Washington, D.C. sports: Nats & Skins similarities

My brother often sends me cool ideas and insights. Including this one from over the weekend. A comparison of the hot teams in our nation’s capital.

The Nationals and Redskins had great seasons. Resurgent seasons.

The Nationals brought playoff baseball back to Washington for the first time since 1933. Talk about your droughts.

By comparison, the Redskins had missed out on the playoffs only since 2007. But Washington hadn’t won a division title or hosted a playoff game since 1999.

So this was quite an autumn/early winter in Washington, which is not a great sports town in terms of success. The NBA Wizards haven’t reached the playoffs since 2008, haven’t won a playoff series since 2005 and have won just two playoff series since the 1979 NBA Finals. The hockey Washington Capitals have fared better, reaching the playoffs five straight years and winning a playoff series in three of those seasons. The Caps reached the Stanley Cup Finals in 1998 but still seek their first NHL championship.

So it’s a destitute sports town compared to most cities with multiple franchises.

And now Washington is star-crossed. And here’s my brother’s point. The Nationals and the Redskins were heavily criticized after playoff losses following the 2012 season.

The Nats were criticized for not playing their superstar — Stephen Strasburg didn’t pitch after Sept. 7, as the Nats decided to protect his shoulder, or at least follow through on an agreement to not pitch him past a certain number of innings. Without Strasburg, Washington lost the National League semifinals to St. Louis, three games to two. Hard to imagine Strasburg not making the difference in at least one of those defeats.