I like Jurrjens, and it feels odd to call a 26-year-old toast, but they've gotta get him out of the rotation.

It's actually worse than it sounds, because it's been a bad rotation. So far, it's consisted of a reliable pitcher, a middling pitcher, two struggling kids, and a guy whose season could end (or whose effectiveness could vanish) at any minute, and the reliable guy is a 37-year-old sinkerballer. The young pitching in particular has taken a tumble.

Pitchers can definitely be toast at 26. See Kazmir, Scott; see also Willis, Dontrelle, and Avery, Steve.

But what actually *happened* to Jurrjens? I'm not a Brave fans (obviously), so I don't really know anything about his history; was there an injury? Some perceptible inflection point? Because right now he's simply abominable.

That said, I'm sure that MLB has collected the needle used to inject Zimmerman's cortisone shot and sent it over to WADA for testing...must be SOMETHING in there other than MLB-approved medications triggering this ridiculous offensive explosion.

Part of the problem, I'm sure, is that Jurrjens was never Steve Avery to begin with; at Jurrjens' peak level, just some very subtle/nigh-undiagnosable problem developing in your arm can crater your K rate and you're finished as a major league pitcher. Similarly to what commonly happens with teenage pitchers; sometimes a young pitcher suffers no identifiable injury, but his body subtly changes and he loses 4 MPH off his fastball or a little bite off his slider, and just like that his major league dreams are over.

Jurrjens' case is a combination of regressing to the mean (he was performing well over his abilities for the better part of the 2011 season) plus an injury. He has a troublesome knee that has contributed to a reduction in his velocity (4-6 mph) to the point where he has to maintain pinpoint location to be effective. When he can't, you see outings like today.

I don't think he's reminded anybody of Greg Maddux even on his best days.

Pitchers can definitely be toast at 26. See Kazmir, Scott; see also Willis, Dontrelle, and Avery, Steve.

Something Mike Rizzo needs to tell Stephen Strasburg the day he shuts him down.

It doesn't have anything to do with innings counts. (Well, not until they veer into Lasorda/Baker-level abuse territory, anyway.) Some guys' arms can take it, some guys' arms can't, from where medical science currently stands there's no way to tell the difference until a guy's arm goes.

After that offensive explosion yesterday, the Nationals are now #10 in the majors in team OPS. Oddly, the team OPS+ is only 98 though.

It's good that they're pretty much clicking on all cylinders, because Ian Desmond has been put on the D.L., and is going to miss at least two weeks, and possibly more.

Is Hanson broken too? With Jurrjens imploding, I didn't realize how mediocre he had become.

It's good that they're pretty much clicking on all cylinders

You did say "pretty much", but their closer is not exactly clicking, or they'd have taken three of four.

It's good that they're pretty much clicking on all cylinders, because Ian Desmond has been put on the D.L., and is going to miss at least two weeks, and possibly more.

It's a good thing this times precisely with Danny Espinosa deciding to no longer be a void of suck.

You can argue that Espinosa is a better shortstop than Desmond, and that Lombardozzi is almost as good a 2B as Espinosa, so the defense may make up some of the power loss, but they would really be rolling the dice by leaving DeRosa as the backup. It sounds like a month for Desmond's injury to me.

Werth should be back soon, too. So, it will essentially be Werth replacing Desmond in the line up.

Oblique tear does not sound like a two week recovery to me. Hopefully I'm wrong.