Four months after that photo was taken, the outfield crew looks much different even though it is the same foursome. James Wood cut off his dreadlocks, Dylan Crews cut his hair, Jacob Young added more muscle, and Alex Call rehabbed his plantar fasciitis. We are just 40-days from Opening Day, and the outfielders are in camp early. They didn’t have to arrive until next week. For months, general manager Mike Rizzo and manager Dave Martinez made it clear that Wood, Young and Crews would man their starting outfield. That didn’t stop a beat writer from asking the question on the first day of camp. Oh, there were certainly other questions that needed to be asked — and follow-up questions that begged to be asked.
From the recognizable voices we heard at the media sessions, only three outlets sent people to the CACTI Park of the Palm Beaches to cover the Nationals. Just writers from MLB.com, Washington Post, and MASN could be heard asking questions. This year, so far, no TV stations or national writers. That is what happens when you don’t build a contender. The DC media spent most of their budget on the Commanders. They will rely on the B-roll that the Nats media department provides to the credentialed media. The operative word is “credentialed” media. Only a chosen few get the video, photos, and notes in the Nats’ MLB Pressbox feed. So, if you wanted to be there with a credential, like myself, you won’t get inside to ask Martinez or Rizzo a question.
There were some good questions, don’t get me wrong, but most did not move the needle for those who stay informed. We knew that eight-of-the-nine starting spots in the Opening Day lineup are cinched up. The only spot up for grabs is third base, and it sounds like it is Jose Tena‘s spot as the front-runner. Rizzo had this to say, “We like where we’re at in that [third base] position. We’ve got three players that we think have a chance to be our everyday third baseman in the future (Brady House, Cayden Wallace, and Yohandy Morales). So, we certainly feel good in the long-term. In the short-term, we couldn’t land the player that was a huge upgrade to the ones that we think we have in camp right now.” Who was that “huge upgrade” third baseman who Rizzo couldn’t land?
You can never have enough starting pitchers as Rizzo says often. This offseason, he re-acquired Trevor Williams along with others. A far different Spring Training from years ago when the team looked short.
“I love our depth. We’ve got quite a few guys who can help us in that rotation, which is awesome. Moving forward, I think we’re going to be in good shape.”
— Martinez said
“We’ll have some tough decisions to make at the end of camp, but all of these guys are going to get an opportunity to pitch. The starters are going to get a chance to start. We can do a lot of different things as we’ve done in the past, as far as utilizing our minor leaguers as well. But they’re all going to get their innings in. The biggest thing is to build them up and get ready for the season.”
The fifth spot in the starting rotation will be the competition to watch. That could be the biggest storyline in camp quite possibly going forward. If MacKenzie Gore, Jake Irvin, Michael Soroka, and Trevor Williams are locks, then the three left-handers of Japanese pitcher, Shinnosuke Ogasawara, as well as DJ Herz and Mitchell Parker will compete for the final spot.
There is also a lot of depth behind that group with Jackson Rutledge, and then there is Cade Cavalli working himself back after missing all of the 2024 season after his UCL elbow surgery in 2023. Then you have several Double-A and Triple-A pitchers eager to make their MLB debuts.
And the bullpen feels unfinished as Rizzo and Martinez both admitted. Who will be the closer? Could that player come from outside the organization? This is another significant storyline to follow.
“Yeah, definitely [hoping for a new acquisition] for me it’s going to be hopefully somebody that can pitch in the back-end of the bullpen. That’s kind of what we’re looking for.”
“We feel like we have guys right now. I know I dabbled a little bit with Jose A. Ferrer pitching in September in that ninth inning. We got Jorge López, who I think could really fill a void, and we got some other guys, like Derek Law, that’s going to do fine. We do like Colin Poche (on a minor league deal), and he has pitched close games before. But I know that we are definitely looking for somebody that can pitch in the back end of the bullpen.” — Martinez said
“I don’t know who [the closer] is yet. It could be Ferrer. It could be López. You know, Law could have some leverage innings. And it could come from somebody that we haven’t thought about yet. … We’ve been talking to Kyle Finnegan throughout the offseason. It takes two to tango.” — Rizzo said
That looks like the best answers we got on the bullpen. David Robertson is the biggest name remaining in the free agent bullpen arms based on WAR projections. He turns 40 just after Opening Day. Craig Kimbrel is available, but he has not looked like an arm you would count on.
Yes, there is Finnegan who is unsigned and is still searching for a team willing to pay him a sizeable raise from the $5.1 million the Nats paid him last year. That analytics on Finnegan are not promising — but his actual results of 38 saves in 43 chances (88.4 percent) is very good. You figure that he could sign today for $6 million. Robertson has made $10 million or more since 2015 and just seems out of the Nats budget.
Speaking of the budget, Rizzo made it sound like he didn’t reach the top, and he has spent $40 million so far with no commitments beyond the 2026 season. Clearly, Rizzo can spend more since he talked about acquiring additional bullpen help.
“The [salaries] of the players on the field is about the same, if not a little less, than it was last year. But I think that we have a better team than we had last year. We filled in a bunch of spots that we needed to fill without expanding … the budget too much, and blocking prospects too much. And I think we’ve improved the club. I think we’ll go from a competitive team last year to a real tough team to play this year … We did all of this without blowing up the budget.”
— Rizzo said and was referring to the Qualifying Offer issue that he addressed in January that he avoided signing those players
“Obviously, the payroll that we have to allocate to players has something to do with [long-term payroll], but there’s other factors that also come into that [because] we had a plan of what we were trying to do, and our blueprint was … we didn’t want to block any prospects that we feel are going to be our future players, and we didn’t want to give up any draft picks or any international money, which is important to us at this stage.”
Some fact checking based on the TalkNats CBT payroll has the Nats at $125.5 million at the moment compared to ending the 2024 season at $138.3 million. Is that “about the same or a little less” per Rizzo? Actually, that is 10 percent below last year. But Rizzo might get close to that number with some more acquisitions and free agents like Colin Poche making the MLB roster.
The Nathaniel Lowe arbitration hearing went in favor of the Washington Nationals for $10.3 million after the player and team went to their arbitration hearing yesterday. That number, could only have been either $10.3 million of $11.1 million and was awarded by the arbiter in favor of the Nationals. Lowe would have been worth closer to $20 million ($22.5 million per FanGraphs) based on his 2024 production. But arbitration does not pay you fair market value. Because Lowe was acquired via trade, Rizzo was able to fill a huge void at a price well below market value. Younger teams normally have lower payrolls because they are mostly made up of arbitration-eligible and minimum salary players with less than six years of MLB service time. Look at the Nats’ entire outfield with two former №1 prospects, Wood and Crews, along with Young, will all make $760,000 each. The Nats’ center fielder is the most senior member of the starting outfield with only 183 MLB games under his belt.
On other camp news, the only pitchers not throwing on the mound are Josiah Gray and Mason Thompson who are both recovering from UCL elbow surgeries. It sounds like there is a small chance that Thompson could compete for an Opening Day bullpen spot. Gray won’t return until late summer. Top pitching prospects, Travis Sykora and Jake Bennett were not invited to camp as both are coming off of injuries. Rizzo said that Sykora is recovering from a hip injury that resulted in “minor labrum surgery” and his season will be delayed at least into May.
Hearing players giving honest assessments of their 2024 season is refreshing. We have heard stories of what players have worked on in their offseason. A lot of talk about improving, and we got the deep dive on CJ Abrams in a TalkNats article. How about this from catcher Keibert Ruiz, “I was really disappointed with my season last year. It wasn’t good, you know? I wasn’t happy.”
This is good that players can acknowledge their shortcomings. Ruiz and Riley Adams might be the only two players who finished last season with negative WAR on the Opening Day roster. Using the FanGraphs RA/9 modeling, there were a total of 24-players throughout last season who were at 0.0 to negative -1.3 WAR, and 18 of those players are gone from the 40-man roster. Gone from the 2024 roster is a cumulative total of -5.6 of negative WAR using addition by subtraction based on that roster purge.
While Rizzo came up short in getting that one marquee name that fans coveted, MLB Trade Rumors looks at how this can be a positive for the future. A TalkNats article suggested that possibly the Nats could use this as an opportunity to extend some players in long-term deals in an article in January. MLB Trade Rumors mentioned the same in their article last week.
College baseball began yesterday and you can expect that the Nationals will be spending near $10 million in a signing bonus on the №1 draft pick that the Nats have possession of. This will be the ongoing storyline. Could the Nationals solve their third base issue or grab an ace in the draft? While Rizzo says he takes best player available, this year he has a clear path to any player with that first pick.
The first Spring Training game is a week from today at 1:05 pm ET against Houston. For those waiting for the Nats’ Spring Training television schedule, we are still waiting. The MASN Orioles schedule was published three days ago showing eight games. You just hope that MASN broadcasts games that are not being broadcasted by the team the Nats are playing.
