Ivan Rodriguez retiring and the Texas Rangers' huge mistake; what a difference Pudge could have made

In July 1997, Texas Rangers fans plastered cars with bumper stickers and roadways with billboards imploring the team to sign their favorite player and future hall-of-fame catcher known affectionately by his one-word moniker, Pudge.

The Rangers, which earlier had traded for 33-year-old Angels catcher Jim Leyritz, ultimately got the message, with the help of one Ivan Rodriguez, and signed the then 25-year-old to a five-year, $42 million contract extension. But in 2002, the team blew it, and let arguably the greatest catcher ever to play the game get away.  

While the "Sign Pudge" campaign in '97 made headlines, Rodriguez quietly appeared at then-Rangers president Tom Schieffer's door sans agent and negotiated the 5-year deal, but left the club, when the contract expired, for the Florida Marlins and their youthful pitching staff.  Texas' front office suggested in 2002 that Pudge was bound to break down soon, having played nearly 1,500 games in his physically demanding position since he debuted in 1991 as a 19-year-old, and thus declined to extend his contract. Word also trickled out that Rangers' brass believed Rodriguez was more concerned about his hitting statistics than working with the team's pitchers, and decided his $10 million price-tag was too high and too risky.

So the beloved 30-year-old veteran catcher became battery mate to a rotation of young Marlins' upstarts with an average age of 25, and helped lead them to a World Series title that year, after earning the National League Championship Series MVP award. The shortsighted Rangers again finished in the American League West Division cellar even after spending $13 million on 30-year-old pitcher Chan Ho Park, who started only 7 games in his second season with the club.

 Pudge would sign in 2004 with the Detroit Tigers -- a team that lost an American League record 119 games the prior season -- and help lead the franchise and its youthful pitching staff from the cellar to the World Series in just three seasons. And from 2003 through 2008 with the Marlins and Tigers, Rodriguez took home three Gold Glove awards -- he owns the catcher's record with 13 -- and his seventh Silver Slugger award as the best hitting catcher, also an American League record and second only to catcher Mike Piazza, who earned 10 in the National League. So much for a player ready for the scrap heap.

During the same period, the Rangers would manage only one winning season and finish no better than third in the AL West, while cycling through four primary catchers -- Einar Diaz, then age 30; Rod Barajas, 28; Gerald Laird, 26; and Jarrod Saltalamacchia, 23. Their combined statistics from 2003 through the 2008 season pale when compared to Rodriguez's numbers during the same period. Some highlights:

2003-08 Catcher Stats	Pudge	Rangers
Games Played	755	780
Batting Average	.298	.258
Hits	861	675
Runs Batted In (RBI)	385	330
Runs Scored	390	357
Extra-base Hits (xBH)	274	241
Stolen Bases	40	14
Walks	161	161
Strike Outs	510	510
On-base % (OBP)	.348	.308
Runners caught stealing	39%	34%

Source: BaseballReference

Of the Rangers starting catchers from 2003 through 2008, one, Diaz, played only one season and was traded to the Montreal Expos before disappearing from Major League Baseball in 2006. The two former Texas prospects, Laird and Saltalamacchia, were dealt in trades, the latter coming in 2010. 

Even more than the firepower, the Rangers missed the opportunity to capitalize on their investment in Rodriguez, especially when they brought up Laird from the minor leagues and/or later traded for Saltalamacchia, a potential catching phenom that Texas acquired in July 2007 from Atlanta in the Mark Teixeira trade. Pudge would have been an excellent mentor to these youngsters, just ask Mike Rizzo and the Washington Nationals, where Rodriguez spent his final two seasons working with Wilson Ramos and Jesus Flores.

It will be a beautiful thing Monday in Arlington when Texas honors its fun-loving former catcher, who spent his first three seasons there as backstop for hall-of-famer and current Rangers president Nolan Ryan. The ballclub should be proud that Pudge wants to formerly announce his retirement with the team where his journey to Cooperstown began, but it should be ashamed that his final major league at-bat happened elsewhere.

Diamond notes Werth mentioning: Four hits first for Nationals rightfielder; Detwiler's 18-inning streak

WERTH IT OR WERTH LESS: Much can be said for Jason Werth's baseball intangibles on the field and in the dugout. In fact, too much has been said. The talking heads blather on nightly about his base-running prowess, his ability to make a pitcher work deep into counts, and his stellar defense.

Photo courtesy of MLB.com

The talk needs to stop until Werth puts his feet on the base-paths enough to justify the big contract he signed last season, when he recorded a career low .330 on-base average and an ugly .232 batting average.

Slapping four hits in a game, like he did against New York, helps, but the Nationals have seen too little of this kind of production. In fact, Tuesday night was the first time the team saw it, period. Werth never had more than three hits in a game during the 2011 season, and notched three hits in only six of the 150 games he played in his debut season with Washington. His last four-hit night was in June of 2009 with Philadelphia.

While ownership can never expect a player to consistently go 4-for-5 at the plate, players paid like top-notch studs are supposed to have banner nights now and then. Werth is not a .300 hitter, and only once in his Major League Baseball career has he produced an average above .275. He has to get on base this season at a higher rate to justify the seven-year, $126 million albatross of a contract he signed with the Nationals that left the rest of the league snickering.

LANNAN DEMOTION PROVES PRESCIENT: Perhaps the chattering will end after Ross Detwiler threw five scoreless, almost flawless innings in Tuesday's tilt against the Mets. Again, prognosticators had a virtual field day when John Lannan and his $5 million guaranteed contract were sent to AAA Syracuse two days before Opening Day, making Detwiler the No. 5 starter in Washington's rotation.

But a closer look at the 26-year-old former first-round pick's last three games, going back to mid-September, shows he should be a more than adequate replacement. Detwiler has pitched 18 consecutive scoreless innings, giving up only nine hits and four walks, while recording 13 strike-outs. He's a power pitcher, where Lannan relies on finesse -- a fine quality if you have Greg Maddux-like accuracy and half of your starts are in a pitcher's ballpark.

The Nationals have waited since 2007 for Detwiler to mature on the mound. He's arbitration eligible in 2013, so Washington's front office needs to determine whether he will be worth future investment in lieu of more one-year veteran signings like Edwin Jackson.

BEAST BESTED BY BACK: Nationals.com is reporting that rightfielder Michael Morse, Washington's biggest offensive weapon last season, was pulled Monday from a rehab game at Class A Hagerstown when he irritated his strained back muscle.

The last is first: Detwiler, offense blow by Mets, 6-2; Zimmerman first National to record 500 RBI

The last pitcher named to Washington’s rotation became the first starter to record a win this season, as Ross Detwiler threw five strong innings while Nationals batters, led by Jason Werth’s four hits, fleeced New York Mets’ pitchers for a 6-2 victory.

In all, Nationals hitters scattered 13 hits in their largest offensive outpouring so far this season.

But it was Detwiler who controlled the game, working quickly and changing speeds to keep Mets hitters off balance. After New York started the night with back-to-back hits from shortstop Ruben Tejada and third baseman Ronny Cedeno, playing in place of an injured David Wright, Detwiler retired 15 of the next 16 batters he faced, striking out six, walking just one and silencing the Citi Field fans. 

Video courtesy of MLB.com

The 26-year-old, and former first-round draft pick, had one luxury his rotation mates lacked in their starts – an early lead, thanks to Ian Desmond’s lead-off home run. The Nationals’ shortstop started the game by blasting a 2-1 Dillon Gee fastball into the left field seats , his first home run of the season, and the first of his two hits on the night. 

But that’s where the scoring ended until the top of the sixth, when Nationals hitters appeared to figure out Gee’s assortment of breaking pitches and dancing 80 mph change-ups. Ryan Zimmerman led off the inning by ripping a double into the left-field corner. After first baseman Adam LaRoche struck out for the third time against Gee, Werth slapped an 83 mph slider into right field, and Zimmerman sprinted home from second base – Werth’s first RBI of the season. 

Xavier Nady followed with a single to left, and Gee gave way to the Mets bullpen and hard-throwing Bobby Parnell. But New York’s luck didn’t change. Roger Bernadina reached base when New York second baseman Daniel Murphy booted his ground ball, allowing Werth to score from second. 

Catcher Wilson Ramos drove in the third run of the inning with a scorched a line drive double into right centerfield, scoring Nady from second. Pinch-hitter Chad Tracy and Desmond struck out to end the sixth, and leaving the Nationals with their first comfortable lead of the season, 4-0.

 Werth, who was mired in a 1-for-14 hitting slump to start the season, grabbed his second RBI of 2012 with a one-out, line-drive single to centerfield in the seventh, scoring Zimmerman, who walked earlier in the inning. Zimmerman would later record his 500^th career RBI with a sacrifice fly in the eighth inning. 

New York tallied its first run in the bottom of the seventh on a double by Jason Bay, a Lucas Duda fly-ball out and a Justin Turner line drive, but the Nationals bullpen quickly snuffed any further scoring opportunities in the inning. 

The Mets would add their final run in the eighth after Washington set-up man Tyler Clippard walked Tejada leading off the inning, then threw a high breaking pitch to Cedeno, who smashed it over Bernadina’s head in centerfield, scoring Tejada from first.

The Nationals and Mets will meet in a 1:10 p.m. matinee Monday at Citi Field with a battle of arms, as Stephen Strasburg goes head-to-head with New York ace Johan Santana.

Winds of Wrigley: Nats win season opener in 2-1 pitchers' duel.

Steven Strasburg and the Washington bullpen posted a one-run, six-hit opening act Thursday afternoon, keeping the Nationals' anemic offense in the game long enough for a dramatic finish and a 2-1 win over the Cubs in Chicago.

Ian Desmond flipped a two-out single to right field in the ninth inning to drive in pinch-runner Brett Carroll from second base after Nationals newcomer Chad Tracy doubled off the still-dormant Wrigley Field ivy in right, missing a home run by a foot.

Right-hander Brad Lidge took the mound in the bottom of the inning to record his 224th career save -- his first in a Nats uniform, and preserved when third baseman Ryan Zimmerman gunned down the tying run at the plate.

 Video courtesy of MLB.com

But it was Strasburg's arm that really stole the show. Throwing with an efficiency that defies his age, the 23-year-old roared through seven innings on 82 pitches -- 58 for strikes. The Nats ace allowed one run on five hits, striking out five. He displayed tremendous control while firing his two-seam and four-seam fastballs as high as 98 mph, then buckled Cubs hitters' knees with precision curveballs.

Yet Strasburg left the game with a 1-0 deficit due primarily to veteran Cubs starter Ryan Dempster, who seemed inspired by direct competition with the Nats youthful fireballer. Dempster pitched 7.2 innings and struck out 10 Washington hitters, who spent the majority of the windy afternoon flailing at his split-finger fastball and tailing change-up.

The Nationals squandered two early chances to stake Strasburg with a lead. Desmond slapped the first pitch of the game into shallow right field for a single, and moved to second base when the next hitter, second-baseman Danny Espinosa, worked his first walk of the afternoon on five pitches.

Both runners advanced on Ryan Zimmerman's towering fly ball to deep left-centerfield, and which appeared to be headed downtown before the Wrigley winds shoved it back into play and into former National Marlon Byrd's glove for the first out of the inning.

First baseman Adam LaRoche, batting for the first time since his 2011 season abruptly ended in late May due to a shoulder injury, promptly struck out -- the first of three he would suffer against Dempster.  Five-hole hitter Jason Werth then flied out to right to end the inning.

In all, Nationals hitters stranded six runners in scoring position; Werth alone marooned four of them, but like his former Philadelphia-turned-Washington teammate Lidge, he came through in the end.

With the bases loaded and two outs in the eighth inning, Werth worked a walk on six Kerry Wood fastballs, pushing Desmond home from third and tying the game 1-1. The young Nationals shortstop ended the day with three hits in five trips to the plate, along with an RBI and a run scored.

Chicago's lone run came in the fourth in a bizarre sequence that only the Cubs could manufacture. After shortstop Starlin Castro grounded out to short on a 97 mph Strasburg offering that splintered his bat, Alfonso Soriano singled to center.

Soriano advanced to second when Ian Stewart tapped a dribbler that was fielded cleanly by catcher Wilson Ramos, but who tried to get the lead runner. Ramos' errant, ill-advised throw carried past Espinosa and into centerfield.

But Ramos atoned for his error moments later, picking off Soriano as he attempted to steal third. Jeff Baker walked, bringing up Byrd, who lined a fastball down the left-field line to score Stewart from second, and stake the Cubs to a 1-0 lead.

The Cubs' last chance came in the ninth. With one out, Stewart smashed a 90 mph fastball to the right-field wall. Again the Wrigley Field winds toyed with the ball, which dropped just out of Werth's reach for a triple.

Pinch runner Joe Mather replaced Stewart, and dashed home on Baker's sharply hit grounder to third, which Zimmerman easily picked and fired to Ramos, who tagged the sliding base runner. Byrd then watched a Lidge fastball catch the outside corner for the final out.