There have been many levels of the return of baseball to DC. First the Nationals debut at RFK. Then the Sunday night affair against Atlanta to open the new ballpark in 2008. Now the arrival of the franchise is complete-- its first bonafide star (Ryan Zimmerman's a very good player, but not on the star level). And the product was better than the promotion. "It's better to travel hopefully than actually arrive" has been a sad reality in the DC area over the last two decades: Heath Shuler, Chris Webber, Kwame Brown, Jaromir Jagr, Joe Gibbs II, the Caps in the Playoffs... Stephen Strasburg had more than a few examples of hype turned bad to look at before he took the mound in his major league debut.
And what a debut... 14 strikeouts (although it was Pittsburgh- technically they're still major-leaguers)... no walks... and four hits scattered over seven innings. Meanwhile, the middle of the order produced with home runs by Zimmerman, Adam Dunn and Josh Willingham- and the bullpen shut the door effectively to give Strasburg the victory.
I could think of two other spectacular debuts on the Strasburg level: Magic Johnson either assisted on or hit the buzzer-beating shot in his first NBA game and hugged Kareem like they just won the title... and Archie Manning ran for the game-winning touchdown against the Rams in his first game quarterbacking the Saints. I'm sure there are others, but those are the two that came to mind first: heavily hyped athlete comes through in the clutch to lead his team to victory. Feel free to email me your favorite debut.
The best part about Strasburg's first start? The framework appears to be in place for a contending team. Zimmerman, Dunn and Willingham are all on pace to hit 30 home runs... Ian Desmond looks to be another long term infield solution... and the relief corps has a slew of young arms from Drew Storen to Matt Capps (the closer is just 26). Strasburg's emergence as a #1 means everybody can slide down one spot in the rotation; in theory he'll eat up innings (6 to 7 per start) so there will be less pressure on the bullpen as well.
Could this merely be a June mirage? Conventional wisdom says Strasburg will run into problems once he's gone through the league a couple of times as opponents will be able to effectively scout him. Even so, the makings of a consistent 15 to 20 game winner were on display. We're not used to dreaming about baseball greatness in Washington. But that was before the kid lived up to the hype.
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