The Stephen Strasburg (shown left after a night with Tim Kurkjian and Buster Olney) hype machine finally rolled into Washington DC last night, where the record for largest collection of bandwagon fans (40,315 to be exact), set in 2008 by the Boston Celtics, was finally broken. DC fans were in awe as Strasburg struck out all but one of the Pirates he faced, finishing with 14 Ks through 7 innings of work. He only surrendered 4 hits, one of which was a 2 run home run from Delwyn Young. Stevie would also get the win, getting run support through home runs by Ryan Zimmerman, Adam Dunn, and Josh Willingham. Strasburg definitely proved that he has the potential to have a long career in baseball.
a great an amazing game, but I’m not going to cream my jeans just yet. It was only one start, at home, in front of a capacity crowd; of course he’s going to be bringing his best stuff in a situation like that. Obviously, he’s talented. Guys don’t hit triple digits on radar guns as consistently as he does very often, but he needs to handle some adversity (which I’m sure he’ll see playing in Washington) before he gets the blue carpet treatment into Cooperstown. Highlights of last night after the jump.
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Thank goodness I paid $16,403 for his rookie card when I did.
Ryan, I could have sworn he struck out every starting Pirate he faced last night.
What constitutes being a true Nationals fan anyway? Aren’t they all bandwagon fans? And what’s the deal with beef stroganoff?
he looked pretty nasty…
Yeah stupid Nats fans. Who do they think are getting excited for a guy who might make the team that has been in the city for all of 5 years actually relevant. Bandwagon, indeed. JUST LIKE YANKEES FANS, I SAY!
The MLB are the Nazis of youtube.
meh. we’ll see what happens when he faces a major league team.
What’s that? The Pirates ARE a major league team? Really?
Who does this fascist prick think he is? Baseball is a democracy! Throw some ground balls, damnit!
*Near the end of last night’s game, I actually stopped rooting for his arm to blow out, thus ending his career.
Underdog, I think you’re right. Going into the 7th, Andy LaRoche was the only one that hadn’t struck out against Stras yet… By the end of the 7th, he had struck out all of them.
Now, now, everyone knows the Red Sox lead the nation in bandwagon fans. They do sell the most pink hats in MLB after all.
Building a fan base for a new team on the hope of their young prospects the exact opposite of a bandwagon fan joining up after a teams gets good. The Nationals are 6 games out of first place in the East and in the best case wont be higher then 3rd this year.
The Washington Nationals have been building a team and a fan base for 5 years. No adult fan had their father take them to their first MLB game at Nationals Park. Every fan, however, has been with the team because the care about their town not because of performance.
He’s a flash in the pan and will fizzle out in under two yrs!