Thursday, September 20, 2012

Wang will start Sunday

US Presswire photo
Chien-Ming Wang tossed 2 1/3 scoreless innings of relief last night.
Faced with a decision to pitch a starter on short rest or use a spot start from his bullpen on Sunday against the Brewers, Nationals manager Davey Johnson has decided to send Chien-Ming Wang to the mound for his first start since June 19.

The situation arose after a postponed game on Tuesday against the Dodgers forced a doubleheader the following day.

After using both Jordan Zimmermann and John Lannan on Wednesday against Los Angeles, Johnson looked towards Sunday with a decision between Craig Stammen and Wang. The Nationals’ manager narrowed it down between the two based on matchups; the Brewers offer a lineup loaded with right-handed bats. Giving the start to Wang also allows Johnson to keep Stammen in his current role in the bullpen, a middle-inning specialist with the ability to pitch in long relief.

"The other guy I was going to do is Stammen, but I really like the role that he is in," Johnson said. "He is invaluable in the role. If I started him, I would lose him two or three days before and two or three days after. I don't want to do that at this point."
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4 comments:

peric said...

Looks like Natslady got it right ... unfortunately that one may have to be pegged as a loss. Wang has an above 6 for a reason. But he was Davey's idea this season and so ... here we go again ...

sm13 said...

Yuk. Sorry I'll be there to watch. Hopefully we can score a lot of runs.

natsfan1a said...

I'll be there to watch and hoping for the best.

Iowa Nats Fan said...

My expectation is 3-4 IP w/3 R out of him followed by a long reliever working another 3. Hopefully this will be only spot in remaining schedule where they'll need to start Wang. I agree with Davey's rationale here; using Stammen would mean he's unavailable for about a 5-6 game stretch in the middle relief role which could cost more than 1 bad start by Wang. They'll get through it.

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