Year four of the rebuild is complete. The team was flirting with .500 well into June but just couldn’t hold it together once they lost their best starter. From the trade-deadline forward they went 22-30 to end the season at 71-91, a .438 winning percentage.
Here’s a quick summary of where we are in the rebuild:
Year 1: 2021: moved Turner, Scherzer, Schwarber, et al. Finished 65-97. Earned 5th overall pick in 2022 draft (Elijah Green)
Year 2: 2022: moved Soto and Bell, finished 55-107, Earned 2nd overall pick in 2023 draft after losing lottery, got Dylan Crews.
Year 3: 2023: Improved to 71-91, dropped to 10th in 2024 draft thanks to new CBA rules despite winning lottery, got Seaver King
Year 4: 2024: Finished 71-91 again.
Our 71-91 finish, combined with the White Sox getting the same treatment we got last year (i.e., being a big market team that is bad two years in a row getting kicked out of the top 10) and Oakland getting kicked out of the lottery as well (they’re a revenue recipient that’s been in the lottery two years in a row), we stand to benefit by moving up a couple of slots of lottery odds.
Tankathon.com has the current reverse order of draft standings, showing us in 4th place/4th best lottery odds. We can pick no worse than 7th, but can move up to pick #1. (all the draft rules are at the bottom of the tankathon page).
We’re a ways off of from the 2025 draft, but we are starting to see some commonality for the names at the 2025 draft boards. Its looking like a college-heavy first round right now, even though a prep kid could go 1-1 overall. If we’re in the top 7 though, we’re in line to get one of these names right now:
Ethan Holliday, SS, Stillwater (Okla.) HS. Brother of Jackson Holliday, son of Matt Holliday
Caden Bodine, C, Coastal Carolina; .347/.432/.564 first two years at CCU as a plus defensive Catcher.
Jamie Arnold, LHP, Florida State. 1st team AA, Friday starter for FSU. 159 Ks in 102ip in 2024, co-ace for US Collegiate National Team this summer with Bremner.
Cam Cannarella, OF, Clemson Freshman ACC POTY, .363/.440/.560 first two college seasons while playing with injury.
Devin Taylor, OF (CF), Indiana. .357/.449/.660 with 20HRs his sophomore season.
Nolan Schubart, OF Oklahoma State. Ridiculous 1.351 OPS in 2024. Huge slugger potential.
There’s also a couple of other prep kids in the mix for the top 10, but something tells me we’ll be taking a college player this time around and not a project. We don’t “need” Bodine or an outfielder necessarily, would love to get one of these two college arms. The top of the class certainly is looking outfielder heavy right now. I like the connection to Schubart, an Oklahoma kid (we seem to take a lot of players from that region) who could mash his way up, but BA has him slipping into the 20s for the class so he may not really be in the conversation for the top 6-7 of the draft. I like a slugger outfielder who could project as a 1B/LF/DH rotation kind of guy, but it has to be a major slugger.
Anyway, lots to discuss this off-season. I’m not sure how much i’ll “cover” the playoffs this year due to other writing commitments, but we have options, rule5, and other fun stuff to cover coming up.
If Sykora isn’t the Nats minor league POTY i don’t know who it could possibly be. Photo MASN
Here’s the End of August 2024 check-ins on all our rotations, from MLB to DSL.
Each team section analysis will have the same items: current rotation, changes in the last month, observations, next guy to get promoted (if its in the minors), next guy to get cut, and then a few comments about relievers.
Rotation as of 8/31/24: Irvin, Gore, Parker, Corbin, Herz
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Irvin, Gore, Parker, Corbin, Herz
Changes sinceend of last Month: None. Same five guys that have been there since the moment Williams went down.
Rotation Observations: Interestingly, the two best starters in August were … Corbin and Herz, who would have both been on the chopping block if we had any positive news from any of our injured starters. Herz had 6 starts with a 3.10 ERA and a 1.17 Whip in the month, both best of any of our 5 arms. Corbin wasn’t half bad either: 3.76 ERA while going 2-1 in his 6 starts. Parker and Gore improved on their July 7+ ERA months with decent ERAs, though Gore’s was quite lucky given his 1.7 whip. Only Irvin really struggled on the month, mostly thanks to one bad start on 8/30.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Honestly … now that we’re in September, nobody’s getting cut out of this rotation unless the team wants to start saving innings. Only two guys got 9/1 callups and neither were starters. There’s only two “starters” on the 40-man not hurt: Rutledge and Ward, and as we’ll read later, neither deserve a promotion at this point.
Bullpen comments: We’ve seen a decent performance from the bullpen lately. Salazar had 13 appearances with zero runs. Can’t beat that. Rainey has been handled with kid gloves all year (and was the subject of a Fangraphs article about pitcher usage and leverage) and was solid in August. Meanwhile, Adon did a great job proving that not only can he not get MLB hitters out as a starter, but that he can’t get them out as a reliever either. He’s now appeared in parts of four different seasons for this team and has never even come close to proving that he’s a MLB quality arm. He’s finally out of options but is nowhere close to enough service time to hit arbitration,
AAA Rochester
Rotation as of 8/31/24: Rutledge, Ward, Alvarez, Stuart, Watkins
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Rutledge, Ward, Lord, Alvarez, Luckham
Changes since end of last month: Lord got hurt and is on the DL, so they replaced him with Watkins, who’s been a LR/SS all year. Luckham struggled upon his promotion so he got sent back to AA, replace with new acquisition Stuart.
Rotation Observations: Lord was solid in 3 starts (1.46 ERA) then hit the DL. He got hit by a comebacker on his pitching hand and was put on the DL 8/20/24. We’re nearly at two weeks now. Alvarez has a nice month: 5 starts, 3.14 ERA and sub 1.00 whip. I wonder what he has to do to earn a call-up. Scouting reports aren’t very flattering: BA has him 45s across the board and describes him basically as a “left hander with 91 and a funky delivery.” Still, wouldn’t mind seeing him get a shot. Rutledge continues to be awful. Luckham had a 12 ERA in a couple of starts before being replaced by Stuart, who has a 7.88 ERA in his first two starts that was probably a little unlucky (he has a 1.00 whip and a .179 BAA in those two starts, so it’s almost like every single guy who got on base managed to score). We’ll see what he can do with the remaining couple of weeks. Ward had a 4.44 ERA with way too many walks. Lastly Watkins had a decent month, as one would expect for a 32-yr old in AAA.
Next guy to get Promoted: None deserve it, and Lord’s injury takes him out of the running.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: We were right on Luckham getting the boot back to AA last month.
Bullpen comments: Brzycky and Ribalta both had solid August numbers and both have been called up. Willingham, who is on the 40-man, also had decent Aug numbers and may get another shot. Tim Cate had a nice month, even if he’s had a crummy year.
AA Harrisburg
Rotation as of 8/31/24: Solesky, Lara, Luckham, Saenz, Shuman
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Cuevas, Solesky, Lara, Theophile, Stuart (with two spot starts from Reyes)
Changes since end of last month: Cuevas, after months of being the worst starter of the group, was taken out of the rotation and put in the bullpen. Luckham got promoted, then demoted right back. Stuart got promoted as he should have with a 27/5 K/BB ratio in 16 August innings and was replaced with Saenz, finally back off the injured list. Lastly Theophile got hurt and went straight to the 60 day/full season injured list, not a good sign.
Rotation Observations: Stuart was unhittable in his 3 Aug AA starts; he should stick in AAA for a while. Saenz got hit very badly; 10+ ERA and a 2.58 ERA in August. He struggled in 15 AA starts last year and may be running out of time to stick in the rotation. Luckham’s AA starts were solid; he definitely earned his promotion, but he’s been getting hit upon his return. Shuman is finally back in AA and only had one start, so not much to go on. Solesky was decent but just has no K/9 power. Lara’s ERA is inflated compared to his peripherals: 1.09 whip, .184 BAA; that should be a sub 3 ERA.
Next guy to get Promoted: No idea. Maybe Solesky despite his lack of swing and miss. He’s 26, has solid full-season numbers. It should be Theophile, but he seems like he’s out for a while.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Saenz; just not sure if he can cut it in AA.
Bullpen comments: Alston earned a promotion. I like Jack Sinclair’s august: 17/3 K/BB in 10 innings. Cronin is finally back in AA and had a 3.09 ERA in 10 appearances as the closer. He replaced Peterson as the closer at some point, who had an ERA in the 8s for the month.
High-A Wilmington
Rotation as of 8/31/24: Atencio, Cornelio, Susana, Caceres. Tepper
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Atencio, Cornelio, Shuman, Davis, Susana
Changes since end of last month: Shuman promoted, replaced by Caceres, who had been dropped from the rotation earlier. Also, Davis got dumped out of the rotation, replaced by the newly promoted Tepper.
Rotation Observations: Caceres, one month after getting dropped from the rotation. was the best starter in Wilmington. Cornelio put up his typical 6+ ERA month; more on him later. Susana got hit; he needs more AA time. Atencio put in another quietly good month (more on him in a moment). Tepper had a 4.50 ERA in two starts; not much to go on.
Next guy to get Promoted: Shuman finally got promoted despite getting whacked in his 3 High-A starts to start the month. I think its Atencio’s turn. He’s had a very solid High-A season all told (3.47 ERA in 18 starts) and had similar numbers in August. He’s only 22 and seems like a sneaky decent prospect for us.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Cornelio. Honestly, I don’t understand why the team sticks with this guy. I can’t remember the last time I saw a gamer with him as the starter where I said, “Oh that was a nice game for Cornelio.” No; instead its constantly 5ip, 7hits 3 walks, 5ER. (as I write this, i see that he had perhaps his best ever start as a pro on 9/1, which dropped his seasonal ERA by nearly a half a run all by itself). His career ERA is nearly 6.00 and instead of repeating low-A he got promoted up to high-A this year, where he’s continued to not be good. And it isn’t as if he has a 12 K/9 rate or anywhere near it.
Bullpen comments: The team finally promoted Cronin after my explicit comments last month. There isn’t much else good to write home about from this bullpen.
Low-A/Fredericksburg
Rotation as of 8/31/24: Sthele, Polanco, Romero, Sykora, Clemmey
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Sthele, Polanco, Tepper, Romero, Sykora ( plus a slew of spot starts from random players and two Saenz rehab starts)
Changes since end of last month: Tepper got promoted, replaced by trade acquisition Clemmey. The team also just put Polanco on the restricted, list, so not sure what’s going on there. So as of this moment there’s only 4 starters on the roster; Polanco’s last turn was taken by lefty reliever Angel Roman.
Rotation Observations: Here’s Sykora’s August numbers: 6 starts, 30 1/3 innings. 0.88 ERA (3 earned runs in 30 innings). In those 30 innings he gave up 12 hits and 4 walks for a WHIP of 0.52. He had 48 strikeouts to go against 4 walks in those 30 innings. Uh, why is he still in Low-A? Nobody else worth talking about right now: Romero has just 10 Ks in 25 innings last month, Sthele had a .297 BAA, Polanco a 1.83 whip. Clemmey is a solid prospect and had solid peripherals even if his ERA was mediocre (.188 BAA, 21/12 K/BB in 19IP).
Next guy to get Promoted: Sykora. should have been promoted last month.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Probably Sthele, who we’ve mentioned in this spot in the past. 22yrs old in low-A just not getting guys out. 12th rounder in 2023 so not a ton invested.
Bullpen comments: Speaking of Roman; he’s been unhittable since getting bumped up from FCL. The team called up a couple of 2024 draftees in Alexander Meckly and Merrill Beeker, but neither are being used as starters right now.
Rookie/FCL Nationals: finished on 7/25/24, so no August games.
Rookie/DSL Nationals
Rotation as of 8/31/24: De la Cruz, Reynoso, Feliz, Reyes, Lunar
Rotation as of 7/31/24: De la Cruz, Reynoso, Vera, Feliz, Thomas, with Juan Reyes as an “opener.”
Changes Since last Month: Vera was mercifully pulled from the rotation after walking 2 guys an inning, replaced by Lunar. Thomas was pulled from the rotation as well, replaced with Reyes’ opener performances.
Rotation Observations: De La Cruz had 3 Aug starts and saw his already bad ERA increase. Feliz only made one start on 8/5 and hasn’t appeared since; that’s not good considering that he was easily the best arm in the DSL this year. Reyes got three short “opener” starts of 2-3 innings and was decent. Reynoso got two starts and got shelled. Lunar had a 4-inning no hit performance and a 5-inning start with just one hit allowed.
Next guy to get Promoted: Feliz, maybe Lunar
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Vera.
Bullpen comments: Probably the best bullpen arm is Jose Sanchez, not much else to report.
That’s it for August 2024. We’ll probably wait until the end of the minor league season in the early parts of September to do an end of season review.
He’ll be wearing this uniform for good. Photo via Crews’ instagram page.
With a bit of advance fanfare (news leaked on Friday 8/23/24 for his 8/26/24 call-up), the cornerstone of the Nats rebuild Dylan Crews has been called up.
He’ll take his place in an outfield that started the year Winker/Rosario/Thomas and which is set to end it with the all-prospect, all-under 24, all pre-arb set of players Wood/Young/Crews. I didn’t think we’d get to this point until at least May of 2025, and honestly I thought a year ago it’d be Hassell instead of Young, but here we are.
Crews’ AAA line in total (.265/.340/.455) doesn’t really look that dominant, or that worthy of getting called up. Even his improved August numbers (.289/.356/.513) bely a bit of a patience problem (just 5 walks in 18 games). But, consider that Bryce Harper got called up with pretty middling AAA numbers (.243/.325/.365) and went on to win the NL ROY in 2012. Speaking of Rookie of the year, the timing of the call-up should be just enough to preserve Crew’s rookie status (150 PAs) for next year while getting him some big league looks as the team plays out the string.
And why not call him up now? Even if Alex Call hadn’t hurt his foot, it makes zero sense to play anyone else for extended periods of time in the OF at this point. Blankenhorn? We’ve already outrighted him once. Garrett? The fact that he remains on the 40-man but has been passed over multiple times for obvious outfield vacancies should tell us everything we need to know regarding the state of his career after last year’s gruesome leg injury, unfortunately. Meneses? Can he even play the outfield? Gallo? why is he even still on the team at this point? In the final game before his call-up, the Nats rolled Gallo out to start in RF and we got the most Gallo-esque performance possible: 4 PAs, 3 strikeouts, 1 walk, and he now sports a season average of .165.
So, call him up, sell some tickets, let him get licked in meaningless games for a 4th place team playing out the string, and plan on 2025 come out firing with all our young guns in the lineup (Wood, Crews, Abrams, Garcia, Young, etc).
Ohtani hits his 40th of the season in grand style; a walk off grand slam against Tampa. Photo via Tampa Bay times
Shohei Ohtani added another achievement to his already lore-level career: he hit a walk-off grand slam for his 40th HR of the season to officially reach 40-40 status.
40-40 has only been done five other times in the history of the sport:
Jose Canseco, who did it in his MVP 1988 season at the age of 23 likely before PEDs took over his narrative. He hit a homer and had two SBs in a Sept 23rd 9-8 game as the 104-win Oakland team was cruising into the playoffs. Doing this at the age of 23 sent shockwaves through the sport, but Canseco’s injury-riddled career never really offered another opportunity for him to get another 40/40 season; he only hit 40 homers in two other seasons, and never again came close to 40 steals.
Barry Bonds, who did it in in 1996, in his age 31 season where he had a 188 OPS+ but somehow only finished 5th in MVP voting. He stole a bag in the final game of the season to get the achievement as his 68-win team was playing out the string. Bonds nearly did the feat again in 1997 (40/37) and then he entered his mid-30s PED era where he was much more of a slugger than a runner. It is only fitting that Bonds did the feat, considering that his father Bobby Bonds was the original pioneer for this feat, nearly doing it twice in his career in the 1970s.
Alex Rodriguezdid it in 1998 when he was just 22, hitting 42 homers and stealing 46 bags. It took a-Rod deep into September to get to 40/40 (game 153), getting his 40th homer for a middling Seattle team out of the playoffs. He added a couple more dongs and a couple more SBs to pad the stats. Like Canseco, doing this at age 22 seemed to really portend A-Rod repeating the feat for years to come, and indeed A-Rod became a home-run machine, hitting 40+ homers each season for basically the next decade, but he never came close to 40 SBs again despite being in his mid-20s prime.
Our own Alfonso Soriano, who did it for our awful 2006 Washington Nationals team during his one season here. The team signed him to a 1yr/ $10M deal as kind of a pillow contract after he had an ignominious exit from NY and a couple of middling seasons in Texas, and the early news was dominated by the team’s fight with him over where he was going to play. He initially refused to head to the outfield but eventually grudgingly trotted out in spring training to take his left field spot, where he played the rest of his career. Once we got past that, he certainly delivered for us; he was our all star that year and made national news with his 40/40 achievement. Soriano had been threatening 40/40 for a while, nearly doing it for New York in 2002 (39/41) and again in 2003 (38/35). In fact, he should have gotten the achievement in that 2022 season: he sat at 39 hrs and 40 SBs for two weeks in September but couldn’t get that 40th homer. As soon as he signed a big money deal with the Cubs for 2007 (manager, Lou Pinella, same guy managing A-Rod in his 40/40 time), his SBs dropped off considerably and he never came close again.
Ronald Acuna who went for 41/73 last season in his age 25 season, taking full advantage of the new pitching rules (which we’ll touch on later) to run up his SB count early and then getting his 40th homer deep into September to achieve the result. He hit his 40th in later september, right in the same game 153-154 range as most of the guys above, so he had some time to spare. Acuna nearly did the feat at age 22, going 41/37 in 2019, so this shouldn’t be too much of a surprise. Unfortunately for Acuna, he blew out his ACL in May of this year, so it may be some time before we see him challenge 40/40 again. Acuna is still in his prime, and seems like an easy threat for 40/40 for a few more years assuming he gets the confidence back in his knee.
I feel like there should have been a 40/40 season prior to 1988, but likely candidates like Bobby Bonds, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, and a couple others just never quite made it there. Mantle never prioritized SBs and had a very bad knee injury early in his career, Bonds (as discussed above) nearly got there a couple times, Mays came close a couple times very early in his career in NY, Hank Aaron had a 44/31 season in the early 60s but was more of a steady power presence.
That leaves us with Ohtani, who as of this writing has exactly 40 hrs and 40 SBs, and achieved the plateau at least a month earlier than any of the 5 previous guys. Amazing. One just has to ask … does he have a shot at 50/50? Yeah, I think he does. He achieved this feat in game 129 of the season (126 that he played), which is amazing enough, but may just leave him enough time to do a 50/50 season.
Ohtani is averaging one HR every 14.45 PAs, and averaging one SB every 3.15 games. Assuming he plays every game the rest of the way (he’s played in 126 of the 129 games for the Dodgers, they have 33 games left, so I’ll assume he plays in 30 of those games, averaging 4.5 PAs per game).
30 games, 4.5PAs/game = 135 PAs left this season, divided by 1 hr/14.45 PAs = 9.3 homers projected the rest of the way.
30 games, one SB every 3.15 games = 9.5SBs projected the rest of the way.
So Ohtani statistically projects to a 49/49 season right now, rounding those numbers down. If he gets hot, or if he plays every game the rest of the way out maybe he gets enough additional looks to get to 50/50.
The new pitching rules have become a boon for stolen bases in the league, something that MLB knew quite well when they went to pitch clocks and limits on pickoff attempts. A few years ago the SB leaders were leading the league with 40-50 SBs. Already this year we have guys with 60 and its mid-august. And some of these guys have power: Elly De La Cruz leads the league with 60 SBs right now and he has 22 Homers to go with it and he’s in his 2nd pro season. Jose Ramirez isn’t exactly known for his speed, but he’s already sitting on a 30/30 season himself and could make a push for 40/40 with a hot September. So, hopefully we’ll see more of this going forward.
Tyler Bell is the highest profile player from the 2024 draft to turn down big money for a chance later at even bigger money. Photo BA.
Ever since we entered the draft pool bonus era, players not signing who were drafted in the top 10 have been a rarity. Oddly in 2024, with the draft signing deadline having just passed on 7/31/24, we saw four players not sign.
This post is a recycled post that tries to answer the question: “does it ever pay off for a player not to sign?” And I’ve added in the 2024 players for tracking and analysis going forward.
Lets take a look. Here’s a summary of the 13 years of players who were drafted but did not sign from the top 10 rounds. This analysis goes back to 2012, since that’s the beginning of the new draft rules.
2014: 6 (two of which were Nats picks: Andrew Suarez and Austin Byler in that ill-fated draft class, and one more who didn’t sign thanks to Houston’s screwing up the Brady Aiken deal and who was eventually granted free agency).
2013: 8
2012: 8
In total, 50 total players picked in the top 10 rounds in the last 13 drafts failed to sign, more than half in the first four years of the construct as teams/players/agents figured things out. The number of players drafted in the top 10 rounds varies slightly from year to year, but its roughly 300 players a year times 13 seasons, so at least 3,900 players picked in that time and probably more than 4,000 when you add in the dozens of supplemental and draft-compensation picks. So usually we see nearly 99% of the top 10 rounds of players sign.
Here’s the better question: did these players make major mistakes by NOT signing and taking the money?
Its a common refrain among pundits in the amateur baseball world (Keith Law in particular) that HS players should “take the money” if they’re drafted high enough. Certainly any first rounder would be a fool to turn away that kind of money, and mostly any prep player offered something in the upper 6 figure range should give serious consideration. MLB contracts generally include college tuition … so even if you sign out of HS you still have 4 years fully paid for in case you wash out. So instead of gambling on your health, or the fickleness of the baseball draft (where one bad start can cost you 30 spots in the draft and millions of dollars), take the cash when its offered.
But, don’t take our word for it. Lets look at the empirical evidence of every player over past drafts who has forgone the cash to see if there’s any trends.
(a caveat here: I did not look at the dollar amounts in every case; this is basically draft round analysis. Its possible that a 5th rounder in one year went in the 8th the next and got offered more money … but its quite rare with the new draft rules and bonus pools. Everything changed with the new CBA that went into effect in 2012).
Tyler Bell, a prep SS from an IL HS. Drafted in 2nd-supp (#66 overall), slot value of $1.26M. Failed to come to terms with Tampa Bay. Based on some quick googling, it looks like Tampa offered him around $1.5M to sign but got other over-slot guys to sign before Bell would, which cost them the overage it likely would have taken. Bell was a top100 draft prospect with a commit to Kentucky and will be a draft-eligible sophomore in 2026. Tampa gets a replacement pick at exactly #67 in 2025.
Chris Levonas, a prep RHP from a NJ HS. Drafted one pick after Bell as a 2nd round Supp (#67). Slot value: $1.23M. He was a higher ranked prospect than Bell, and he and Milwaukee couldn’t come to terms. Per my google research, Milwaukee had $3M to offer him, but Levonas was a significant prospect and decided to honor his commitment to Wake Forest. Milwaukee pivoted and spread out that $3M to several later picks. Milwaukee gets a replacement pick at exactly #68 in 2025.
Ryan Prager, a college junior LHP from Texas A&M. Los Angeles picked him in the 3rd round with a slot value of $948k. Per reporting in the Athletic, Prager was pretty open with teams about being open to coming back to school, earning his degree, and seeing if he could help TAMU get back to the title game. No numbers were discussed, but it sounds like the Angels drafted him without understanding his requirements nor what it would take to sign. Prager goes back to school, while the Angels will get a comp pick after the 3rd round in 2025 (meaning they’ll lose a couple dozen spots in the draft).
Jaxon Jelkin, a college junior RHP from Houston. The Mets drafted him in the 9th round (slot value $196,700). There’s not a lot of information out there. MLB’s scouting report notes that he made 7 starts for Houston then blew out his UCL, requiring TJ. They also note he was “dismissed” from Nebraska’s two years ago and has “severe makeup concerns.” Reportedly NY didn’t even make him a contract offer, which means technically he’s a free agent right now with a year of college eligibility left but with a TJ surgery likely putting him out for the entire 2025 college season. It might make more sense for him to take a pro contract and rehab at a pro facility instead of college, but we’ll see. New York will not get a comp pick here.
Obviously it’s too early to tell for all these four players if they made the right decision. I’ll say this: if you’re a prep player who gets offered $3M … you made a mistake not taking it. If indeed Levonas got that offer. Is he guaranteed to be a 1st rounder in three years? Same to a lesser extent for Bell, who turned down $1.5M. Prager? He may be able to do better next year. Jelkin? He should have signed. So, my too early verdicts are: 3 mistakes, 1 may work out.
Caden Kendle, a Jr OF from UC-Irvine taken in the 10th round by St. Louis. He apparently agreed to a $175k bonus (around 10k over slot), but then had a change of heart and decided to go back to school for his senior season.
Verdict: He refused a $175k, played another year, got drafted in the 5th round of 2024 and signed an under-slot deal for $147k. So, he lost money, and a year of pro development. He may have gained a college degree though, so that’s good.
Nolan McLean, a draft-eligible sophomore two-way player from Oklahoma State (RHP and 3B) who was picked by the Orioles at the top of the 3rd round. Baltimore found an issue in his medicals, so McLean went back to school. Slot bonus figure: $794k. Its unclear what bonus figure they agreed upon. McLean went back to school, and was picked again in the 3rd round in 2023, dropping 10 slots and signing for $747K with the Mets.
Brandon Sproat, a RHP sophomore from Florida, failed to sign with the Mets as a 3rd rounder (slot value $691k) for reasons unknown. He went back to school, then (amazingly) agreed to a re-draft by the Mets in 2023, who picked him in the 2nd round and signed him for $1.47M. Sproat also appears later on in this post because he refused to sign out of HS as well.
Brock Rodden, a 2B junior from Wichita State, failed to sign as a 10th rounder with Oakland (slot value: $151.3k). He went back to school, got drafted as a 5th rounder in 2023 and signed for $200k.
Verdict: McLean was not penalized for not signing, but it wasn’t really his choice since the team reneged. Sproat more than doubled his bonus offer from last year, and Rodden improved his by likely 25%. So, all three guys “worked out” in the end.
Kumar Rocker, RHP Vanderbilt, in a well publicized blow-up, the Mets drafted Rocker 10th overall and made a huge splash announcing a $6M over-slot bonus .. then ran into issues with his medicals, resulting in the two sides failing to agree on anything and the Mets passing on the Vanderbilt star altogether. Rocker’s agent (ahem, “advisor”) Scott Boras of course refused to make his medicals available ahead of time, and of course claimed that there was no injury, but the subsequent findings vindicated the Met’s decision. Rocker had shoulder surgery in the fall of 2021, then pitched in Indy ball in 2022 before shockingly getting drafted by the Rangers with the 3rd overall pick in 2022. He signed for $5.2M, well below the slot value, and well below the $6M he agreed to in 2021, but he was still an upper 1st rounder. He pitched in the fall league, then made a handful of starts in 2023 before …. tearing his UCL and having Tommy John. So, Perhaps the Mets were right all along.
Jud Fabian, OF Florida; saw his draft stock fall from a possible top-5 pick all the way out of the first round. But, he apparently had a $3M deal with Baltimore in the second, but those plans were foiled when Boston selected him at the beginning of the 2nd round. Fabian stuck to his bonus demands, and the two sides could not reach an agreement. Fabian went back to school and was a Comp-B pick in 2022, signing for $1.03M.
Alex Ulloa, prep SS from Texas failed to come to terms with Houston as a 4th round pick. Ulloa bailed out of an Oklahoma State commitment, went to Yavapai College Juco … and went undrafted in 2022 altogether. Again in 2023, but he did get a commit to U of Miami for 2024, his junior season. Failed to get drafted in 2024 altogether, now at Florida International.
Verdict: Rocker couldn’t beat $6M but still got $5.2M as damaged goods, so its hard to say he made a bad decision (not that it was entirely his to make with the Mets pulling the offer). Fabian lost out on $2M of bonus money, but we don’t know what money he turned down from Boston (odds are he lost out on the deal). Ulloa’s slot value was $492k in 2021; we don’t know what he was offered in 2021, but we went completely undrafted in 2022, so it seems safe to say he has lost out on money.
2020: in a shortened 5-round Covid-related draft, not one player picked in the 5 rounds failed to sign.
2019: 2 players did not sign from the top 10 rounds
Brandon Sproat, RHP Fla HS 7th/205 overall by Texas. $222,100 slot value, which wasn’t enough to buy Sproat out of his commitment to Florida. As we’ve already seen, Sproat and signability was also an issue in 2022, but he did eventually sign in 2023 for a ton of money.
Wyatt Hendrie, C from Calif Juco 10th/312 overall by Chicago Cubs. $142,200 slot value. Cubs seemingly ran into slot issues with both 10th and 11th rounder, and Hendrie wouldn’t take under slot. Hendrie went undrafted in 2020’s shortened draft, but then was picked in the 7th in 2021 and signed for $177,500 out of San Diego State.
Verdict: both players ended up making money by not signing; Sproat a ton, Hendrie a little bit.
Carter Stewart, RHP Fla HS. 1st/8th overall. Atlanta didn’t like Physical, offered 40% of slot value ($1.9M); initially slated to Mississippi State. Update: However, he did an about face, went to a Juco instead with the plan on re-entering the 2019 draft. When he struggled in Juco and fell to a mid 2nd round projection … he attempted an end-around of the MLB draft rules and signed to play in japan, a situation I detailed in this space. By 2021 he had graduated the Japan minor leagues into their majors, and his stats as of 2023 seem pretty solid (as a 23yr old he has a sub 2.00 ERA for his team Softbank).
Matt McLain: 2B Calif HS. 1st/25: Asked $3M, Arizona offered $2.6M didn’t budge, going to UCLA. Update: picked 17th overall in the 2021 draft and signed for $4.63M. Huge gamble and huge win.
JT Ginn: RHP Miss HS. 1st/30th: LA dodgers offered $2.4M, asking $2.9M, going to Mississippi State. Update: drafted 2nd round/52nd overall in 2020 draft, signed for $2.9M with the Mets in a well over-slot deal. So two years later he got his asking number.
Gunnar Hoglund: LHP Fla HS. 1supp/36: Pittsburgh didn’t like physical, low-balled and he declined. going to Ole Miss. 2021; was projected as a top 10 pick, hurt his arm, had TJ but still got drafted 19th overall by Toronto and signed for $3.25M. Big win.
McLean drastically improved his stock, Ginn got what he wanted, and Hoglund (despite his injury) got paid. I already detailed why I think Stewart’s deal is smart.
Drew Rasmussen, RHP, Oregon State, 1s/31st overall. Failed to sign with Tampa, who (I guess) didn’t like his medicals. He was coming back from TJ and only had a few weeks of action before the draft. Update: Went 6th round in 2018 to Milwaukee.
Jack Conlon, RHP, Clements HS (Sugar Land, Texas). 4th round/128 overall. Failed to sign with Baltimore, went to Texas A&M. Update: left TAMU, went to San Jacinto, then enrolled in Rice and sat out 2020. However, he wasn’t on the 2021 roster, and its unclear where he’s playing at this point. He seems to be out of baseball at this point.
Jo Jo Booker, RHP, Miller HS (Brewton, Ala.). 5th round/145 overall. failed to sign with LA Angels, went to South Alabama. Ended up playing 5 full seasons for South Alabama, was never drafted, posted an ERA north of 6.00 his 5th year, and is likely out of baseball.
Two players who ended up playing themselves out of any bonus dollars. Rasmussen didn’t turn down the Rays as much as they refused to tender him a contract … they must have tendered him something because they got a comp pick in 2018 draft. So he turned down 40% of first round money in 2017 to sign an under-slot deal in the 6th round of 2018 ($135k, just $10k more than the non-top 10 rounds minimum). I’d say this was a bad move by the player unless Tampa flat out refused to pay a dollar.
Verdict: 1 worsened his draft position, 2 missed out on any draft money.
Nick Lodolo: 1S/41st overall; LHP from Damien HS in California. failed to sign with Pittsburgh, went to TCU instead, draft eligible in 2019. In 2021, drafted 7th overall, signed for $5.43M.
Tyler Buffett: 7th/217 overall; RHP, failed to sign with Houston. returned to Oklahoma State, drafted in 6th round in 2017 and signed with Cincinnati
Lodolo went to school (an arm-shredder program in TCU even) and went from 41st overall to 7th overall, with probably 3x the bonus. Furthermore, by 2021 he was one of the best pitching prospects in the game. Meanwhile Buffett improved his draft position one round by going back to school.
Verdict: 1 drastically improved his draft pick and money, 1 improved his draft position one round.
2015: 6 guys did not sign.
Kyle Funkhouser: 1st/35th overall: RHP from Louisville, failed to sign with LA Dodgers, turning down an above-slot $2M. 4th rounder in 2016, signed with Detroit.
Brady Singer, 2nd/56th overall: RHP Florida HS. failed to sign with Toronto, went to Florida and was 1st rounder in 2018, signed with Kansas City
Jonathan Hughes, 2nd/68th overall: RHP Georgia HS. failed to sign with Baltimore, went to Georgia Tech and not even drafted in 2018…
Kyle Cody, 2nd/73rd overall: RHP U Kentucky. failed to sign with Minnesota, drafted in 6th round in 2016 and signed with Texas
Nicholas Shumpert, 7th/220th overall. SS Colorado HS. failed to sign with Detroit. Went to San Jacinto CC, drafted in 28th round 2016 by Atlanta and signed.
Kep Brown, 10th/311 overall. RF South Carolina HS, failed to sign with LA Dodgers. went to Juco, then to UNC-Wilmington, not drafted in 2018.
Funkhouser was the biggest “whoops” here; a poor spring took him from his pre-season top 10 draft position all the way out of the first round, but he still demanded upper 1st round money. He didn’t get it … and then fell to the 4th round the next year. That was a big fail. Singer clearly improved on his 2nd round status by going to college. Cody slipped from being a 2nd rounder to a 6th rounder. The other three guys drastically fell on draft boards; one of them going from a 10th rounder to not even being drafted.
Verdict: 1 improved, 5 hurt draft stock
2014: 6 failed to sign
Brady Aiken: 1/1 overall, RHP from San Diego HS. failed to sign with Houston, went to IMG Academy in FL, drafted 1/17 by Cleveland
Andrew Suarez: 2nd/57 overall LHP from U-Miami, failed to sign with Washington. Drafted 2nd round/61st overall in 2015 by San Francisco
Trevor Megill; 3rd/104th overall RHP from Loyola Marymount. failed to sign with Boston, drafted 7th/207 in 2015 draft and signed with San Diego
Jacob Nix: 5th/136 RHP from Los Alomitos HS; couldn’t sign when Tampa lost bonus money, sued, FA, signed with San Diego
Zack Zehner: 7th/204 OF from Cal Poly, failed to sign with Toronto. Drafted 18th round 2015 and signed with NYY
Austin Byler, 9th/274 1B from nevada-Reno. failed to sign with Washington, drafted 11th round in 2015 and signed with Arizona
Aiken became quite the rarity; the first #1 overall baseball pick to fail to sign in 30 years. But his lack of signing cascaded and cost the Astros both their 5th rounder Nix and another player later on thanks to the new draft rules on bonus pools; Nix ended up being declared a FA in a face-saving move by MLB so as not to admit that their new bonus cap circumvention rules were BS. Aiken had no where to go but down from 1-1 so he obviously cost himself money. The others all fell, if only slightly in Suarez’s case.
Verdict: 1 didn’t count, 5 lowered draft stock
2013: 8 failed to sign
Phil Bickford: 1/10 RHP California HS. Toronto failed to sign. went to Southern Nevada juco, drafted 1/18 by SF and signed.
Matt Krook 1s/35 LHP calif HS. Miami failed to sign, went to Oregon State, drafted 4th round by SF in 2016
Ben DeLuzio 3rd/80 SS from Fla HS. Miami failed to sign. Went to Florida State, played 4 years … undrafted out of college, NDFA with Arizona
Ben Holmes, 5th /151 LHP Oregon State. Philly failed to sign. went 9th round in 2014
Jason Monda 6th/181 OF Washington State. Philly failed to sign … then accused him of NCAA violations. he wasn’t drafted again and quit to go to Med school
Stephen Woods 6th/188 RHP NY HS: Tampa failed to sign, went to Suny-Albany, drafted 8th round 2016 by SF and signed
Dustin DeMuth 8th/230 3B from Indiana, Minnesota failed to sign, became 5th rounder in 2014 and signed with Milwaukee
Ross Kivett 10th/291 2B from kansas State. Cleveland failed to sign, became 6th rounder in 2014 and signed with Detroit
Bickford fell 8 slots year over year but still fell. DeMuth and Kivett both improved their stock. The rest fell, drastically in some cases.
Verdict: 2 improved, 6 fell
2012: 8 failed to sign
Mark Appel 1/8 RHP Stanford by Pittsburgh. failed to sign, was 1/1 in 2013 with Houston
Teddy Stankiewicz 2/75 RHP from Texas Hs. failed to sign with Mets, went Juco, 2/45 in 2013 by Boston
Alec Rash, 2/95 by Philadelphia from IA HS. went to Missouri, 2015 drafted in 23rd round by Washington but still didn’t sign; quit baseball and started playing NCAA basketball
Kyle Twomey, 3/106 LHP Calif HS Oakland. Drafted 13th round 3 yrs later out of USC by Chicago Cubs.
Brandon Thomas 4/136 OF from Ga Tech; didn’t sign with Pittsburgh, drafted 8th round one year later and signed with NYY
Colin Poche 5/162 LHP texas h s. failed to sign with Baltimore, went to Dallas Baptist, undrafted Jr year, drafted 14th round 2016 by Arizona
Nick Halamandaris 8/251 1B Calif HS. failed to sign with Seattle, played 4 years at cal, undrafted jr and Sr year, NDFA with Seattle, played one season
L.J. Mazzilli 9/280 2B from UConn. 4th rounder in 2013 signed with NY Mets
Appel managed to improve from 8th overall to 1st overall. Stankiewicz also improved his stock about a round’s worth. Mazzilli improved from a 9th rounder to a 4th rounder. The others all fell.
Verdict: 3 up, 5 down.
Summary: of the 50 players who failed to sign, passing judgement even on the players where its far too early to really tell:
30 hurt their draft stock by failing to sign (15 HS, 15 coll)
1 didn’t really count b/c of the Houston 2014 draft bonus shenanigans (Jacob Nix, HS)
15 improved their draft stock/money
4 from 2024 too early yet to tell.
So, 2 out of every 3 times a kid turns down the money they’re costing themselves in the long run. But, its also worth noting that a huge percentage of these players who declined to sign were at the very beginning of the new rules … in the last few years, the success rate of players has gone way up. I attribute it to players now understanding better the rules of the system.
Jarlin Susana gets a well-deserved bump up in teh rankings. Photo Washington Post
The boys at MLBPipeline (Jim Callis, Jonathan Mayo, et al) have done a mid-season reshuffling of all 30 teams’ prospect lists, and the Nats system looks demonstrably different in the wake of the draft, trades, and over/under performance of some players.
This is a discussion of where the system stands as per one of the leading pundits in the game.
Below is the current top 30 (also online at this link, which is dynamic and shows the current status of the list at all times). I’ve added a new column that looks at the last few MLBpipeline top 30 releases, going back to the Mar 2024 initial list, to show the general range of where players have been the entire time as a comparison to where they are now.
Here’s some thoughts on the current top 30 on this list, how they’ve risen/fallen, plus all the names who have appeared in MLBPipeline’s top 30 lists this year who are now pushed out, and then at the bottom a list of all the graduations. All stats listed are as of my looking them up and writing them here on 8/14/24.
With Wood’s graduation, Dylan Crews ascends to #1. He’s got an .814 OPS figure in AAA this year, which sounds good … but when you compare his 2024 to what his fellow top 5 college draftees are doing (Skenes; started ASG. Langford, destroyed minor league pitching and started the season in the majors) he almost seems like a disappointment right now. I think its slightly telling that the team has now called up four different hitters (Blankenhorn, Call, Tena, Chapparo) instead of Crews in the wake of trades and releases.
House Remains #2. He finally got pushed to AAA, where he’s got a sub-300 OBP figure. But, it’s also telling to remember he’s 21. If he had gone to college, he’d have just been drafted a month ago and would be sitting in XST.
Sykora and Susana now 3/4 in the system. And as they should be, based on their complete dominance this season. Sykora should have been promoted already with the numbers and accolades he’s got in the last month. Sykora even made his way onto the MLBpipeline top 100 for all the minors. Meanwhile, Susana is now #61 on ESPN/Kiley McDaniels top 100 for the entire minors. That’s pretty impressive.
Our big-3 round 2024 draftees (King, Dickerson, Lomavita) come in at #5, #7, and #10. Only a handful of our 2024 draftees have even made it out of XST (the above three plus Bazzell), and only King & Lomavita have been assigned to a real team for their pro debuts as of this writing.
Clemmey comes in at #6. Is this a little high? Perhaps. But it is telling that in his first pro season he went straight into the low-A rotation and has been there the entire time, with massive K/9 numbers and decent BAA, even if his ERA and WHIP show a lot of room for improvement.
Cavalli has slipped, from a consensus top 3 to now #8 on this list. I don’t blame them; A 12-month recovery has now been delayed by “dead arm” and “the flu” and perhaps next week we’ll hear that he has the bubonic plague and then maybe after that a mysterious soft tissue injury.
Morales is also slipping, though he was injured for a big chunk of this season. He’ll need another year at AA just to get his value back. Meanwhile, he’s being passed on the pecking order for 1B/DH types (since he’ll be completely blocked by House at 3B), and will need to bash his way up over the likes of Yepez, Chapparo, Meneses, Blankenhorn, and whichever veteran FA/Joey Gallo v2.0 we sign this off-season
Cayden Wallace at #11 just got dumped to the 60-day DL; per some googling, he has an Oblique Strain and has been out since first week of May. Does that sound like a long time for that injury? We’re at 3 months.
Lile, Hassell, and Hurtado are all treading water, being lower on the list than they were earlier but all due to initial placements above them pushing them down. Nothing to report here for now. These guys aren’t impressing or overly disappointing for now.
Angel Feliz has gotten bumped up decently, from the 20-24 range to #16 here. The 17yr old SS made the DSL all-star team and is slashing .308/.385/.449 this year. Wow, when was the last time we had a solid hitter matriculate out of the DSL? Luis Garcia? Juan Soto? It’s early, but after the sh*t show that was the 2023 IFA class, its refreshing to at least have a couple guys who look like they’ll move on. By the way, as far as I can tell the best hitter out of the 23IFA class right now is looking like Carlos Tavarez, a 1B/OF who had a .869 OPS figure in the FCL this year. Not one other 23IFA who even made it to the mainland had an OPS figure much above .600 (Marcano, Soto, Acevedo, Batista, Maricuto, and Arias).
Andry Lara now sits in the #17 spot, having moved up from the 27-30 range. Um; ok. He’s 21 and in AA, where he’s been for most of the year after dominating the first month of High-A. If he was playing by American rules he’d be sitting in XST right now. For me he’s a lot better prospect than #17. I think this is a top 10 prospect.
Green: significantly dropped to #21 from the 6-8 range, and before that even higher. We’ve debated Green for a while in this space. His stat line is comical this year: .198 BA and a ridiculous 171 Ks in 88 games. He’s repeating low-A. I agree with Keith Law’s take on Green, where he called out Green by name as a golden example of a player who NEEDED the former Short-A league that’s now gone. Instead he’s jumped straight to low-A and has had to stick there. I hope he can rebound, I really do, but his prospect rank is where it deserves to be for now.
Brzycky, Grissom, Ribalta: I just don’t see why RHP relievers are ranked as prospects. They come in at 22, 26, 30 on these rankings. They’re fungible, replaceable assets who generally are good one year (Rainey in 2020 and 2022, Weems in 2023) then awful the next (Rainey in 2021 and 2024, Weems in 2022 and then again in 2024). Ribalta just got called up; i wouldn’t be surprised if he had a 2.00 ERA this year and a 6.00 era next or vice versa. It’s like ranking backup middle infielders or 4th outfielders.
Pinckney has taken a fall in the rankings; his swing looked long and slow in spring training and it hasn’t really improved. 119 Ks in 108 games for just 6 homers isn’t going to cut it. I know a lot of readers here were super high on him coming out of Alabama, but he may have plateaued already. He may get pushed up to AAA at some point, but where does he fit in?
Lord coming in at #30. Not sure what else you want the guy to do; he’s the same draft as Tyler Stuart who is ranked 10 spots higher but is a level below him. If Lord was a 2nd rounder he’d be in the top 100 right now. He’s now been in the AAA rotation for nearly 2 months (8 starts) and he’s still holding a 3.27 ERA there.
Guys who were in the top 30 but who are now pushed out:
Brenner Cox: He’s getting a long run as a starter in low-A w/o the batting average to sustain it.
Armando Cruz: ranked solely b/c of his signing bonus for a while, he just got an undeserved promotion to High-A so that Seaver King could start in Fredericksburg.
TJ White remains in the 19-20 range for other pundits but is now outside top 30 for MLBpipeline. Not sure why some pundits still rate him; he’s hitting .202 as he repeats high-A.
Dustin Saenz: Seemed like a possible sneaky starter prospect like a Parker or Lord, but got hurt and has struggled in his return from the DL in AA.
Darren Baker: has played a solid season in AAA but has not gotten an opportunity since neither Vargas or Nunez has gotten hurt. Has been playing a ton of LF to give him some positional flexibility, but he remains a power-less slap hitter at a time when you need to have some power no matter where you play.
Cole Henry: what are we going to do with this guy? He was our #3 prospect for a while post draft, but just can’t seem to stay healthy.
Jeremy De La Rosa: was hopefully the last example of a ridiculous 40-man addition that this team will make, putting a guy on the roster who was in low-A and had zero chance of getting picked. He was dfa’d out outrighted in November 2023, which means we can’t ever outright him again. He played well to start the season in low-A, earned a promotion but hasn’t hit since. He got promoted to AA in July to fill the gaps left when Crews got bumped up and Hassell got hurt, but he didn’t deserve it. He’s continued to hit sub .200 since and probably should be back in A-Ball.
Anyone else worth mentioning?
Andrew Alvarez: i’m not sure they’ve ever ranked him, but he’s in the AAA rotation and faces an interesting Rule-5 dilemma this off-season.
Acevedo and Solano, our two $1.3M 2023IFA signings: nowhere to be seen.
Rodney Theophile and Michael Cuevas: youngsters in the AA rotation mix; I wonder if they can get some prospect love soon.
How about Jose Atencio, 22yr old doing well in High-A rotation?
Graduations from Mar 2024:
Trey Lipscomb: 29-32 range; has struggled in the majors, which fits given his prospect status. An infielder in the 20s would have a ceiling as a backup, and that seems to be where he is right now.
Jacob Young: 17-18 range: As is often discussed, he’s drastically outperforming his prospect ranking, and sits 2nd on the 2024 team in bWAR behind Abrams. It’s almost entirely on the strength of his defense though since he has an 85 OPS+ figure.
James Wood: 1-2 range: has not disappointed in his MLB debut; 134 OPS+ as of this writing.
Mitchell Parker: 20-22 range: has drastically outperformed his prospect status since arriving in the majors, which is being attributed to the Nats pitching staff. But he’s been out-performing his reputation his entire pro career.
DJ Herz: 12-14 range: He’s performing as I would have expected Parker to do, based on prospect reputation … 4.41 ERA, 91 ERA+. He probably needs more AAA time.
Note: I agree with those shops that stick by 50ip/150ABs versus service time for Rookie status, but the following three guys are “graduated” per service time.
Drew Millas: 18-20 range (graduated by service time not by ABs): hitting well enough in AAA but didn’t hit at all when he spelled Riley Adams on the MLB roster. He’ll be #3 on our 3-catcher depth chart for the forseeable future.
Nasim Nunez: 19-20 range (graduated by service time not by ABs). I’m amazed he’s lasted this long based on his utter lack of any performance, and he’s done little to make me think he’s really even a prospect honestly. He’ll go to AAA and sit there for 3 years as a spare-part infielder.
Israel Pineda: 26-28 range (graduated by service time not by ABs). He’s much younger than Millas, but where has his bat gone? He hit .280 in 2022 in a AA call-up, but is now hitting .157 there two years on.
Lots of questions about Abrams this week Photo via dcsportskings.com
I have not done this in a while. I used to do this near weekly post series when former Nats beat writer Bill Ladsen would answer fan questions. Now he’s moved on and we rarely get any of the known beat writers addressing any fan questions … except for long-time beat man Mark Zuckerman. Zuckerman periodically does a q&a session in the form of comments on a post. Fans post questions and Zuckerman answers them.
So for fun I thought i’d try it. Here’s some of the main questions asked and how I’d answer them. I’ll go from the bottom up. I post the “question” (sometimes editing for clarity), put my response, then put Zuckerman’s response summarized.
Q: Who would you expect the Nationals to add to the roster and who would you like to see them add yourself?
A: If they’re just doing existing 40-man players, the two most obvious players to add would probably be a starter (Rutledge) and an outfielder (recall Meneses). The starter would help manage innings limits for the young guys, and the OF can cover for the guys we traded (Winker, Thomas). If they’re going to add new players to the 40-man roster to do roster expansion on 9/1, then the obvious choice is likely to add Crews at that point and maybe reward Lord? Maybe not; still seems too early for Lord. Zuckerman kind of hedged, saying maybe Crews, maybe Tena/Chapparo, maybe Rutledge, maybe Williams/Cavalli coming off the DL.
Q: Wood has more than held his own at the plate but his defense in LF has been suspect so far. How long until he’s moved to his more comfortable spot in RF? I vision him eventually manning 1st base. Sooner, rather than later.
A: Um. LF is far, far easier to play than RF. If he can’t handle LF, he’s going to be a massive liability in RF. Its small sample size, but indeed his defense so far across the board is bad: DRS of -4 (that’s 4 runs cost in 274 innings, which projects to -20 DRS for a full season) and a UZR/150 of -26. Those are both really, really bad. Luckily, he’s 6’10” and would make a perfect 1B. My guess is this: once we have enough top-quality OFs in the majors, Wood makes way. Who will that be? Who knows: we still have a pipeline of OFs in the minors who could force their way into the conversation: Hassell, Lile, Pinckney, and Stone Garrett are all relatively close, while guys like Vaquero, Green, Cox, and 2024 draftees are further away. Zuckerman asked Martinez if Wood would move to RF once Thomas got traded and he said no … intimating that the Nats believe Crews will take RF upon promotion and the OF will be Woods-Young-Crews for the forsee-able future.
Q: Should they just DFA Corbin at this point? He seems to be getting worse as the year goes on. Trevor Williams could hold that spot for the remainder of the season
A: Nope. As discussed in the July rotation review post, thanks to the injury issues our three possible replacements face (Grey, Cavalli, Williams), the high likelihood is that Corbin stays through the end of the season. Now we’re close enough to 9/30 that our young pitchers like Parker and Herz (and even Gore to some respect) will need to skip starts to keep IP low. Even if Cavalli or Williams magically re-appeared, you’d still keep Corbin in the pen to provide this service until his $35M salary is exhausted. Zuckerman basically agrees, noting that neither Williams or Cavalli are both just basically playing catch right now, let alone building up strength, let alone doing rehab starts.
Q: Which of the minor leaguers we received at the trade deadline are likely to be called up for a cup of coffee? At least 2 (Tena and Chaparro) appear to be MLB ready.
A: The easy answer is Tena, who’s on the 40-man. The moment we have an infield injury he’s on the bus to DC. Fun fact: we’re in mid-August and Nunez has 15 total at-bats! Wow. Chapparo seems like a 2025 NRI to compete for the Meneses job: 1B/DH mostly. He projects to be a stumpy slugger with little defensive value, not exactly something the team values, and I can’t see him getting added to the 40-man to get called up over Meneses and Garrett. Zuckerman says Tena, and maybe sooner than later since Lipscomb continues to struggle playing every day.
Q: (Paraphrased) Kiebert Ruiz had a few decent moments but generally is struggling and batting cleanup, and is signed long term. How do you see this playing out?
A: I’m going to chalk it up to just a bad season. His career MLB numbers prior to this were just fine and justified the long term contrac.t The OP asks about why he’s batting cleanup … turns out his splits at cleanup are a lot better than at 6-hole where he batted most of the year. His OPS of .710 batting clean-up would give him an OPS+ figure above 100. I’m not worried about Ruiz. Zuckerman is more harsh, calling Ruiz the biggest disappointment of the season, plus he was critical of Ruiz’ defense. Hmm.
Q: Did Matt Cronin do something to get deep in the dog house?
A: Note: Cronin was finally promoted to AA after sitting in High-A for probably two months too long. I questioned the same in my last two monthly check-ins, and have no answer other than to guess that, as a guy who passed through waivers/DFA to get outrighted, the team doesn’t consider him a prospect anymore and he’s now in “org arm” territory, which means he gets moved around the system as needed to eat up reliever innings until that point where he hits 6year MLFA or gets cut. Zuckerman noted he did have back surgery last year and perhaps the team wanted to ease him back, but otherwise has no idea why he’s been stuck in A ball for so long.
Q: Why is it taking so long to get Williams back on the mound in games?
A: Because he had a serious injury. A Flexor issue is a 2-3 month injury at best case, and worst case leads to TJ surgery. He went on the DL June 4th. We’re now August 7th, so that’s 2 months and he’s reportedly not yet doing mound work. Per the injury update, the team is hoping to have him “throw a few innings” in September. Zuckerman says the same.
Q: What is wrong with CJ’s batting? He seems to be swinging at bad pitches.
A: Everything in Abram’s aggregate stats in 2024 is an improvement over last year. Line Drive % up, hard contact % up, Ground ball and weaker contact down. He is in the 10th percentile of all MLB hitters in Chase rate … but his swing/take numbers are drastically improved over the past two years. I’ll take a couple of chase pitches for a guy who has really improved on balls over the plate. Zuckerman notes he’s in a slump right now and this is what he does when he slumps.
Q: Your early thoughts who Rizzo may target FAs in the off-season (or make any surprising trades like Gonzalez or Eaton) for DH/1B/SP/backup C for 2025? Who would YOU like to see as a veteran (ala Werth) signing to lead the young players?
A: I’m beginning to think that Rizzo may give it another year to allow the younger players to matriculate up before making a massive deal. I don’t think this is a 2011 heading into 2012 deal, where he thinks a major signing will be the catalyst to go to a 90-win team. I also think the team is pretty well set at a lot of the positions.
OF is set with Wood-Young-Crews once Crews shows up
3B/SS/2B will be set with top prospects House-Abrams-Garcia.
C is set with long-term signee Ruiz. Why bother signing a backup veteran C if you have healthy Adams and Millas?
So the only thing i could see on the FA market would be yet another 1B/DH veteran type like Gallo to try to catch lightning in a bottle.
Starters: Gore, Parker, Herz, Irvin all young and healthy right now. You expect Cavalli back for 2025. Williams is a FA and might take a deal to return. We don’t have a ton of depth past that, so maybe another FA starter … but who does that starter replace? Herz? You’re not getting a starter to replace Gore or Cavalli, and Parker/Irvin have earned their spots. So, there doesn’t seem to be a huge need for a starter.
Relievers; definitely need some FA help. As of this writing, I’d dump half my relievers. So, look for a ton of 1yr and MLFA deals in the off-season.
Zuckerman says, power hitting 1B, maybe a SP, and relievers.
Q: The “500 Clubs” questions. 1) Do you think the next 500 foot home run will be by one of the famous sluggers or someone people don’t expect to hit one that long?; 2) Which players have the best chance of reaching 500 career home runs based on current totals, age, injury history and other reasons?
A: The next 500-foot homer will be from one of the known sluggers (Ohtani, Stanton, Judge), because they’re the ones who are playing regularly and getting frequent looks. The longest so far this year is 480 from someone unexpected, but last year 493 from Ohtani and the last 500 footer was in 2022 in (surprise) Colorado from CJ Cron.
Best chances to get to 500 homers? Taking a quick peek at active HR leaders …
I think Stanton can get another 80 despite injury issues
Trout should be a shoe-in sitting at 378 with probably another 7-8 seasons to go.
Harper and Machado are both 31 and sitting at 330; both are signed long term for the same team and should be able to average 20 a year for 8 years to get there.
Judge sitting at 298 at age 32 is an interesting question mark: he’s so prolific but so injury prone.
Alonso and Ohtani are both 29 and sitting in the 205-215 range; that’s a ways to go but doable.
Soto is only 25 and already has 188. He could hit 200 before the end of the season. The better question for Soto might be can he hit 600, or 650.
Zuckerman wasn’t aware of stat cast tracking, but listed the same guys I did.
Q: Do you have any insight or theories as to why the return for Flora was so light (a minor league free agent) relative to other mid reliever trades?
A: Probably reputation, role, and contract status. Honestly, in hindsight the return for Hunter was amazing. What a fleece job (Cayden Wallace and a supp-1st draft pick). Zuckerman says it’s because Floro was a 2month rental and a FA at the end of 2024, so there was limits as to what you’d get.
Q: Why has the radio feed been eliminated in the concourse?
A: No idea. There’s no good reason to turn that off. Zuckerman has no idea either
Q: Who’s next to be brought up, Millas, Ribalta etc.? Got a guesstimate?
A: I’m sure we’ll see random call-ups for double headers and other minor injuries between now and 9/1. Willingham and Millas seem to be the two most likely. Zuckerman says he hopes its Crews.
(From here down Zuckerman called it a day, so no alternate answers)
Q: Do you think Joey Gallo will return to nats line up after he gets off IR?
A: Yes I do think he’ll return and will be given a chance to showcase himself for the off-season. Seems like veteran privilege. I don’t think he’ll hit though and may get DFA’d so the team can continue to start prospects to audition for 2025.
Q: What is Jake Noll up to these days?
Hit MLFA in November 2023 and never signed another affiliated deal. He wasn’t in winterball and he’s not with any indy or foreign league in 2024. I can’t find any hint as to what he’s done since: nothing on his twitter or wikipedia page. So, who knows?
Q: Who is one player you wish that has gotten more opportunity with Nats but it was not meant to be?
A: I wonder why we couldn’t get the performance out of Fedde that he found in Korea.
Q: Outfield of the future for Nats? Young needs to hit for more power to be part of it or? Do you still be believe in Hassel?
A: I believe its Wood-Young-Crews for the time being until Hassell or Lile makes a case. But, neither are really making that case right now.
Q: Do you think Abrams is good enough as SS or better as 2B?
A: Defensively? He’s not half bad: for 2024 he’s at 1.1 UZR/150 and a 4 DRS for the season. I’ll take that for a SS generating his offense, as would nearly every other team in the league. There’s no reason to move him to 2B unless we found a SS who was just significantly better and provided passable offense. our SS depth right now doesn’t really show that coming: Tena/Cluff in AAA, Made in AA, Pena in High-A (who will lose that job as soon as King is ready to go), Cruz in low-A? Maybe Dickerson next spring in FCL? Nobody is close.
Q: How much of the offensive struggles can and should be placed on the hitting coach and manager?
A: Some, I suppose? But if a hitter just isn’t talented, what can a hitting coach do? You can only get results up to a point. We’ve seen our pitchers drastically improve and are attributing it to Sean Doolittle, perhaps we should expect more from our hitting coach.
Q: If the Nats win the draft lottery in 2023, do they draft Paul Skenes instead of Dylan Crews, and would Lane Thomas still be a Nat?
A: 100% we would have picked Skenes. Thomas still would have been traded b/c he fetched value and we still have other OFs in the system.
Phew. that was fun. Disagree with my or Zuckerman’s answers?
Could Lord be the next guy promoted to the majors?? Photo via threads.com IG
Here’s the End of July 2024 check-ins on all our rotations, from MLB to FCL.
Each team section analysis will have the same items: current rotation, changes in the last month, observations, next guy to get promoted (if its in the minors), next guy to get cut, and then a few comments about relievers.
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Irvin, Gore, Parker, Corbin, Herz
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Irvin, Gore, Parker, Corbin, Herz
Changes sinceend of last Month: None. Same five guys, for better or worse.
We did however get some distressing news on the two guys we thought we’d have back by now, Grey and Cavalli. Grey was yanked after a dip in velocity in a rehab start, given another MRI and he’s got a UCL issue. He thought maybe it was just a brace insertion, but on July 25th he got Tommy John surgery. The timing of the injury is bad; he’ll miss the rest of 2024 and probably is no guarantee to even see 2025 on the field. Meanwhile, Cavalli got the flu, which started him back to ground zero in terms of his rehab, then he suffered a “dead arm” after coming back, and we havn’t seen him in weeks. Um, its now August 2024, he had the surgery in March of 2023. So we’re now at 16 months post surgery and counting. So much for a 12-month recovery period. Lastly, we’ve heard jack and sh*t about Williams, our most valuable 2024 trade piece lit on fire after his flexor issue. The last update I’ve seen as July 19th “light throwing” activities. Great, so he’ll be ready for October.
Rotation Observations: So, as for the guys we DO have in the rotation: Irvin took a step back in June, going 2-2 with a 4.75 ERA. Corbin blew up after a couple of acceptable months, pitching to a 7.27 ERA last month. Gore had an uncharacteristically awful July, walking 16 in 26 innings and going 0-2 with a 7.62 ERA. Not good. Parker? Same story: he went from a 3.15 ERA last month to a 7.89 ERA this month. Lastly we have the new guy Herz, who improved a ton from June and threw 5 starts at a 4.04 ERA with a 26/5 K/BB ratio last month. Interesting.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: So, Yes I know Corbin is awful, but this team seems hell bent on having him soak up innings until his $35M/year contract is over. If someone was healthy tomorrow, I think Herz may still make way, but on the other hand his promising July tells me he’s improving and should be given more time. However, none of our 3 injured starters is seemingly coming back any time soon, and as we’ll see in the next section, nobody from AAA is pushing for a promotion right now.
Bullpen comments: Two of our best relievers were moved in Harvey and Floro. We wish we could have moved Finnegan, but an ill-timed blow-up inning likely scared off the suiters (Baltimore? Philadelphia?) and cost us some more prospects (at least he’s still under Arb control for another year). In the place of the departed guys, the team added wavier claim Salazar and brought up newly converted reliever Adon. Get ready for some reliever blowups the rest of the way: Rainey has an ERA in the 6s, Ferrer in the 7s, and the whole middle relief corps (JBarnes, Garcia, Adon, Salazar) are middling 4.00 something ERA guys who are all the definition of a replacement level arm.
AAA Rochester
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Rutledge, Ward, Lord, Alvarez, Luckham
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Rutledge, Watkins, Ward, Lord, Alvarez
Changes since end of last month: Watkins made 3 starts then hit the DL, replaced by AA-call up Luckham, who joins Lord and Alvarez as 3/5ths of the AAA rotation promoted up in the last couple of months.
Rotation Observations: We’ll go in order of seniority. Rutledge was awful in July, has been awful all season, and it seems to me the scouting reports on the guy are holding true; he’s a 2pitch guy who needs to be moved to relief. Ward made 4 starts to a 4.04 ERA (which … normally you’d say, oh that’s not so bad), but he only threw 17.2 innings in those four starts and he managed to walk 17 in those 17.2 innings. This team wasted a roster spot on him all year last season to see what they’ve got: I’ll tell you what you’ve got: a 27yr old guy who may have been a promising starter once, but i’m not sure what you have now. Alvarez’s foray into AAA has not been good: 13ip, only 7 punch-outs and he’s very hittable (.351 BAA). The 2023 Nats minor league pitcher of the year who appears on almost zero prospect lists may be exhibiting why: its likely AA was the limit of his competence. Luckham’s first two AAA starts have been blow-outs: he doesn’t seem ready. Which leaves us with Lord: the 18th rounder who’s now a 24yr old in AAA holding his own. He threw 5 starts, 3.86 ERA, solid K/BB numbers, looks like he belongs. Amazing. He was the 531st player drafted in 2022, a college reliever out of a middling baseball school.
Next guy to get Promoted: Amazingly, its Lord on merit. No, i don’t think they’re in a hurry to promote him, but he’s most deserving. Certainly our 40-man starters aren’t.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: I think Luckham is overmatched right now and goes back down when an opportunity presents or when Watkins comes back from DL. Alvarez is also on short leash. If it were me i’d look at both Rutledge and Ward in the bullpen, but no reason to do that now unless a slew of AA starters make noise to move up.
Bullpen comments: Salazar already got called up; he didn’t give up a run in AAA after his acquisition. La Sorsa continues to pitch well in Rochester and looks like he deserves a promotion; he’s on the 40-man (post-publish correction; he was outrighted last Dec) so maybe if the Nats get tired of Rainey sucking they’ll give him another shot. Rico Garcia is a 30yr old closer in AAA who we got as a MLFA from Oakland; he was solid in July and may merit a 9/1 callup to see if he’s worth extending.
AA Harrisburg
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Cuevas, Solesky, Lara, Theophile, Stuart (with two spot starts from Reyes)
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Luckham, Cuevas, Solesky, Lara, Theophile (plus a couple Grey rehab starts and one Reyes spot-start)
Changes since end of last month:Luckham promoted, replaced in the rotation by Reyes spot starts until we acquired Stuart in trade for Winker.
Rotation Observations: New acquisition Stuart got the 7/31 start; gave up 3 runs in 5 innings for his new team and reportedly sat 97. Ok, that sounds good. Solesky continues to keep the ERA down but have crummy peripherals (11 Ks in 26 ip) and i’m beginning to suspect the team doesn’t really plan on doing much with him. Lara: 4 starts, 2.63 ERA but interestingly just 10 Ks in 24ip. Great that Lara (just 21) is more than holding his own in AA but where’d his strikeouts go? The ERA seems like a mirage, since his BAA is in the upper .280s Theophile looks decent: 4 starts, 3.18 ERA, but i’d like to see him go deeper in games (just 17 IP in those 4 starts). Lastly we have Cuevas, who had a 6.75 ERA in July, which is about in line with his season ERA. His peripherals showed he was probably a little unlucky this month, so the team will continue to run with him.
From the DL; we saw some rehab starts from Saenz this month; if he comes back someone likely makes way. No idea what is going on with Henry. Lucas Knowles got put on the full-season DL which usually means “major arm injury.”
Next guy to get Promoted: Dare I say Lara? They’d never push a 21yr old to AAA, not given that the big club is 12 games under .500 and tanking fast. Solesky continues to be too old for AA and in need of a challenge, but I wonder if the team thinks he could survive in AAA given his lack of K rate.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Continues to be Cuevas. But they’ve stuck with him all this time with an ERA in the 6s so I can’t see them making a rotation change here.
Bullpen comments: Grissom was promoted earlier this season and he’s pushing for another one; he had 8 appearances and gave up just 5 hits and zero runs in July. Brzycky is back and continues to be a K machine: 13 in 9 innings since returning from a long DL stint. Remember, he’s on the 40-man so the team likely bumps him up to AAA soon.
High-A Wilmington
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Atencio, Cornelio, Shuman, Davis, Susana
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Atencio, Caceres, Young, Cornelio, Shuman (plus a couple rehab starts from Cavalli and Brzycky)
Changes since end of last month: Caceres, Young bumped out of rotation, replaced by the promotions for Davis and Susana.
Rotation Observations: Shuman continued to confound this observer as to why he’s still in High-A: he’s 26, has little trouble getting these guys out, and should be in AA. 2.40 ERA for the month to go with his CAREER 3.21 ERA in the minors. Atencio was solid this month: 1.82 ERA even if his peripherals made that figure probably a little lucky. Caceres and Young both had ERAs in the 6s, earning their fates to be dropped out of the rotation and into dreaded LR/SS territory, but this was a long time coming for Caceres in particular. Susana was fantastic in his High-A debut; 3 starts, sub 1.00 whip, 2.40 ERA. Can’t ask for more than that out of the 20 year old. Newly promoted Davis only got one start. Lastly we come to Cornelio, who had an ERA in the 7s for the month, a 5.76 ERA for the season, and a 5.21 ERA for his career. I’m beginning to wonder what the team sees here. He had similarly mediocre numbers all last year, but got promoted anyways, and now continues to post crummy numbers the next level up. He was a 7th rounder with a decent bonus but nothing massive, but the team gives him chances like he’s a 7-figure guy. Weird.
Next guy to get Promoted: Shuman. He’s 26, should be in AA at least, and has a career minor league ERA in the mid 3s. (I did not change a word of this from last month’s post).
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Caceres; 24, almost no IFA bonus, can’t get guys out in Low-A, a 2017 signee who’s near the end of his tenure here. He may make way if someone needs a promotion from Fredericksburg. After that, Cornelio.
Bullpen comments: Here’s Cronin’s line for the month: 8 2/3rds innings, 3 hits, 0 walks 1 run allowed and 13 strikeouts. As a 26yr old former 40-man member. What the f*ck is he still doing in High-A?? I wrote nearly this exact same thing last month too. Past Cronin, there’s a slew of relievers who are unhittable in Wilmington right now: Miguel Gomez 13/1 K/BB ratio last month, Richard Gausch had a 0.88 whip last month, Chance Huff had a 0.84 ERA. So lots of options to move up if the need arises.
Low-A/Fredericksburg
Rotation as of 7/31/24: Sthele, Polanco, Tepper, Romero, Sykora ( plus a slew of spot starts from random players and two Saenz rehab starts)
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Sykora, Susana, Davis, Sthele, Polanco (plus 4 Shuman rehab starts and 1 Grey start)
Changes since end of last month: Susana and Davis promoted, replaced by Tepper and Romero (who started the year in low-A but was demoted early and has been in FCL most of season). Diaz had a couple of spot starts and was released.
Rotation Observations: Davis and Susana were (finally) promoted after both showing they had nothing left to prove in low-A. Sthele is now doing the same, giving up just 2 ER in 21 July innings. Sykora’s month might be even more impressive: in 4 starts he struck out 31 guys in 17 innings and had a .136 BAA. Finally, a high-round prep draftee who’s performing. Tepper only has one start so SSS, and Romero just got promoted and didn’t pitch in July. Polanco has struggled and may be the one who makes way for newly acquired Alex Clemmey, though they could also go to a 6-man rotation and keep giving the likes of Tepper and Romero starts.
Next guy to get Promoted: Is it Sykora? I’m not sure what else he needs to do to show he can get low-A hitters out, and they just promoted Susana who is of similar age and had similar low-A numbers. Why not? Push him up for the last month of the season.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Sthele has bought himself some time with a solid July but has generally struggled this season. As noted above, I think Polanco makes way for Clemmey in the short term. Polanco was an IFA signing in 2021 with such a small bonus figure that it wasn’t reported, meaning that the team has almost nothing “invested” in him, and often these kinds of data points come into play with these decisions.
Bullpen comments: Matthew Bollenbacher’s month stood out to me: 16 Ks/ 0 walks in 10 innings. So did Merrick Baldo, 14/3 K/BB in 8ip and zero runs allowed.
Rookie/FCL Nationals
Rotation as of 7/25/24 (end of FCL Season): Colon, Portorreal, CSanchez, BRomero, and Saenz rehab
Rotation as of 6/30/24: Colon, Portorreal, Camilio Sanchez, Brayan Romero, and rehabbers
Changes since end of last month: None really. The FCL rotation was basically the same all year.
Rotation Observations: Romero crushed it in July; 20/2 K/BB in 14ip, which is why they promoted him to Low-A the moment the FCL season ended. Colon and Portorreal also had nice ending months, each with an ERA in the 1s. Sanchez struggled a bit, probably costing himself a shot at a promotion this season. Interestingly Aldo Ramirez, coming back from a long-injury, is now technically assigned to FCL and had an era in the 10s for July, which included one spot start. I’m afraid he just hasn’t come back from injury and may be a lost cause.
Next guy to get Promoted: Romero already promoted.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Nobody pitched egregiously bad to get cut here.
Bullpen comments: The best relievers from the month was Angel Roman, and he was already promoted to Low-A.
Rookie/DSL Nationals
Rotation as of 7/31/24: De la Cruz, Reynoso, Vera, Feliz, Thomas, with Juan Reyes as an “opener.”
Rotation as of 6/30/24: De la Cruz, Reynoso, Vera, Thomas, Feliz (with Hernandez getting a couple spot starts)
Rotation Observations: MILB’s dsl nats stats page can’t do splits, and i’m probably already at 3000 words, so we’ll use full season stats to discuss. The DSL rotation has been relatively stable all year, with just 7 guys getting all the starts. And we’re seeing some widly crazy stat lines. The Ace continues to be Feliz, who has a 48/10 k/BB and a sub 3 era for the season. Jhoan Thomas has 24 ks and 24 walks in 26IP yet somehow has a sub 4 era. Now for the funny lines: Vera has 35 walks and 17Ks in 19ip. Yeah, that’s a little wild. De La Cruz Reynoso all have middling ERAs in he 6s with bad peripherals. Not much else to write home about with the 2024 DSL rotation. Hernandez seems to have been removed from the rotation with this 26 walks in 13ip, and Reyes has 5 starts but only 6IP so he’s being used as an opener of sorts.
Next guy to get Promoted: Feliz.
Next guy to get cut/demoted: Vera. Just can’t walk 2 guys an inning.
Seaver King should be the highest-ranked player we’ve picked up this month. Photo via opendorse
We’re now past both the 2024 Draft and the 2024 Trade Deadline. Lets summarize the draft results, the trade deadline deals, and then discuss the impact all these new players seem to have on our “top 30” ranks and perhaps on the team in the future.
2024 Draft Results. We signed 20 of our 21 picked players, only missing out on the 20th pick, who seemed to be picked as insurance in case our 2nd rounder Luke Dickerson failed to come to terms. Based on the immediate ranking adjustments, the following 2024 draftees will soon slot into our various top 30s in roughly the following spots:
5-7 Range: #1 pick Seaver King, who probably starts at SS and 3B in High-A next year.
7-10 Range: #1s pick Caleb Lomavita, who hopefully is catching full time at High-A next year.
16-20 Range: #3 pick Kevin Bazzell, who probably gets some C cycles in High-A next year.
Low 20 range: #2 pick Luke Dickerson, who the Nats seem higher on than others. FCL next year.
23-25 Range: #4 Pick Jackson Kent, who should be in the Low-A rotation next year.
28-30 Range: #8 pick Sam Peterson, who BA slotted in at #29 right out of the gate. Low-A OF.
So, that’s 6 guys pushing the typical edge of the prospect list downwards. For Baseball America’s immediate impact analysis, the above 6 guys meant that #31-36 became Cruz, Nunez, Baker, Alvarez, Lord, and Brown. To give an idea of how the draft strengthens farm systems.
Expectations out of this lot? I’m hoping King turns into someone who can push Luis Garcia when the time is right and maybe Garcia’s pushing arbitration dollars. I’m hoping one of Lomavita or Bazzell makes a for-real push to the upper minors and bolsters our C depth. I’m hoping we get some found-gold in one or two of the starters we got. But, unlike the last couple of drafts, where our 1st rounder was supposed to be a bonafide future superstar, I’m just not that wow’ed by anyone in our draft this year. Maybe its b/c of the lack of brand name awareness this year. We know the pundits seem to really like this draft, so we just have to be patient.
Then, along came the trade Deadline. The Nats were able to move four of the really obvious guys on the trading block (Harvey, Winker, Thomas, and Floro). An ill-timed blow-up inning seems to have cost the team the shot at trading closer Finnegan, and of course what could have been our best trade chip in Trevor Williams blew any shot at a prospect haul when he strained his flexor tendon two months ago. Other FAs to be who also missed out at netting us prospects; Corbin (ha-ha), Gallo (hurt), and the crew of Robles/Rosario/Barnes/Senzel (all DFA’d/released due to under-performance before they could be flipped). The four guys we did trade netted us the following players (and the rough area the acquisitions will slot in from a prospect perspective):
7-9 range: Cayden Wallace, 3B in AA, netted in Harvey trade. Also got the supplemental draft pick that turned into Lomavita
15-17 range; Tyler Steward, RHP Starting pitcher in AA, netted in Winker trade.
6-8 Range: Alex Clemmey, a 19yr old LHP Starting pitcher in Low-A netted in Thomas trade. High-risk/high-reward prospect.
23-25 range: Rafael Ramirez, a 19yr old SS in Low-A, netted in Thomas trade. Another high risk/high-reward.
Outside top 30: Jose Tena, a 23yr old AAA 2B/3B with some MLB time. At one point he was near the Cleveland top 10, now has dropped back. He has great AAA numbers this year, better than a lot of our middle infield guys. So this isn’t a throw-in. He could legitimately push Vargas as a backup middle infield option.
Outside top 30: Andres Chapparo, a 25-yr old 1B/3B AAA guy who was a MLFA signing in the off-season. Acquired for Floro. Did we really just trade Floro for a month of a MLFA? I’d like to think we retain some control over Chapparo for more than the rest of 2024. He’s destroying AAA this year and is on his way to hitting 20+ homers for the 3rd straight year in the minors. Listed as 3B, but the guy is 5’11”, 200lbs, which screams out “immobile 1B or DH basher.” Plus we already have House, Kieboom, Dunn and a couple others sharing 3B in AAA.
So, that’s quite a haul. Probably 9-10 guys who will slot into our top 30s at either MLB, BA, or elsewhere picked up in the last month. Four of them project as top 10 guys, really helping to bolster the depth in this system. King remains the highest ranked of any of them, but you have to be excited to see what guys like Clemmey, Wallace, and Dickerson can do.
Expectations here? Well, I like the fact that we got two established AA guys. Last year we acquired a solid AA guy in Herz and now he’s in the majors; we could see the same thing out of Steward or Wallace in a year. I like that we got two AAA talents who can bolster that lineup. And I like the lottery tickets that slot into low-A because why not, and because Cleveland is one of those teams that doesn’t shy away from drafting and developing prep and DSL kids well.
One last tidbit. Our Trade partners this year were … odd. We traded with four teams:
Kansas City/Harvey: last trade was in 2021, a minor cash deal. Last time we did anything of substance in trade with KC was 2018.
New York Mets/Winker deal: last move with them was 2018, a minor cash deal. Before that was the random Jerry Blevins deal in 2015, who seemingly got moved because he took the Nats to arbitration over like $200k, beat the team, and was dealt a few weeks later.
Cleveland/Thomas: last move with them also was 2018, the Yan Gomes deal that turned out a lot better for us than it did them.
Arizona/Floro: we havn’t traded with Arizona since 2011, nearly the entire Rizzo tenure here.
So, interesting that we traded with teams we havn’t done business with in years. Who are the teams we’ve gone the longest without making a deal with? We havn’t traded with Colorado since 2009 (the Joe Biemel deal), We havn’t done business with Houston since 2007 (and even that was the swap of two minor leaguers), but the most hilarious one? We havn’t traded with Baltimore since 2001.
CJ Abrams is a first time all star in 2024, hopefully the first of many. Photo via dcsportskings.com
This is a running post with all star notes for the team, updated for 2024.
Nats All Star Game Trivia:
All-time leader in Nats all-star appearances: Bryce Harper and Max Scherzer, both with 6 appearances with the Nats. (these numbers are only appearances with us, not including other franchises)
All-time leader in All-Star Game starts: Harper, who had 5 starts.
Total number of Starters in the history of the Franchise: Now is 11; Harper 5 times, Scherzer 3 times, and one each for Soriano, Murphy, Zimmerman.
Most all-star players named in a single year: 5 in both 2016 and 2017.
Least all-star game players named in a single year: 1 in multiple years during the “dark years” of 2006 through 2011, and now in 2022 and again in 2023 as we rebuild.
Most unlikely All-Star: Probably Dmitri Young or Cristian Guzman, both being the “someone has to make the all star team” nominations in our 100 loss period in the late 2000s.
Nationals All-Star Representative: CJ Abrams, Kyle Finnegan (both 1st time)
Snubs: Trevor Williams (on dl)
Narrative: Abrams was initially our sole representative until Finnegan was added at the last minute as an injury replacement. Williams should have been the named representative, sitting in the top 10 in most pitching categories, but got hurt a few weeks before the ASG and probably won’t return for weeks afterwards. We have a couple other players putting up decent seasons (Winker, Irvin) but none really All Star worthy.
Four Ex-nats appeared in the 2024 ASG, three of them starters (Harper, Turner, Soto). Amazingly Reynaldo Lopez represented Atlanta. Erick Fedde didn’t make the ASG but is considered one of the best trade prospects of the year. Wish we could have gotten these two guys to pitch like this for us.
Narrative. The Nats were bad this year, and were one of those teams that had to dig deep to find a sole representative. Grey was our opening day starter and was our best starter for the bulk of the year. We had some other players who ended up having decent seasons (Candelario, Thomas, Harvey) but they would have too much competition in their respective positions to earn a spot.
Nationals All-Star Representative: Juan Soto (2nd)
Snubs: Josh Bell
Narrative. Soto gets his 2nd ASG appearance, probably more on reputation than performance for 2022. He’s only hitting .243 as of the naming, but is getting on base at nearly a .400 clip thanks to his league-leading walk figure. Meanwhile, the best hitter on the team by far is Bell, who is snubbed from making his own 2nd ASG appearance likely a couple of weeks before he’s traded to a contender. Well, when you’re a last place team, you’re only getting one guy on the roster. Soto also gets into the Home Run Derby, which he wins. However, the story of the week was the leaking of contract talks breaking down, with Soto turning down a $440M deal and the team announcing they’re entertaining trade talks.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Trea Turner, Juan Soto, Kyle Schwarber, Max Scherzer* (substitute addition)
Possible Snubs: none
Narrative: The Nats scuffle into the all-star week on fumes thanks to losing 7 of 9 against NL West teams and suffering perhaps one too many injuries. Scherzer was not initially named, which I immediately listed as a huge snub. But then not only was he added as a replacement player … he was then named the damn starter. How is that possible? Anyway, among our other named players Schwarber’s injury prevents him from playing, but Soto gets into the Home Run derby, where he upsets #1 seed Shohei Ohtani before losing in the next round.
2020
Nationals All-Star representatives: (No Game)
Who would have made it: Juan Soto
Narrative: Covid-19 forced the cancellation of the ASG and the shortening of the season from 162 to 60 games. Nonetheless, the season that Juan Soto put up should have been recognized, even un-officially. He hit .351/.490/.695 in 47 games for an astounding 221 OPS+ figure, the 33rd best ever season posted by this figure. But, since Soto got hit with Covid and had to miss the first two weeks … he did not qualify for batting titles and was left out of the ASG and MVP conversations.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Max Scherzer, Anthony Rendon
Possible Snubs: Juan Soto, Stephen Strasburg, Howie Kendrick, Trevor Rosenthal (just kidding)
Narrative: Rendon finally is named to an all-star team, having played in the shadows of other more well-known NL third basemen for years. Arbitrary Endpoints: Rendon is 7th in baseball among hitters in total fWAR since 2014. 7th. In the entire league. And this is his first ASG. Meanwhile Scherzer is the obvious pick, though i’m not sure he gets the start this year. Scherzer leads the NL in bWAR … but Hyun-Jin Ryu is having an amazing season and could get the nod (indeed, he has). Soto’s numbers are solid, as good as his rookie campaign, but he started slow and the story-line surrounding the Nats this season has overshadowed his production. Strasburg actually has more bWAR than Rendon … but his numbers are solid, not all-star good. Kendrick would never have gotten a nod, but he should be a shoe-in for comeback player of the year for the season he’s having. Others of note: Sean Doolittle was amazing for most of the first half but has tired and his numbers slipped. Patrick Corbin‘s debut season has been solid, not flashy, and he has the same issues as Strasburg had.
Post publishing update: neither of our two representatives are actually going to Cleveland. Rendon staying home to rehab a nagging quad injury, and Scherzer is traveling but will not pitch b/c he threw a start just ahead of the game. Both players were replaced by non-Nats … which was a shame b/c a like-for-like with Strasburg for Scherzer seemed like the right thing to do.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Bryce Harper*, Max Scherzer*, Sean Doolittle
Possible Snubs: Juan Soto, Trea Turner, Anthony Rendon
Narrative: For the home-town All Star Game, Harper gets the starting nod from the fans despite his abhorrent season at the plate (his slash line on 7/8/18: .219/.371/.475). However, by making the ASG, Harper now keeps his promise to participate in the Home Run Derby one last time before hitting free agency. There’s no real “snubs” on this Nationals team; The #2 player on the team in terms of seasonal bWAR is Trea Turner but he’s not exactly having a head-turning season. He was named to the “last 5 ballot” but was a huge long-shot to make it (update; he didn’t: the very deserving Jesus Aguilar did). Anthony Rendon is having his typical under-rated season and got no love from the voters over the more famous Nolan Arenado (a common refrain when it comes to Gold Gloves/Silver Sluggers too). None of our starters besides Scherzer are really deserving; Stephen Strasburg was having a decent but not spectacular season but missed a month and is on the D/L. Nor is any of the bullpen past Doolittle. Its an odd-season where a team-wide malaise is contributing to the team hovering at .500 at the All Star Break. Only Juan Soto really is deserving … but he was never going to make the ASG (not when recent more spectacular rookies failed to make it) and thanks to his missing all of April and most of May he wasn’t on any ballots and may struggle to win the RoY over guys who have played longer this season. Scherzer is named to the team on 7/8/18 was named the NL starter for the 2nd year running on 7/16/18.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Bryce Harper*, Daniel Murphy*, Ryan Zimmerman*, Max Scherzer*, Stephen Strasburg
Snubs: Anthony Rendon, Gio Gonzalez
Narrative: For the second year in a row, the Nats are well and properly represented in the All Star Game. We have three starters named in the field, including Zimmerman who beats out a slew of 1B sluggers in the NL to not only make the team but get his first start. Its also likely i’ll be editing this post and adding in Scherzer as an additional starter; he is the obvious choice to start the game for the NL given his first half production (7/10/17 update: yes indeed we did). Rendon is having a very quiet solid season and is in the “last 5” popular vote, but he seems unlikely to win given that last year’s MVP Kris Bryant is also in the voting (Update: neither guy got in). Gonzalez misses out despite having a better first half than Strasburg by nearly any statistic; he’s having a career year but seems unlikely to get rewarded with his 3rd ASG appearance. There’s no other real snub from our 2017 team; certainly there’s nobody in the bullpen meriting a spot, and Trea Turner‘s torrid 2016 2nd half did not translate into the 2017 season (not to mention, he’s had two separate D/L trips). Once again i’m slightly perturbed that Harper continues to refuse to participate in the HR derby; why the reticence? Its a fun event that is quickly becoming better than the actual game itself and practically every other slugger is participating. Is he afraid to lose? On a larger scale, i’m really happy to see (finally) that deserving rookies are named: Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger are both named and are both on the inside track for ROY awards; too many times in the past we see deserving rookies unnamed. On July 10th, the fourth Nat starter was named: Scherzer got the starting pitcher nod, a first for the Nats. August Update: Rendon’s omission is looking even more ridiculous; he’s top 5 in the league in bWAR.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Bryce Harper*, Stephen Strasburg, Daniel Murphy, Wilson Ramos, Max Scherzer (named as replacement for Strasburg on 7/8/16),
Possible Snubs: Danny Espinosa, Tanner Roark
Narrative: The four obvious candidates from the Nats this year were all initially correctly selected, though voting shenanigans out of Chicago elected Ben Zobrist over Daniel Murphy by a scant 500 votes. I thought perhaps Strasburg would have a chance to start the game, given his 12-0 record, but it seems the team pre-empted any such thought when Scherzer’s naming occurred. For the first time writing this post, I can’t really name any “snubs” and the team has (finally?) earned the proper respect it deserves in terms of naming its players properly. Espinosa had a week for the ages just prior to the end of voting but really stood little chance of selection in the grand scheme of things. He’s not really a “snub” but is worthy of mention based on his resurgent year. At the break, Espinosa ranked 3rd in NL fWAR but 7th or 8th in bWAR thanks to differing defensive value metrics, so maybe/maybe not on him being a “snub.” As pointed out in the comments, even I missed the sneaky good season Roark is having; he’s 12th in the NL in bWAR at the break and 9th in fWAR but was left off in favor of any number of starters that stand below him in value rankings. Unfortunately for fans (and for Harper’s “Make Baseball Fun again” campaign, he opted to skip the Home Run Derby again. I guess its kind of like the NBA superstars skipping the dunk contest; the Union should really do a better job of helping out in this regard. The new format is fantastic and makes the event watchable again; is it ego keeping him from getting beat by someone like Giancarlo Stanton?
Nationals All-Star representatives: Bryce Harper*, Max Scherzer
Possible Snubs: Yunel Escobar, Drew Storen
Narrative: Harper not only made it in as a starter for the 2nd time, he led the NL in votes, setting a MLB record for total votes received. This is no surprise; Harper’s easily in the MVP lead for the NL thanks to his amazing first half (his split at the half-way point of the season: .347/.474/.722 with 25 homers and an astounding 225 OPS+). I guess he won’t be earning the “Most overrated player” award next year. That Harper is electing to skip the Home run derby in a disappointment; his father is nursing an arm injury can cannot throw to him in the event. In a weird year for the Nats, the only other regular worth mentioning is newly acquired Escobar, who is hitting above .300 and filling in ably at multiple positions that, prior to this year, he had never played. Storen is having another excellent regular season … but at a time when mandatory members from each team often leads to other closers being selected (there are 5 NL closers and 7 AL relievers), the odds of him making the All-Star team were always going to be slim. Scherzer deservedly makes the team and probably would have been the NL starter; he’s got sub 2.00 ERA and FIP and leads all NL pitchers in WAR at the mid-way point of the season. But his turn came up in the final game of the first half, making him ineligible for the game and forcing his replacement on the roster.
As a side note, the 2015 All-Star game will go down as the “Ballot-Gate” game thanks to MLB’s short-sighted plan to allow 30+ online ballots per email address. This led to severe “ballot stuffing” by the Kansas City Royals fans, led to MLB having to eliminate 60 million+ fraudulent ballots, but still led to several Royals being elected starters over more deserving candidates.
Nationals All-Star representative: Jordan Zimmermann (Update post-publishing: Zimmermann strained a bicep, and had to withdraw from the ASG. For a bit it looked like the Nats wouldn’t even have a representative, until Tyler Clippardwas named on 7/13/14).
Possible Snubs: Adam LaRoche, Anthony Rendon, Rafael Soriano, Drew Storen
Narrative: Zimmermann’s been the best SP on the best pitching staff in the majors this year, and thus earns his spot. I find it somewhat odd that a first place team (or near to it) gets just one representative on the team (as discussed above). Rendon tried to make the team via the “last man in” voting, but historically Nationals have not fared well in this competition (especially when better known players from large markets are in the competition, aka Anthony Rizzo from the Chicago Cubs), and indeed Rendon finished 4th in the last-man voting. LaRoche is having a very good season, almost single handedly carrying the Nats offense while major parts were out injured, but he’s never going to beat out the slew of great NL first basemen (Joey Votto couldn’t even get into this game). Soriano has quietly put together one of the best seasons of any closer in the game; at the time of this writing he has a 1.03 ERA and a .829 whip; those are Dennis Eckersley numbers. But, the farce that is the all-star game selection criteria (having to select one player from each team) means that teams need a representative, and deserving guys like Soriano get squeezed. Then, Soriano indignantly said he wouldn’t even go if named as a replacement … likely leading to Clippard’s replacement selection. The same goes for non-closer Storen, who sports a sub 2.00 ERA on the year. Advanced stats columnists (Keith Law) also think that Stephen Strasburg is a snub but I’m not entirely sure: he may lead the NL in K’s right now and have far better advanced numbers than “traditional,” but its hard to make an argument that a guy with a 7-6 record and a 3.50+ ERA is all-star worthy.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Bryce Harper*, Jordan Zimmermann
Snubs: Stephen Strasburg, Ian Desmond
Narrative: Harper comes in 3rd in the NL outfielder voting, ahead of some big-time names, to become only the second Nationals position player elected as an All-Star starter. He was 4th in the final pre-selection vote, so a big last minute push got him the starter spot. Harper also becomes the first National to participate in the Home Run Derby. Zimmermann was 12-3 heading into the game and was on mid-season Cy Young short lists in July in a breakout season. Strasburg’s advanced stats are all better than Zimmermann’s, but his W/L record (4-6 as the ASG) means he’s not an all-star. It also probably doesn’t help that he missed a few weeks. Desmond loses out to Troy Tulowitzki, Everth Cabrera and Jean Segura. Tulowitzki was having a very solid year and was a deserving elected starter, while Cabrera and Segura are both having breakout seasons. Desmond was on the “Final vote” roster, but my vote (and most others’ I’m guessing) would be for Yasiel Puig there ([Editor Update: Desmond and Puig lost out to Freddie Freeman: I still wished that Puig finds a way onto the roster but ultimately he did not and I believe the ASG was diminished because of it). Gio Gonzalez, Ryan Zimmerman, and Rafael Soriano are all having solid but unspectacular years and miss out behind those having great seasons.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Stephen Strasburg, Gio Gonzalez, Ian Desmond, BryceHarper
Possible Snubs: Adam LaRoche, Craig Stammen
Narrative: The two SPs Strasburg and Gonzalez were the obvious candidates, and my personal prediction was that they’d be the only two candidates selected. Gonzalez’ first half was a prelude to his 21-win, 3rd place Cy Young season. The inclusion of Desmond is a surprise, but also a testament to how far he’s come as a player in 2012. Harper was a last-minute injury replacement, but had earned his spot by virtue of his fast start as one of the youngest players in the league. Of the “snubs,” LaRoche has had a fantastic come back season in 2012 but fared little shot against better, more well-known NL first basemen. Stammen was our best bullpen arm, but like LaRoche fared little chance of getting selected during a year when the Nats had two deserving pitchers selected.
Possible Snubs: Danny Espinosa, Michael Morse, Drew Storen, Jordan Zimmermann
Narrative: While Clippard was (arguably) the Nats best and most important reliever, I think Zimmermann was a more rightful choice. He was 10th in the league in ERA at the time of the selections and has put in a series of dominant performances. Meanwhile Espinosa was on pace for a 28-homer season and almost a certain Rookie-of-the-Year award (though a precipitous fall-off in the 2nd half cost him any realistic shot at the ROY), and perhaps both players are just too young to be known around the league. Lastly Morse is certainly known and he merited a spot in the “last man in” vote sponsored by MLB (though he fared little chance against popular players in this last-man-in voting).
Possible Snubs: Adam Dunn, Josh Willingham, Ryan Zimmerman, Stephen Strasburg
Narrative: Capps was clearly deserving, having a breakout season as a closer after his off-season non-tender from the Pirates. The 3-4-5 hitters Zimmerman-Dunn-Willingham all had dominant offensive seasons as the team improved markedly from its 103-loss season. But perhaps the surprise non-inclusion was Strasburg, who despite only having a few starts as of the all-star break was already the talk of baseball. I think MLB missed a great PR opportunity to name him to the team to give him the exposure that the rest of the national media expected. But in the end, Capps was a deserving candidate and I can’t argue that our hitters did anything special enough to merit inclusion.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Ryan Zimmerman
Possible Snubs: Adam Dunn
Narrative: The addition of Dunn and Willingham to the lineup gave Zimmerman the protection he never had, and he produced with his career-best season. His first and deserved all-star appearance en-route to a 33 homer season. Dunn continued his monster homer totals with little all-star recognition.
Narrative: The first of two “hitting rock-bottom” seasons for the team; no one really merited selection. Zimmerman was coming off of hamate-bone surgery in November 2007 and the team was more or less awful across the board. Rauch performed ably after Cordero went down with season-ending (and basically career-ending) shoulder surgery. Guzman’s selection a great example of why one-per-team rules don’t make any sense. Guzman ended up playing far longer than he deserved in the game itself by virtue of the 15-inning affair.
Possible Snubs: Ryan Zimmerman, Shawn Hill (though I wouldn’t argue for either)
Narrative: Young gets a deserved all-star appearance en route to comeback player of the year. Zimmerman played a full season but didn’t dominate. Our 2007 staff gave starts to 13 different players, most of whom were out of the league within the next year or two. Not a good team.
Nationals All-Star representatives: Alfonso Soriano*
Possible Snubs: Nick Johnson, Ryan Zimmerman, Chad Cordero
Narrative: Soriano made the team as an elected starter, the first time the Nats have had such an honor. Our pitching staff took massive steps backwards and no starter came even close to meriting a spot. Cordero was good but not lights out as he had been in 2005. Soriano’s 40-40 season is a poster child for “contract year” production and he has failed to come close to such production since. The team was poor and getting worse. Johnson had a career year but got overshadowed by bigger, better first basemen in the league (a recurring theme for our first basemen over the years).
Nationals All-Star representatives: Livan Hernandez, Chad Cordero
Possible Snubs: Nick Johnson, John Patterson.
Narrative: The Nats went into the All Star break surprisingly in first place, having run to a 50-31 record by the halfway point. Should a first place team have gotten more than just two representatives? Perhaps. But the team was filled with non-stars and played far over its head to go 50-31 (as evidenced by the reverse 31-50 record the rest of the way).
