Despite the bullpen meltdown the other day, the Nationals are not making any changes to the active roster. Mitchell Parker and Paxton Schultz are staying around despite their roles in blowing a 9-1 lead. Teams were 1-3,090 when leading by 8+ runs after 7 innings, but the Giants got that second win.
Honestly the lack of moves was a surprise to me, and was a bit upsetting. You would think that there would be consequences after a meltdown of those proportions. However, that is clearly not how Blake Butera and this front office think. They do not want to let singular games impact their decision making.
In today’s pre-game press conference, I asked Butera about what they see in Parker to keep him around. His answer is a little over two minutes in. The first thing Butera mentioned was Parker’s ability to throw strikes. Parker does throw a lot of strikes, only walking 5.7% of hitters. However, he has been throwing too many hittable pitches.
One thing that Butera really emphasized was how sharp Parker was when he got back up to the majors. Butera said, “When he first came up here, there were a lot of really good reviews and it is our job to get him back there”. I understand this, at least partially. Parker did look really good when he came up, and Butera is going to want to stick up for his guy.
However, I do not understand why he cannot try and get back to his best at the AAA level. This team is playing well right now, and it is a bit unfair to the offense to have a guy struggling this badly at the MLB level. Butera even mentioned that Parker could be struggling with mindset and confidence issues. Is that really a guy you want in the show on a team in the wild card mix?
As I said in the question, Parker has a 6.44 ERA since May 1st of last year. We have a long track record of Mitchell Parker not being a good big league pitcher. That little spurt Butera mentioned seems like more of an outlier.
Butera said that the Nats do not want to make decisions off of one game, but for Parker this is much more than one bad game. With PJ Poulin eligible to come back to the show, I just cannot understand this decision to stick with Mitch.
For Paxton Schultz, I asked Butera why his highs and lows are so extreme. Butera pointed to the walk issues that Schultz ran into. He said that solo homers are fine, but issuing free passes and allowing things to snowball is not.
The Nationals bullpen melted down in epic fashion the other day, but Paul Toboni and Blake Butera are sticking with the process. This is not a group that will allow one game to influence decisions. However, for a pitcher like Mitchell Parker it has been more than one game and fans are well aware of this. For now, Parker is staying and that leaves fans with more questions than answers.
