Jennifer Stewart-USA TODAY Sports
For seventh time since the franchise moved to D.C. back in 2005, the Washington Nationals will be looking for a third base coach now that Trent Jewett has jumped ship for the Seattle Mariners.
Jewett’s exit doesn’t come as that much of a shock. Seattle’s new manager Lloyd McClendon and Jewett have had a longstanding relationship dating back to the early 2000s. Jewett will be moving into the dugout to be McClendon’s bench coach.
Losing Jewett is a costly one for the Nationals and especially Matt Williams. In 2013, Jewett was a very aggressive third base coach and often sent runners on close plays in an effort to score Washington some much-needed runs. Williams wants to usher in a more aggressive base-running mentality, and Jewett would have certainly helped make that happen.
Now, Williams will need to find someone who has experience at third base but is also aggressive. In order for his philosophy to work and to improve the Nationals’ play on the basepaths, he’ll have to find someone who will buy into being aggressive and letting this young team run wild and score some runs.
As Jewett leaves, he takes a lot of good qualities you look for in a third base coach. He’s aggressive, has a run-scoring mentality, but also understands when you need to hold the runners. He’s a smart coach and is certainly well deserving of the job in Seattle, but he’ll be sorely missed in D.C.
Currently, it isn’t known who will replace him in the hot corner. One name that has surfaced is the Nationals’ triple-A manager Tony Beasley. However, there isn’t a consensus among all experts that he’s the man for the job. James Wagner of The Washington Post said it doesn’t look like Beasley will be replacing Jewett. Don’t be surprised if the Nationals look back to their list of managerial candidates to find a replacement.
One thing’s for certain: not only are the Nationals trying to replace Jewett, they are also trying to replace the runs that he scored.
Brian Skinnell is a freelance sports writer for www.RantSports.com and contributor at Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter, Like him on Facebook and add him to your network on Google.
