At this time of the year, twenty-eight MLB front offices have put together their top priorities on their white boards and are working on their payroll budgets.
Photo by Jeffery Salter
The Washington Nationals have the same top priorities (1-3) that they had on July 29th when they needed:
- Shutdown closer
- Big outfield bat
- Shortstop upgrade
- Lefty bullpen depth
- Starter depth
On July 30th, the Nationals traded for Mark Melancon, but in doing so they also traded away Felipe Rivero which created a larger hole in the lefty bullpen depth which Rizzo solved in then trading for Marc Rzepczynski. The Nats never added the big outfield bat or were able to make a shortstop upgrade. The Nationals also have a glaring hole in the catcher position.
Last year at this time the Nats had greater needs:
- Hire a manager/coaching staff
- 2nd baseman (preferably left-handed batter)
- Centerfielder/lead-off batter
- Bench bat lefty
- 4th outfielder
- Solve Papelbon/closer situation
Last year, Washington Nationals’ general Manager Mike Rizzo checked off each box even though the Jonathan Papelbon situation wasn’t resolved until July 30th of this year when Mark Melancon was acquired. Many times last off-season we covered whether Bryce Harper and Papelbon could co-exist, and they did.
Last year’s priority list was much more challenging than this year’s list. This year’s list can be solved internally for some of these spots like #3 with Trea Turner.
- Shutdown closer
- Big outfield bat
- Shortstop upgrade
- Lefty bullpen depth
- Starter depth
- Catcher upgrade
- Bench upgrades
There clearly were some other 2016 weaknesses like 1st base production that will be a question mark for the 2017 roster, and the belief is that Ryan Zimmerman will be the starter for 1st base, but like Jonathan Papelbon last year, Mike Rizzo will replace a starter if he has to.
Could Mike Rizzo make upgrades by re-signing Mark Melancon and Wilson Ramos or does Rizzo stay in-house? There is twenty teams that are thought will be in need of a closer upgrade and twelve teams that are in need of a catcher upgrade.
This is what Mike Rizzo said on both Ramos and Melancon in his appearance yesterday on 106.7 The Fan radio:
“We have interest in both of those players,” Mike Rizzo said yesterday on the Sports Junkies show. “There’s a deal out there for each and every one of these guys. They differ by the circumstances and the situations, but we’d love to have Willy back, we’d love to have Mark back. They were key components to what we did last year and we’re going to make a run at both of them.
“There’s a deal to be had out there, it’s just that two parties have to meet on it and we’re certainly going to discuss it with both guys and we’d like to have both guys back. Percentage? I don’t know. It depends on what their expectations are, what they’re looking for, how much can we fit into the payroll and that type of thing, but suffice it to say, we like both guys and we’d love to have them both on the team. We’re a better team with either or both of those guys on it.”
Mike Rizzo appeared on 106.7 radio yesterday and here is a good chunk of the interview on this link by Chris Lingenbach who does excellent writing over there:
“Our season ended [after Game 5 on Thursday October 13th]. I gave our office off [Friday October 14th] and then the weekend, and then we got back at it Monday,” Mike Rizzo told The Sports Junkies yesterday.
“We had our first postseason meeting to kind of put a bow on the season, try and kind of analyze what went right, what went wrong. And then there’s some mechanical things, roster things, that you have to decide shortly after the World Series ends, so we kind of got our ducks in a row there. Yeah, the process never ends.
“Right now we crank it up, we restart it. Believe it or not, your mindset as the President and GM of the team is when we lost that [Game 5], our season was over. We were immediately in the 2017 mode and kind of trying to put the ’16 season behind us and look forward.”
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