While it may sound kind of obvious considering where you're reading this, I have to say that one of the great pleasures of Major League Baseball's return to D.C. has been the ability to follow the Nationals' progress and the variety of Nats information and opinion that's available -- and continually updated around the clock -- on the internet.

The sheer volume of information and the frequency with which it is refreshed is a marked change from the daily newspaper and TV / radio coverage of a couple of decades ago. And both old and new sources have helped fulfill fans' hunger for information by exploring teams' player-development organizations and keeping readers up to date on their activities.

One of the finest such sources, Nationals Farm Authority, made its debut in 2005 at about the same time as Nationals Daily News (then NationalsPride). Over the past six seasons, NFA editor Brian Oliver has maintained a commitment to keeping his readers up to date on the goings-on of the Nats' minor-league system.

That's not all he's been doing. Like most of the rest of us, he's also been holding down a day job. And, on the side, he's been going to school to obtain his certification as a high-school mathematics teacher.

Having fulfilled the latter goal, Brian has sadly -- if probably wisely -- concluded that there's not enough time in the day for classroom teaching and NFA, and has therefore announced that he's shutting down the site. While he does point his readers to other Nats farm-system websites, Brian's reports and insights as well as the Big Board and other good things at NFA will be awfully hard to replace.

We wish Brian success and fulfillment as he embarks on his new journey.

      

I made an appearance late Monday evening on Bill Ivie's I-70 Baseball Radio program.  We reviewed St. Louis' just-completed series at Nationals Park and pondered the future of right-hander Stephen Strasburg after his upcoming Tommy John surgery.

You can access the recording of the show via this link.

      

I'll be making an appearance late this evening on the "I-70 Baseball" edition of United Cardinal Bloggers Radio Hour.  We'll be previewing St. Louis' upcoming visit to Nationals Park, discussing the status of Stephen Strasburg and projecting the future of Bryce Harper.

You can access the show via this link.  The program begins at 10:30 and I'm scheduled to be on air from about 11:00 to 11:15.

Feel free to phone in on (646) 929-1758, or submit a comment or talk on the chat board.

      

Where in a major-league ball park are you apt to find the smartest, most invested baseball fans?

Ordinarily, I would bet against finding them in the ultra-pricey seats behind home plate.  Not that the people in those seats are automatically apt to be ignorant of baseball.  But the most deeply steeped fans, for the most part, simply can't afford to cough up close to $25,000 a season for a prime seat.

Well, then, where do you find the nightly faithful?  Where they can afford to sit for 81 (or 41, or 21) games a season.  For many, this will be in the $15 to $25 seats in the upper tiers of the ball park.

So if you think some of the folks downstairs might be less into the game than some of the folks upstairs, and might be babbling about God knows what, I dare say you'd be right.  And perhaps this, in part, was what MASN broadcaster Rob Dibble had in mind when he unburdened himself of a few sexist cracks on air the other night.

And maybe -- thought I at the time -- that entitles him to a bit of a break from the criticism he's been getting for it.  Except that, on reflection, I have three problems with that.

First, as readers of my season and series previews surely know by now, I can make no pretensions to clairvoyance.  So I really don't know what the hell was in Dibble's mind.

Second, thanks to the Red Carpet Rewards perks that accompany Nats season-ticket plans, it's possible for non-millionaire fans to accumulate points that they can cash in for Presidents' Club seats, among other desirable things.  So it's not just the rich folks sitting down there.

Third, and most importantly, it was just dumb for Dibble to say what he did.  Self-evidently dumb, it would seem to me -- presuming that his wife, mother, sister(s), daughter(s) and / or niece(s) are baseball fans, or that he and MASN would like them to be.

There's no need to cast Dibble as an outlier; all of us have committed acts of jaw-dropping stupidity from time to time.  And despite the bitterness that can characterize this town's political operations, Washingtonians are mostly a forgiving lot.

But, like the rest of us, Dibble should know that forgiveness isn't necessarily automatic -- and that if he wants to be taken sincerely, there's only one thing he can say when he's been caught out:

"I did a really thoughtless thing, and I'm sorry."  Or words to that effect.

      

Readers of the Washington Post in print and online will be rejoiced to know that the Nationals beatwriter position -- which is in the process of being vacated by the departure of Chico Harlan to the Post's East Asia bureau -- will be in good hands.

Adam Kilgore -- a past intern and Orioles beatwriter at the Post who has managed, among other things, to garner a share of a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre -- will be joining the sports desk full time to keep the Post's readers up to date on all things Nats.

Kilgore sounds like he's pretty charged about his new gig, so if his new colleague Tom Sietsema might have had reason to worry for the safety of his job over the past year or so, that estimable critic can probably breathe a sigh of relief.

If that last bit sounded like a dig on Harlan, it was intended to be.  Harlan's mea culpa after the Washingtonian kerfuffle never particularly resonated at this Hutch.  And while Harlan is a fine writer, it's a shame that he had to save some of his finest and most insightful writing for his valedictory blog entry Friday evening in the Post's "Nationals Journal."

In any event, if you, as we, miss Barry Svrluga on the Nats beat, you'll miss him a little less; Kilgore is capable of producing not only prize-winning copy but also a Svrlugesque turn of phrase.

Expect top-notch Nats coverage from 15th and L this season.  Welcome back to town, Mr. Kilgore.

      

The keeper of this Hutch will be appearing on Pro Baseball Central tonight (Thursday, February 25) at 9:30 EST to talk Nationals baseball with PBC hosts Joe McDonald and Steve Keane.

Listeners can participate during a live call-in segment.  You can access the show through this link or via the graphic above.

UPDATED 25-Feb-2010 11:45 pm: Show's a wrap. Click on the BlogTalkRadio graphic at this link to find out what Hendo, McDonald and Keane had to say about the Nats, and why you'll soon be seeing Hendo's byline under a new site name…

      

As fearlessly predicted last week, Ben Goessling, former Nationals beatwriter for the now-defunct sports section of the Washington Times, has found new employment covering the Nats for MASN.

More information including relevant weblinks as we have it.

UPDATED 01/05/10 11:35 am: Here's a press release from Todd Webster at MASN…

      

Two of the many who found themselves suddenly out of work at the Washington Times' sports section this past week were Nationals beatwriters Mark Zuckerman and Ben Goessling.  In between packing boxes or whatever on New Year's Eve, Goessling managed to squeeze in a tweet that offers a glimmer of hope:

washtimesbb A thank-you from me (Ben) to the editors, reporters and readers of the Washington Times--and some info on what's next: http://bit.ly/4Wfzft

Reading that link makes one suspect that Goessling isn't about to fall off the face of the earth -- and causes one to wonder which of the Times' able scribes and editors will surface either at 15th and L or elsewhere in the District.

Happy New Year, everyone.

      

George Michael, longtime sports anchor on Washington's WRC-TV and creator of the nationally syndicated "Sports Machine," has died at the age of 70 after a two-year battle with cancer, according to dcrtv.com.  More as we know it.

UPDATED 12/24/09 10:40 am: Additional confirmation has been relayed by the Post's Dan Steinberg…

UPDATED 12/24/09 1:20 pm: Here's the obituary from the Post…

Appreciation:  Before -- and even long after -- ESPN become a household name, George Michael was the guy an awful lot of us Washingtonians spent our Sunday evenings with as he reviewed Redskins games (and other fare, not excluding pro wrestling) on his "Sports Final" which became the "Sports Machine" of legend.  So powerful was his influence that many viewers would probably vouch that it was Michael and not Warner Wolf that popularized the expression "Let's go to the videotape!"

Although they occupied their anchor desks at various times and stations, Michael, Wolf and the late Glenn Brenner might justly have been adjudged three of Washington's, and perhaps America's, most popular sportscasters during the last quarter of the 20th century.  Michael was also responsible for helping to guide the ascent of present-day sports anchors like his mid-aughts co-host Lindsay Czarniak, whose up-front attitude -- occasionally doled out to Michael himself when he got a little too cute -- has carried on the worthy tradition of her Channel 4 predecessor.

The family of NationalsPride.com extend our heartfelt condolences to the Michael family.

      

Say you're a Yankee fan -- for whatever unaccountable reason (OK, I'll stop) -- and you run a good-quality, frequently updated blog on your team.

What could go wrong?  Well, you could get a letter like this...

To be sure, the Yankees' trademarks and other intellectual property deserve respect.  But there's such a thing as overreacting, no?