Shocking, I know. Jayson Stark of ESPN.com alluded to the inevitable earlier this week, when two scouts told him that the chances the Nationals will keep Morgan are “nonexistent.”
Let’s just say that Morgan isn’t doing anything to change their minds. Take last night’s game against the Marlins, for instance. Batting eighth, Morgan reached on a two-out single in the bottom of the second inning. For some reason, he thought it was be a wise idea to attempt to steal with the pitcher batting. He was snuffed out at second base, leaving John Lannan to lead off the third.
Recent history between the two clubs aside, this is just bad baseball. Even a little leaguer knows not to run there. Perhaps more shocking than the act of attempting to steal the base, Nationals manager Jim Riggleman failed to call him out on it, according to Mark Zuckerman of Nats Insider.
“That’s his game. I can’t ask him to hit eighth
but don’t run. I really thought he would get that base. The pitcher
wasn’t real quick to the plate. But the catcher made a great throw, and
he got him. That’s Nyjer’s game. I can’t take that away from him.”
Hey, Jim, there is this thing called a “stop sign.” When somebody only has a 66 percent success rate in stealing bases, you should probably look into it, regardless of where they hit in the lineup. Just another example of confusing aggressiveness with stupidity.
Fortunately, MLB is about to levy a lengthy suspension on Morgan, so the Nats won’t have to deal with his distractions and poor fundamentals much longer.
