He’s thrown strikes throughout his pro career, and keeps his cool in tough situations. I like Ferrer. No one should blame him for his pitching coach or manager. He’s not even arb eligible yet, and needs to be part of the pen for the next few years at least.
I completely agree with you. I like him a lot. I just want his use optimized for his development. I don't particularly mind his performance when viewed as a learning curve. In a good bullpen, he'd be #4 or #5 rather than the primary set up guy and fireman.
EMERGENCY EMERGENCY
There is nothing more demoralizing for a team than to have the bullpen blow leads game after game. The last time this happened was 2015, which was a miserable year to be a Nats fan. Now we're reliving the nightmare 10 years later. The 2025 Nats have a reasonable chance of making the postseason ONLY if upper management acquires a couple more decent bullpen arms NOW.
hold on, help is coming. Keep Henry healthy and limit him to 1 inning for now. His stuff can play. Rutledge can be a multi-inning keep it close when behind guy that you need. So long as the starters are pitching like the past 10 games, that helps cover things.
I'm OK with Lopez; even the blown hold Wednesday wasn't a big bad - got 2 outs when he came in with the bases loaded; next inning the leadoff triple was the big damage. Almost all of the damage on the year was in 2 outings on 4/13 & 16 against Miami and pittsburgh - 7 runs in 1.2 IP with 5 H, 2 BB, and 1 HR. 5 no hit no walk appearances out of his 11. He can be in the mix of useful guys.
To my eye, we have 3-5 or useful pieces right now: Finnegan, Lopez, Henry, Rutledge, and Ferrer, with the later two maybe better in low to medium leverage for a while.
As soon as Brzykcy is ready, he's an easy swap for Salazar if he's still ineffective. Sims and Poche just need to be spotted in carefully, preferably behind by 4 runs or so, to see if they can figure something out.