Nationals’ fans, it’s time to take a deep breath.

 
The Washington Nationals had one of their most productive offseasons in recent history. They locked up the best starting pitcher to a six-year contract with Patrick Corbin to replace Gio Gonzalez’s and rounded out the rotation by signing Anibal Sanchez and resigning Jeremy Hellickson.

The continued to improve their offense by getting Kurt Suzuki and Yan Gomes to replace Matt Wieters and Pedro Severino. They also brought in Brian Dozier to get more offense from second base.

 

And let’s not forget Matt Adams resigned to close out the bench.

 
They even attempted to improve the bullpen by trading for Kyle Barraclough and signing Trevor Rosenthal and Tony Sipp.

 
With the internal promotion of Victor Robles, with a healthy Adam Eaton and Howie Kendrick, the Nationals were set to start 2019.

 
Then Bryce Harper officially signed with Philadelphia.

 
Since then the reality of this team has been disappointing. They started out by losing their first two games to the Mets before Harper made his triumphant return to DC, which was made worse by Trea Turner going down with a broken finger.

Trevor Rosenthal did not record an out his first four appearances, Dozier started the season going two for his first 25, and Victor Robles already has multiple fielding and baserunning miscues.

 
But, Anthony Rendon is batting .400/.460/.873 with 6 home runs and 17 RBIs, Sean Doolittle is still sporting a zero ERA while winning three games, Patrick Corbin has looked great in his first 3 starts, and Howie Kendrick looks sharp off his injury.

 
The most important thing to remember is that the Nationals have survived the early season struggles and are 7-7.

 
The season is not over; it has just begun. This team is not beat. They are adjusting to new roles and hitting their groove.

Three weeks ago, if I were to tell you that the Nationals would have only won 1 of Max Scherzer’s first 4 starts, with the worst bullpen ERA in the entire MLB and only two regular players batting over .290 you would assume they would be much worse off than 7-7 and only 2.0 games back.

 
They start an important series against the San Francisco Giants and have a chance to catch up on the top of the NL East while the Phillies and Mets beat each other up.

 
Don’t count this team out just yet. We only have 148 more games to go.