Does anyone know if the Washington Nationals were trading Kyle Finnegan? How can you say his trade value was affected by his meltdown on the mound last night? News at 11. Come on. If Finnegan did his job, nobody would be complaining. Stuff happens. Unfortunate timing to take a loss in a game like that — but for Finnegan’s trade value — it probably did not affect the asking price at all.
One of the great quotes on TalkNats in 2018 was whether Bryce Harper should have been traded: “Mike Rizzo is under no obligation to help other teams. You make the trades that improve the Washington Nationals first and foremost. There is no rule that says you must trade a player to help another team.” That lesson should apply today, and always.
There is a clamoring from some on social media to sell everything. Why? At this point, 55-games remain to be played in this season. In 2025, there are 162-games scheduled. You still need players to add positive value going forward.
Trading Lane Thomas is not the same as trading Finnegan. The Nationals have a future outfield of James Wood, Dylan Crews, and Jacob Young. The team does not have an heir apparent to Finnegan. By trading Thomas, the Nationals and Rizzo freed up approximately $9 million next year in funds, and possibly more as Thomas will be due a sizable increase in his third and final year of arbitration eligibility.
Could a team sweep Rizzo off of his feet with an offer for Finnegan that he cannot refuse? That is possible. We are hours from the trade deadline. Time will tell on this. What none of us will ever know is whether or not Finnegan’s 5-run meltdown last night affected any trade decisions. Again, you cannot assume that Rizzo wanted to trade him, but you can assume that if Finnegan is traded today that Rizzo got his asking price in trade value.
Up until this point, Rizzo has played the trade deadline very well. As I wrote earlier in the month, he was playing 4-D chess. Think of this further, by trading Thomas, Rizzo as of right now, just lowered his offseason payroll to $45 million. Do you want to add back the Stephen Strasburg $35 million in sunk costs per the CBT payroll? Okay, the Nats are at $80 million before CBT benefits. That’s approximately $101 million with those benefits.
The Nationals were at $127 million for the 19th highest payroll in baseball on Opening Day. If the Nats just achieve the median payroll of $142 in 2025, Rizzo will have $41 million to spend. The hope is that he has a lot more to spend. Get one big bat and an ace pitcher while adding Crews to the roster, and this team is set to ascend next year.
“… You can’t tell me that you can’t see the ascension for all these young players. I think when you factor that in — and our young pitching — the way they’re [performing], and the young players coming up, and the payroll flexibility — you have to be enthusiastic about where this franchise is going in the future.”
— Mike Rizzo said two weeks ago on the Sports Junkies radio show
The Nationals certainly have more payroll flexibility today than they had two weeks ago, and Rizzo has added six new top prospects to the farm system since the beginning of the month thanks to trading Hunter Harvey, Jesse Winker, and Thomas.
Per MLB Pipeline, they have seeded five of those trade acquisitions into their Top-30 rankings, and Caleb Lomavita, acquired in the Harvey trade as a drafted player, will be seeded into the system in August. Alex Clemmey, the left-handed 19 year old starter, acquired in the Thomas trade, was seeded sixth into MLB Pipeline’s rankings, one ahead of Cayden Wallace who was acquired with Lomavita in the Harvey trade. Baseball America has ranked each acquired player and Clemmey is the third best trade acquisition so far in their evaluation.
The return for Thomas on Baseball America’s rankings had Clemmy as the Guardian’s No. 7 prospect, SS Rafael Ramirez at No. 20, and infielder Jose Tena at No. 28. Clemmey was a 2nd-round draft pick last year, and his ceiling is the highest of any acquisition so far by the Nats. You can see scouting reports on those three prospects on Baseball America. Also, they have added the new draft picks to their Top-30 rankings as well as the trade acquisition of Wallace. At some point, Baseball America will add Tyler Stuart who was acquired in the Winker trade as well as the three players from the Thomas trade.
If Rizzo does not make another trade, this was a huge haul for the Washington Nationals. They have gone from the mid-teens in farm system rankings to No. 7 before the Thomas trade to No. 5 last night on FanGraphs. At some point soon, James Wood will come off the FanGraphs rankings as he graduates to rookie status and is no longer considered a top prospect. At that point, the Nationals will drop back several spots in the farm system rankings.
One more consideration is that every team can only carry 165 minor league players in their five levels in the U.S. from the signed draftees to the Florida Complex League to Triple-A. Taking on players in trades, who don’t profile higher than your 165th player, makes no sense. This is where trades must fit for the entirety of the team and farm system.
Expect more rumors as the minutes get closer to the 6pm trade deadline at MLB Headquarters in New York. The poll from Sunday told you what other fans were thinking as to who would get traded. In that poll the percentage values that were shown were percentages of total votes, not voters. Since any voter could select anywhere from 1 to 1 names, it was necessary to download the raw data and re-summarize it (done as of when Thomas was traded).. This first table shows distribution of number of selections per voter. For example 142 voter picked 3 players.
Next, here are the percentages of voters who voted for each of the seven names. Floro with the most voters (77.1%) and Thomas in second place with 68.2%.
And here is a listing of the combinations that had at least 10 voters.
We are just 7-hours away, and you will know soon enough who is traded.
