL SEASONS
watch as uncoordinated blogger David “Slanch” Siegel participates in 4 major professional sports. will he succeed? will he fail? and how many bones will he break? find out, only on “A Slanch for All Seasons!” — premiering this Tuesday night after an all new episode “The Bad Guys Won” — our minseries about at those depraved 86 mets!