The Washington Nationals made a somewhat surprising move in the bullpen. With Clayton Beeter coming back from the IL, the Nats decided to option PJ Poulin to Triple-A. On the surface, this move seems pretty odd. Poulin leads the Nats in appearances with 23 and has posted a solid 2.91 ERA.
However, when you look under the hood, things make more sense. Despite Poulin’s low ERA, the underlying metrics agreed that he was getting lucky. Poulin’s xERA
and xFIP are both 5.46, while his FIP is 5.51. You have to believe that the Nats front office was looking at those numbers when they decided to send Poulin down.
Frankly, if you watch Nats games on a consistent basis, you do not need those fancy stats to tell you that Poulin was flirting with disaster. Poulin rarely had a shutdown outing and was consistently dealing with traffic on the bases. He also issued 14 walks in 21.2 innings, which is not ideal for a guy without overwhelming stuff.
The strikeout to walk rate is also something the Nats considered when sending him down. For the season, Poulin has 6.65 K/9 and 5.82 BB/9. Having nearly as many walks as strikeouts is not a recipe for long term success. Last season, Poulin actually did show some swing and miss stuff with 9.85 K/9. However, the whiffs have not been a big part of his game this season.
This season it just felt like Poulin did not really trust his stuff as much. He was constantly nibbling and trying to throw the perfect pitch instead of just attacking guys. Maybe that was due to a slight drop in velocity forcing him to try and be perfect. Poulin usually got out of the jams he put himself in, but the lefty was putting himself in bad spots too often.
Interestingly, I thought Poulin was at his best this year when he was opening games. He was an opener 5 times, and posted a 1.42 ERA with just one walk in 6.1 innings. However, when Poulin was put in higher leverage spots, he really struggled to throw strikes.
Another factor here is Richard Lovelady, who has a lot of similarities to Poulin. It felt like Lovelady started to eat into Poulin’s role. Both are lower slot lefties who rely on funk rather than velocity. Like Poulin, Lovelady allows his fair share of baserunners, but he can get ground balls and whiffs when he needs them more consistently than Poulin.
I do not want to knock Poulin too much while he is down here. He is still a solid arm and is very likely to be back in the big leagues at some point. There are going to be injuries and guys who start to struggle. When that happens, Poulin is going to be an arm the Nats will turn to again. He just needs to attack hitters some more and get back to doing what he did at the end of last season.
As for Clayton Beeter, it will be interesting to see what his role is. Beeter also has walk issues, but has dynamic swing and miss stuff. He was the de facto closer at the beginning of the season, but it feels like Gus Varland has taken that mantle. Beeter will be in the mix for high leverage looks, but I do not think he will be the big dog in the bullpen the way he was to start the year.
We just need to see more strikes from him. Beeter has the best raw stuff in this bullpen, but he can be erratic. However, when Beeter is on, he can be absolutely lights out. Beeter looked good on his rehab assignment in AAA, making two scoreless appearances. At his best, Beeter can be a real weapon.
The Nats are going to have to make another bullpen decision soon as well. Cole Henry is also on the mend, and has looked good during his rehab assignment. If he gets his spot in the bullpen back, who will the Nats send down? Paxton Schultz seems like an obvious candidate, but I wonder if Mitchell Parker could be in trouble. With Andrew Alvarez sticking in the big leagues, can the Nats afford to carry three long relievers?
There are some interesting conversations to be had with this bullpen. For the first time in a while, it feels like the Nats have a lot of options. Sure, none of the options are amazing, but they have plenty of guys who have shown they can have success in the big leagues if they are on their game. I am curious to see how the bullpen shakes out as we go through this season.
