Strasburg Shows He's Fallible...Sometimes

Bet you didn't think Stephen Strasburg would actually get pulled from a game after loading the bases, did you? I bet you also didn't think that he'd be booed as he left the mound. Well, that's exactly what happened in Sunday's match against the Cleveland Indians. But even though all of that sounds bad, Strasburg's start really wasn't all that terrible.

The rookie phenom's final stat line: 5.1 innings pitched, 1 earned run allowed on 2 hits (one of which was a home run), with 5 walks and 8 strikeouts. Yes, that's too many walks. It's a Lannan-esque amount of bases-on-balls. But every other statistic shows that Strasburg did exactly what he was supposed to: he held off the Indians' batting order so that his hitters could take the lead.

The truth is that Strasburg isn't always going to strikeout 14 hitters in a game. Sometimes, he might only fan 8. Neither is he always going to show the unflappable command that he did in his first start against the Pirates. He'll have a learning curve just like any other pitching prospect. But Strasburg has shown (even in his limited appearances) that he can do what every starting pitcher should do: put his team in a position to win the game. To that end, the rookie is 2 for 2, winning both of his starts so far. He may not always be picture perfect, but at the end of the day, a win is a win, and the Nationals will take them any way they come.