It took a pair of one-year contracts for the Nationals to get some value out of Chien-Ming Wang, who finally returned to the mound in the second half after missing two calendar years following shoulder surgery, and now Bill Ladson of MLB.com reports that Washington is working to re-sign him.
According to Ladson both sides are interested in getting a deal done and have been negotiating for a while now, but nothing is close to happening.
Wang wasn’t his pre-surgery self upon returning, as his fastball velocity was down two miles per hour and he induced fewer ground balls. He also served up eight homers in 62 innings after throwing 131 innings per eight homers allowed with the Yankees.
Along with a putrid strikeout rate of 3.6 per nine innings that suggests his raw stuff was either lost to surgery or still needs more time to return. Yet despite thrower slowing, inducing fewer grounders, and barely missing any bats Wang still managed to be effective in 11 starts, posting a 4.04 ERA while walking just 13 batters in 62 innings.
