Ballpark ready; Nats still under construction

The Washington Nationals finally have their ballpark. Now it's time to build a winner.

President Bush will throw out the ceremonial first pitch in the season opener in Nationals Park on March 30, beginning a new era in Washington baseball in a 41,222-seat stadium that will also serve as a revitalization centerpiece of the Southeast side of D.C., an industrial end of town that was the home of many auto body shops and strip joints.

Fans will have to dodge some construction equipment to get to the park – which has no real signature look, but has a lot of influences of many of the newer ballparks - and there aren't any restaurants nearby yet. And the product they'll see on the field is also under construction.

A group of promising young hitters – Ryan Zimmerman, Lastings Milledge and Elijah Dukes among them - will no doubt enjoy the smaller field dimensions in Nationals Park, but it's not likely that a very suspect starting rotation will share those sentiments. The opener against the Braves will be started by Odalis Perez, a journeyman left-hander who will be the answer to a very obscure trivia question one day.

The Nats will host the Orioles in an exhibition game on Friday, March 29, in a sort of dress rehearsal at the ballpark.

Other storylines for the Nationals:

• The team's biggest pickup might not be Milledge or Dukes. It could be first baseman Nick Johnson, who has had all sorts of injury bad luck and is back to reclaim a once-promising career. He missed all of 2007 with a broken leg.
• A couple of veterans lost starting spots – infielder Felipe Lopez and first baseman Dmitri Young – and could be trade targets. That's especially true for Lopez, who hit 23 homers for the Reds in 2005 but slumped to nine homers and a .245 average in 2007. But he makes $4.9 million, a hefty total for that kind of production.
• Dukes had a troubled upbringing and was a troublemaker in Tampa Bay, but that Nationals believe they have a true diamond in the rough that they obtained for a Single-A pitcher.

Photo: Odalis Perez will start the first game in the Nationals' new ballpark on March 30. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)

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