It's not just Ian Desmond who has to cut down on the K's in 2012, and it's not just the strikeouts the Nats' shortstop has to limit. Desmond's 139 K's were the most by a shortstop in 2011 and combined with Jayson Werth's 160 (2nd amongst RF in MLB), Danny Espinosa's 166 (1st amongst MLB 2B), Michael Morse's 126 (a disappointing 7th league-wide amongst 1B) as Nats' Skipper Davey Johnson put it this winter,"[We] struck out too much, tried to do too much, didn't make pitchers throw the ball in the strike zone, didn't hit the fastball as well as we should have, a mountain of things, a few things defensively, but I think we definitely can get there and a good Spring Training and a good start..."

The Nationals, as a team, led the majors in K's. K's with men on base. K's with men in scoring position.

The Nationals are counting on the 26-year-old Desmond being able to cut down on the strikeouts, get on base more often as the leadoff hitter and limit the errors at short. The '04 3rd Round pick committed 11 fewer errors in '11 than his league-leading 34 in 146 games at short in 2010, managing to cut the throwing errors down from 13 to 4 in his second full season in the Nationals' infield, but his 23 total errors were still the second-most by a shortstop in the NL though, and his 19 fielding errors were tied for the league-lead with the Texas Rangers' Elvis Andrus. Desmond's -5.5 UZR/150 at short was the third-lowest in the NL amongst shortstops with at least 1000.0 innings at the position last season.

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Before the end of an early November interview with ESPN980's Kevin Sheehan and Thom Loverro, back even before the Washington Nationals had announced that Davey Johnson would return to manage the team in 2012, the then-68-now-69-year-old skipper said that he was already waking up at night thinking about the new season and who would be his Opening Day starter on April 5th in Wrigley Field. "Well, you guys know," Johnson said, meaning all-things considered it will be 23-year-old right-hander Stephen Strasburg facing the Cubs in Chicago in game one of one hundred sixty-two on the 2012 schedule. But one thing the manager said had to be considered was the weather. "If it was thirty-two degrees maybe it might be someone else, you know" Johnson joked. (ed. note - "For the record, the average Chicago temperature in early April is between a low of 40 and a high of 58.")

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23-year-old, Fulton, Maryland-born infielder Steve Lombardozzi was drafted out of St. Petersburg College in St. Petersburg, Florida 571st overall in 2008 with the Washington Nationals' 19th Round pick. Over four seasons in the Nats' system since he was selected the 6'0'', 170 lb switch-hitter has a .298/.369/.411 line with 90 doubles, 28 triples, 17 HR's and 74 stolen bases in 447 games and 2,001 plate appearances. Last year, at two stops in the Nats' organization with Double-A Harrisburg and then Triple-A Syracuse, the then-22-year-old second baseman (who turned 23 in September and played a little short) had a combined .309/.360/.430 line with 25 doubles, nine triples, eight HR's and 30 stolen bases.

Defensively, Lombardozzi had a .996 FLD% in 122 games played in 2011. The son of former major league infielder Steve Lombardozzi (MIN, HOU) made just two errors in 66 games at Double-A, and he played 59 games at Triple-A without making an error.

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Current Washington Nationals' manager Davey Johnson was the New York Mets' skipper from 1984-1990. From 1985-1988 Gary Carter was the Mets' no.1 catcher after he'd established himself during twelve seasons with the Montreal Expos. In 1986 the two men went to the World Series together, winning New York's first championship since 1969. On behalf of the Washington Nationals, the 69-year-old Johnson, who returned to the bench in the majors for the first time in 11 seasons in the nation's capital last summer, issued the following statement tonight about Carter's passing at 57 years of age after a battle with cancer:

• A STATEMENT FROM DAVEY JOHNSON ON BEHALF OF THE WASHINGTON NATIONALS REGARDING THE PASSING OF HALL-OF-FAME CATCHER GARY CARTER:

When Montreal Expos' 1972 3rd Round pick and HOF catcher Gary Carter traveled to the nation's capital in August of 2010 to take part in a ceremony to recognize former Expos' outfielder and then-recently-elected Hall of Famer Andre Dawson's induction into the hallowed halls, Carter was surprised and moved to find that his name too had been added to the so-called "Ring of Honor" which wrapped around the facade which hung below the first level above the field level seats in Nationals Park. Carter and Dawson's names were placed (alongside the Expos' stylized eMb logo) side-by-side with the names of the Hall of Fame Senators' players who had once called Washington, D.C. their home. The Nationals' decision to recognize the Montreal Expos' past of the franchise they inherited meant a lot to Carter as "The Kid" explained to reporters.

"I just found out about five minutes ago that they put this ring of honor up there," Carter said, "I mean, I'm just overwhelmed. To now be recognized with Andre Dawson and all the great Washington Senators' players, I'm speechless basically, and that's tough for me to do, you know, but when I was doing the interview they told me about this and so there will always be a remembrance here at Nationals Park, and I'm very honored and very proud."

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In discussing the ways in which Washington Nationals' manager Davey Johnson had changed his thinking in Johnson's first year back managing in the majors in eleven years, Nats' GM Mike Rizzo pointed to Johnson's use of the bullpen, telling the Washington Post's Thomas Boswell last November, as quoted in an article entitled, "With Davey Johnson back, Nationals will be fun and fascinating", that the 69-year-old veteran of 13 seasons as a player and 15 as a skipper remains, "... an innovator,":

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5. Jayson Werth, Year Two: Remember last Spring when Jayson Werth was standing behind the batting cage with D.C. GM Mike Rizzo joking about their feelings for the Philadelphia Phillies, the Nats' NL East "rivals"? Then they weren't doing that. Remember the first time the Nats' new $126M dollar outfielder stepped in against closer Drew Storen for some live BP and got thrown at by the Nationals' then-23-year-old closer, who wanted to let the former Phillie know he didn't forget the previous September's walk-off HR in Philadelphia. Things were different then. People are still trying to figure out what went wrong with Werth in the first year of his seven-year deal. In a report last night on the MLB Network Show Clubhouse Confidential they pointed to Werth's splits against left-handed pitchers, with Werth down from a .278/.382/.526 career line to .184/.307/.368 last season and his BABIP, which fell from .324, .304 and .352 from '08-2010 to a career worst .286 in 2011. A report by ESPN.com's Mark Simon yesterday looked deeper into Werth's struggles against left-handers pointing to the drop in his line drive percentage against LHP which was down from 19% in 2010 to 10% in 2011 and his issues in two-strike counts on the year...

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Asked earlier this winter what his goal was for the 2012 Nats, skipper Davey Johnson said he was aiming for nothing short of a pennant, and he told reporters he believed, "the talent is there," for the 2012 Washington Nationals to make a run in the NL East. D.C. GM Mike Rizzo, who started the winter saying the Nats were a pitcher and an outfield bat away from contending, told reporters after introducing left-hander Gio Gonzalez to the nation's capital's last month that even without adding a slugger (though they'd considered signing Prince Fielder), he believed that it was possible the 2012 Nats could improve their offense and compete. "That other bat may be a healthy Adam LaRoche," Rizzo argued, "A healthy full season Ryan Zimmerman and a back-to-Jayson Werth-Jayson Werth. I think that with the maturation of our young core, of [Wilson] Ramos getting better, [Danny] Espinosa getting better, [Ian Desmond] getting better, just by maturing and playing another season and with the continued success of Morse, LaRoche getting better, Zim playing a full season and Jayson coming back to his career norms, I think we have addressed the offensive part."

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