Revisiting the Nats' Quest to Avoid 100 Losses

Just three days ago I completely wrote off the Nationals' chances of avoiding 100 losses and even declared that they might skid to the finish and drop 110+.

But coming off a sweep of the fading Dodgers, the Nats need just to go 14-14 over the remaining 28 games to finish a triumphant 63-99. Granted, their winning percentage on the year is .366, so to go .500 for a month might be asking a lot.

Let's look at the remaining schedule:

Seven games vs. 59-75 Atlanta
Six vs. 73-61 Philly
Six vs. the 74-60 Mets
Six vs. 68-66 Florida
Three vs. 51-82 San Diego

The 18 games against winning ball clubs don't bode well, but if they can own the Braves and Padres and split with the Marlins, they could still get to magical win number 63.

Countdowns to make you forget about how bad your baseball team is:

1 day until Maryland Football Season Opener (vs. Delaware)
6 days until Redskins Season Opener (@ NY Giants)
9 days until Ravens Season Opener (vs. Cincinnati)*
42 days until Capitals Season Opener (@ Atlanta)
61 days until Wizards Season Opener (vs. New Jersey)
77 days until Maryland Basketball Opener (vs. Bucknell)

*If you're using this to make you feel better about your horrible baseball team, you have issues.
 

Pop the Champagne

The O's will NOT lose 100 games this year.

Last night's 11-3 stomping of the White Sox not only avoided a sweep, it also was win number 63 for the Orioles, which guarantees that they will not reach that big round number in losses that was talked about so much in March.

So here's a celebratory video for all of us O's fans:


Tiger Woods y'all. It's all good y'all.
 

Time to give up the dream

With 31 games left in the season, the Orioles are 7 games under .500. That means to break the string of 10 straight losing seasons they'd have to go a whopping 19-12 to finish the year.

With 17 of those 31 games coming against teams playing for a playoff spot (2 vs. the White Sox, 3 vs. Boston, 6 vs. Tampa, 3 vs. the Yankees and 3 vs. Minnesota), it's not looking promising.

Meanwhile, the Nationals also have 31 games left and they'd have to go 17-14 to keep from reaching the century mark in losses. That makes me feel kind of bad because I've said for a while (and may have even posted it here) that our local baseball teams couldn't possibly be bad enough to lose 100 games, because that requires a rare kind of awful.

The Rays (101 losses) and Royals (100) both did it in '06, but no National League team has dropped 100 games in a season since the D-Backs lost an impressive 111 in 2004 (the Nats can still match that monumental feat by sputtering to the finish line with a 5-26 mark ... and don't rule it out ... that's well above the pace they've been playing at for the last 16 games), and no NL East team has lost 100+ since the Marlins went 54-108 a decade ago.

Yep. Another baseball season winds up, and our local teams continue to put on quite the depressing show.

In the immortal words of Rob Schneider: "Oh no! We suck again!"


Countdowns to make you feel better:
4 Days until Maryland Football Season Opener (vs. Delaware)
9 Days until Redskins Season Opener (@ NY Giants)
12 Days until Ravens Season Opener (vs. Cincinnati)
45 Days until Capitals Season Opener (@ Atlanta)
64 Days until Wizards Season Opener (vs. New Jersey)