I think the thing that I've found most frustrating has been his apparent lack
of attention to the little things that win....like assembling a bench and
making sure you have enough starting pitching to get through the season.  The
Nats lacked pitching at the high minors and had a major league staff made up
of pitchers with injury histories...yet, Bowden released Cladio Vargas and
Sunny Kim, and traded Zach Day and Tohma Ohka in deals designed to help our
offense (which didn't).  When Armas and Drese went down with injuries (and
Halama failed), we were left scrambling for starters at the end of the year.
 While we got VERY lucky with Carrasco as a starter, Bowden's efforts
weakened our pitching overall while our offense did not improve.  Why he did
these moves when we had a 2B at AA hitting .400 (Short) and 3 productive
OFers is beyond me.

Also, Bowden assembled a horrible bench.  Bennet, Carrol, and Baerga (and
Guzman) played amost 2 full season's of below replacement level baseball.

His bench this off season is better, but how many second basemen can we use?
 Paying Marlon Anderson that kind of money is not a luxury that this team can
afford.