What can Dunn do your you?

On most nights the Nationals cannot buy a run. It is like Washington's offense mirrors the business on Capitol Hill -- slow, stagnant and dull to watch. A perpetual filibuster impeding on progress.

Thus, the notion of trading the most productive piece of the lineup -- Adam Dunn -- would seem like a major mistake. Ryan Zimmerman and Josh Willingham have enough troubles on their hands as the Nationals offense has sputtered in June. Imagine the drop off without Dunn and a disappointing summer in D.C. becomes downright unbearable.

These are temporal concerns. That Nats are going to be better than their last two 59 win campaigns yet, at 33-44 they are on target for a 69 wins and a forgotten entity in Washington come August when Redskins training camp gets into full gear. Hence, no matter what the Nats do, the second half of 2010 is as much a throwaway as the last five years of baseball in the nation's capital.

Hence, trading Dunn now does not seem that bad of an option. He is making $12 million of his two-year $20 million contract this year and, if he was traded today, the organization that picked him up would take on approximately $6.3 million of that contract (considering a $12 million contract comes to about $74,000 a game, times 85 more games). That is not an insignificant chunk of change, about 11 percent of the Nats season payroll of $66.275 million.

Nationals president Stan Kasten knows what it takes to build a winner in the Majors. He presided over one of the greatest stretches in the history of major league baseball as the Braves president from 1986 to 2003 when the Braves won 14 straight division titles, a World Series and sported one of the greatest collection of pitching arms in the modern era.

That is what Kasten and general manager Mike Rizzo will be looking for in dangling Dunn -- pitching. Not just any pitching though. The Nats are not exactly in a position to be buyers where a stabilizing starter and reliever will put them over the top. Washington is on the lookout for close to major league ready young pitching with high upside. The ideal would be someone in double or triple A who could break the rotation by July 2011 at the earliest. 

According to the rumor mill, the White Sox and Angels are the teams most interested in Dunn. So, heading over to Baseball-Reference to check on the organizational pitching depth charts of those two particular organizations and you find . . . 

Just about nothing.

Los Angeles and Chicago are interesting teams. Both have been strong over the last decade and are too proud to throw the towel in on any season. Both started this year on down streaks only to come back in the last month to be contenders in their respective divisions once again and go from probably sellers to definite buyers. Yet, because of this competitive nature, neither team has much depth left on the farm, either from graduation or previous trades.

It is not like Dunn will bring a future John Smoltz or Greg Maddux to Washington in any deal. But, Washington could hope for a player on par with a guy like Derek Lowe (discounting the fact that the Heathcliff Slocumb for Lowe and Jason Varitek trade between the Red Sox and Mariners in 1998 was perhaps the most lopsided deal in the last 20 years), a sinker-baller that is durable to slot into the middle of the rotation for the next five years or so.

The two most promising players in the upper-echelon of the White Sox organization appear to be Daniel RHPs Daniel Hudson and Carlos Torres. Hudson, 23, was a fifth round draft pick in 2008 and is 10-3 in 15 starts this season at triple-A Charlotte. He has a 3.84 ERA over 82.1 innings and a K/9 rate of 10.6. His BB/9 is a touch high at 3.0. In six games (two starts) with the White Sox last year he went 18.2 innings with 6.8 K/9 though an abnormally high 4.3 BB/9. That figures to come down closer to his minor league average given more time in the majors. In the majors last year he had 20 ground balls (including one bunt) versus 38 fly balls/line drives (32 and 6).

Torres, 26, is a touch too old to be considered much of a prospect anymore and did not pitch particularly well in 28.1 innings last year (30 hits, 17 walks, 19 earned runs). His strikeout rate was OK at 7.0 per nine but he also sported an absurdly high 5.4 BB/9, well above his still high 3.7 rate through five plus seasons in the minors.

MinorLeagueBaseball.com rank Hudson and Torres as the 1st and 20th best prospects in the Chicago organization, respectively and it is not outside the realm of reality that Dunn would be worth the best prospect in a weak farm system along with a a guy who could end up being a useful arm to have kicking around the organization. Other names to watch would be LHP Santos Rodriguez (10th, primarily a reliever) or Jhonny Nunez (12th).

The Angels are similar in having poor depth in the system but have a significantly larger pool of pitchers to choose from. The top names on the list are LHP Trevor Reckling, who is having a terrible season after being promoted to triple-A this season (4-7, 8.53 ERA with appropriately terrible supporting numbers). 

Right-hander Garret Richards is the Angels No. 4 prospect and has played well after being a 2009 supplementary round (No. 42 overall) pick by the Angels. He is currently pitching well at low-A Cedar Rapids and projects to be major league ready by 2012. Of all the options that are available between the two teams, Richards would probably be the best though one has to wonder if general manager Tony Reagins would want to split with perhaps his best pitching prospect for half a year of Dunn's bat, especially considering that Kendry Morales will be back in the lineup in 2011.

This, as always, is just speculation but it is always interesting to size up the trade market as the All-Star game approaches and teams identify where they stand heading into the final two-thirds of the season. If Rizzo can make an acceptable trade, a lost half season of Dunn would be a player well spent.

Lack of length plagues Nationals lineup

The last time the Nationals were close to the .500 mark was entering play on June 11 with a 30-31 record after a sweep of the Pirates in a series that saw Stephen Strasburg make his MLB debut. Since then, Washington has gone 3-9 to fall to nine games back of first place and mar what was becoming a promising season. In Nats standards, that means that they were not absolutely abysmal and had an outside shot at being relevant in September.

Well, that probably was never going to happen, but being near .500 in mid-June with the best prospect in baseball bringing big buzz to National Park was about as good as could be expected. It seemed a minor tweak here and a roster spot there and the Nats might actually make a run at it.

Right.

Perhaps all Washington needs is to get out of the inter-league portion of the schedule as the last four series have come against American League Central opponents and two of the three wins came against the Royals, a organization far more damaged these days than even the Nationals (though they did find a way to beat Strasburg).

For the most part, it is all about the lineup. Yes, and I have harped on this before at Sports Chutney, they lack starting pitching depth but if Jason Marquis (elbow) and Chien Ming-Wang (shoulder) come back and are productive and Jordan Zimmerman (elbow -- Tommy John surgery) makes a solid return then then the rotation is not quite a glaring weakness as it has been. John Lannan, the nominal No. 1 for the last two years, has finally had his talent level catch up with his production and is back in the minors to work things out though in a real world rotation he would be a decent fourth or fifth starter if he can keep his ground ball rate up.

The pitching has given up 4.5 runs per game the last 12 games (55 runs allowed), which is actually about league average. The problem is that the lineup has gone into a serious funk at 2.66 runs per game and the Nats have been blanked with 1-0 scores twice in the last week, not counting the 2-1 extra innings affair when Strasburg went seven one-run innings against the White Sox and left the game with a 1-0 deficit (though they would score one in the bottom of the seventh to technically take him off the hook) last Friday.

When discussing major league lineups, there is a lot to be said about length. Washington has three good to great hitters in Adam Dunn, Ryan Zimmerman and Josh Willingham, who have produced 43 of their 65 home runs and make for as stout a middle of the order presence as can be found in the majors. Yet, the trio might as well be an island and when they hit slumps there are not much other tools that manager Jim Riggleman can deploy to get the team over the hump in games where the starters give them a chance to win, as has been the case in the last six games against the White Sox and Royals.

It starts at the top. Nyjer Morgan, for all his supposed defensive prowess (great UZR/150 last year of 39.4, projected to be at -7.3 so far this year), is simply not a leadoff hitter. His slash line of .244/.304/.320 is below replacement level and his WAR of -.4 means that he has actually cost the Nationals half a win this year as opposed to where the Bill Games projected him to be at 2.4 before the season. He has 15 stolen bases but his percentage is terrible with 11 times caught stealing. Yet, Riggleman has little choice but to roll him out in the No. 1 spot every day and hope he makes some plays. Morgan will eventually come around to be a little bit better than replacement but general manager Mike Rizzo should keep his eyes open for a legitimate leadoff hitter either later this summer or in the Hot Stove. Length in the a lineup starts with two hitters at the top of the lineup who can get on base for the middle of the order and Morgan's .304 OBP just does not cut it.

Then there is second baseman Christian Guzman. He is a decent complimentary player and at first glance you might think that he is a consistent contributor with his .303 average. Yet, he has a .329 OBP, about league average and that is actually better than his career average of .308. Add to that his .389 slugging percentage (.414 usual league average) and, overall, Guzman is more of a liability than a benefit. Taken as a unit, the table setters for the Zimmerman/Dunn/Willingham trio provide scant opportunity for the big boys to feast.

On the other end the Nationals have Ian Desmond at shortstop, Ivan Rodriguez at catcher and Roger Bernadina in right. Desmond is a shell of a hitter at .251/.286/.381 and his minors line of .256/.326/.388 through five seasons does not bode well for future production. Riggleman tends to have him in the No. 8 spot which basically gives the lineup two automatic outs with the pitcher in the No. 9 spot. Despite his "hitting," Desmond has a .07 WAR, mostly because he plays decent defense with a 2.5 UZR (6.7 UZR/150 projected) thus far.

Rodriguez's line of .313/.338/.416 is good but deceiving. Of his 52 hits, 12 are doubles with one home run and one triple, making him, for all intents and purposes, a singles machine. Combine him with Desmond in the bottom third of the order and the slugging and on base percentages that lengthen a lineup are virtually nil.

Then there is Bernadina. In his first full season, he is holding his own at .284/.344/.436 with six home runs and 20 RBI in 49 games and 164 plate appearances. His OPS+ of 108 shows that he is eight percent better than league average. In a perfect world he would be a great compliment lower in the lineup but at this point might be better suited in the No. 2 slot or even leadoff. Outside of the slugging trio, he has been there fourth best hitter this year, with apologies to Pudge. He might be due for a regression with a .330 batting average on balls in play but, lucky or not, there are not a lot of options in the cupboard.

There are things to like in Washington. The core is sound with Dunn/Zimmerman/Willingham, a top-five National League starter (and likely better than that in years to come) in Strasburg and a sound bullpen with Matt Capps, Drew Storen and Tyler Clippard. Yet, there is no bench to speak of, the rest of the lineup is spare parts and starting pitching depth is non-existent. Yet, the task in front of Rizzo is not impossible. A couple key additions (maybe a big free agent hitter and a couple upgrades to the the spare parts) and the Nationals have the chance to be competitive next year. Considering how the National League fluctuates on a year-to-year basis, that may be good enough to grab a playoff spot.

There will be money to spend as well as the Washington market (even with the Orioles just to the north) figures to be able to support an above average payroll. Hey, if the Twins can have a $100 million payroll this year, the Nats certainly should be able to spend some money. Jim Bowden may have thrown the organization off three or four years with his roster bungling (and alleged scandal) but all is not lost in the nation's capital. Strasburg's buzz may help convince a marquee name into Nationals Stadium and from there it could be off to the races. Either way, the prospect of continuous 59 loss seasons should be behind the organization. There is hope to be competitive next year . . .

Or at least be in contention in September. In Washington recently, that would still amount to a major coup.