Washington Nationals’ GM Mike Rizzo displays Commissioner’s Trophy for D.C. residents on day that would have been the home opener...

Mike Rizzo did what he could on Thursday night to bring some joy to the nation’s capital while responsibly social distancing amidst the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Washington’s GM put the Commissioner’s Trophy on display in the second story window in his home in the Navy Yard on the day of what should have been the Nationals’ 2020 home opener so that fans passing by could at least get a moment or a photo with the trophy which is presented to each World Series winner.

[ed. note - “Yes, this is the home Rizzo purchased before negotiating an extension with the Nationals, making him, by his own admission, possibly the world’s worst negotiator.”]

Rizzo joked in each of the two conference calls he held with reporters last month about the Nationals still being World Series champs, reminding everyone that the title is still the Nats until baseball starts up again.

“We will be very prepared to defend the world championship which we hold right now,” he told reporters in his March 20th call, “can’t forget that, and that we are the defending World Champions and we will go into this season whenever that is as the defending world champs and we take it seriously, and we feel again that we like the team that we have, and we feel that we are capable of repeating as the world champs and we’re going to have a strategy in place for player health and player preparation to get us ready for Opening Day and from Opening Day it will be our goal to win another world title for D.C.”

All plans are on hold for now, of course, which Rizzo acknowledged in that call and his last one this past week.

At some point, however, the nation’s capital will get to celebrate the 2019 championship in Nationals Park. We don’t know when that will be, but as Rizzo said, it’s going to be a special day, whenever it is.

“This is going to be a very, very special Opening Day for us when it happens, so we still have that to look forward to,” Rizzo said. “On the brighter side, the glass half full view is that we’re the reigning world champions and we still are clutching hard to that trophy. We’ve got ourselves a banner-raising ceremony coming, we’ve got ourselves some beautiful rings that we’re going to be able to wear around D.C. in the very near future, so although we’re thinking daily and hourly about the humanity of what’s going on right now, we also have that to look forward to when we get through this thing and we come out the other side and baseball begins again.”