1st: it is September 1st and very important that the Washington Nationals are in 1st place in the NL East
78-55: is the Nationals won-loss record overall with 29 games to play.
#21: is the Nationals Magic Number. They call the Magic Number the number of games to clinch the division. If the Nationals were to go 21-8 for the remainder of the season it would not matter what the other teams do. For every Nationals win the Magic Number is reduced by one number and for every loss by the 2nd place team the magic number is also reduced unless like we saw this week that there is a tie for second place in which case the Magic Number does not move.
+9.0: is the lead in the standings the Nationals have ahead of the 2nd place NY Mets. The Mets play tonight which will move that number to either +9.5 if the Mets lose or +8.5 if the Mets win tonight. If the Mets lose, the Magic Number will also move. The range after the Nats three head-to-head games with the Mets this weekend are worst case scenario the Nats would head out of NY with a +5.5 game lead to as much as +12.5, but the numbers are calculated by what happens tonight, and also the Marlins could retake 2nd place over the Mets depending on how their series goes with the Cleveland Indians.
#2: The Nationals are currently in the #2 position in the postseason seeding which would allow the Nationals to host the Los Angeles Dodgers if the season ended today. The Dodgers are 74-59
#40: Today is the day that teams will start expanding rosters for September, and can continue to add to their roster for the remainder of the regular season up to 40 players. Most teams do not add that many additional players, but it should not surprise us if the Nationals add 8 to 12 additional players.
83: That is the number of wins the Nationals had for the 2015 season. The Nationals are just 6 wins away from eclipsing that number. Interestingly, the Nationals statistical Pythagorean has the Nationals currently at 81-52 which says the team has been unlucky.
5 & 20: The Nationals have 5 players who have hit 20 home runs this season which includes Daniel Murphy, Bryce Harper, Wilson Ramos, Danny Espinosa and Jayson Werth. Anthony Rendon is 4 home runs away from joining this group and Ryan Zimmerman is 7 home runs away.
162: Daniel Murphy now has 162 hits this season.
190.0: Max Scherzer has pitched 190 innings so far this season. At some point, the Nats need to think about saving some innings for late October.
126: The Nationals have now turned 126 doubleplays which is an impressive number.
2.87: Tanner Roark leads the team in ERA and is now Top 10 in the Major Leagues. Max Scherzer is 0.02 behind Roark in ERA. They are the second best duo behind the Cubs top 2 pitchers.
Do you have any favorite numbers to share?
