District On Deck
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Washington Nationals: Offensive awakening in the city that never sleeps?

By Blake Finney

WASHINGTON, DC - AUGUST 01: Wilmer Difo #1 of the Washington Nationals steals second base against Jose Reyes #7 of the New York Mets during the seventh inning at Nationals Park on August 01, 2018 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON, DC - AUGUST 01: Wilmer Difo #1 of the Washington Nationals steals second base against Jose Reyes #7 of the New York Mets during the seventh inning at Nationals Park on August 01, 2018 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images) /
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The Washington Nationals are fresh off a nice series win against the Phillies. Can they sweep the New York Mets this weekend to keep the feel-good factor?

It’s certainly been an interesting week for the Washington Nationals organization. To wrap it up, they head to the big apple to face the New York Mets.

Joining Blake Finney on this edition of the DoDCast to look ahead to the series is Andrew Lang from TalkNats. You can check it out here.

On this episode, they look at the following:

  • The epic pitchers duel between Max Scherzer and Aaron Nola
  • Ryan Zimmerman and his walk-off heroics
  • The waivers trade the Nats made in the week
  • Which Mets should we watch out for?
  • Preview and predict each pitching matchup individually

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The Mets have a budding young middle infield pairing that will be worth keeping an eye on this series. Amed Rosario, a former top prospect has been leading off a lot lately and has heated up. In the last 15 days, he’s hitting .328 with 12 RBI and four steals. But his partner seems to be doing even better than that.

The other half of the pairing, Jeff McNeil, has really emerged in his rookie season. He sports an impressive .330/.387/.485 batting line and he’s drawn some comparisons to former Met and Nat Daniel Murphy. If they get a Murphy clone on the field, then they’ll have done a fantastic job.

On the pitching side, Zack Wheeler has been flat-out dominant for the Mets lately. He’s pitched to the tune of a 1.38 ERA in his last six starts, to go with 40 Ks in 39 innings and just 7 walks and draws the start on Saturday. After all the injuries in his career, Wheeler finally seems to be living up to the hype he had.

This series presents an ideal chance for Gio Gonzalez to bounce back from a truly dreadful stretch he’s had lately. He has a 7.07 ERA in his last 13 games, but we saw earlier this year, thanks to Tommy Milone, that the Mets have an offense that can go missing easily.

Want to hear more about the Washington Nationals on our DoDCast? You can subscribe to us on iTunes or Google Play and have episodes automatically downloaded for you. You can also listen to us on other podcast platforms such as Stitcher and Spreaker.

Next. Five players who could depart via waiver trades. dark

The Washington Nationals will likely need to pick up a series sweep in this series if they seriously want to keep hope alive. We’ll have to see how it goes, but they shouldn’t take the Mets lightly.

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