Since 2019, the Washington Nationals have been devoid of a full year from a competent third baseman, since Anthony Rendon departed for free agency. No team has been worse than the Nationals at third base during that span, per statistics, and we will explain that below.
From general manager Mike Rizzo’s chat a few days ago, you might think Jose Tena was the starter at third base with Amed Rosario as his backup, and Trey Lipscomb a long-shot for the spot after Rizzo just said, “We like where we’re at in that [third base] position.” This was a black hole for the Nationals. Things change quickly as the Nats have reportedly come to terms with Paul DeJong on a 1-year deal for $1 million plus $600,000 in incentives.
“We’re definitely looking for corner [infield] guys, we really are. We need to fill that first base void. … Like I said, we’ve got our feelers out. We’re talking to a lot of different guys. We’ll see what transpires.”
— manager Dave Martinez said at the Winter Meetings in early December
“We’re definitely looking for some
power bats at both corner spots, maybe a DH spot. We’ll see what transpires.”
The Nats really needed to upgrade third base as manager Dave Martinez specified as an offseason goal. Tena had a hot bat after his call-up to the Nats until his final five games of the 2024 season, when he finished at a disappointing 0-for-20. Couple that with his poor defense, and you had to hope that Rizzo had a solution, even just short-term.
In Rizzo’s defense, the third base market was thin — and so thin that Rizzo tried to convert Gleyber Torres to a third baseman if he accepted the Nationals’ offer. He did not accept that offer reportedly because he did not want to change positions. Per a source, the Nats did inquire and check in on Alex Bregman, but we do not know how far that went. Then we got this response from Rizzo a few days ago:
“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 that Rizzo couldn’t land?
After the 2019 season, third base has been a revolving door when they handed the position to rookies and journeymen. Beginning in 2020, the third base position cumulatively posted a -0.9 WAR when you remove the positive production from Jeimer Candelario‘s four months on the Nats in the 2023 season. Even if you left Candelario in those numbers, the Nats cumulatively were a +2.1 with all third baseman which is still the worst in all of baseball in that time span of five years.
There are some crazy numbers on DeJong that don’t make sense on his Statcast during the 2024 season. Maybe he was extremely unmotivated playing for the horrific White Sox. He was a below average defender with the White Sox for his four months there, and then was traded to the playoff-bound Royals on July 30. He went to the Royals and in a short time put up Gold Glove numbers at third base with a +6.0 OAA in just 2 months with KC. Those are some unbelievable numbers. His batting average and OBP weren’t good at .227/.276 — but his power numbers were very good in only 445 at-bats and 24 HRs which led to a decent .703 OPS. Yes, we will hate DeJong’s strikeout rate, and that is the smear on his reputation. Another note, he was a reverse split hitter in 2024 which means he hit right-handed pitchers better than lefties. How’s about a .730 OPS vs. RHPs and .621 vs. LHPs.
Early in his career, DeJong was an impressive contact hitter with the Cardinals that had him as a top prospect in the St. Louis farm system. As a right-handed batter, and 31 years old, this could be a good one-year bridge for DeJong while the Nats’ see if their top position prospect, Brady House can put it together in the minor leagues this year.
While House has been the heir apparent top prospect and the future of third base, he turned in a checkered season in the minor leagues where he would be hot then cold, and was chasing pitches that he was missing by a large margin in some ugly swing and miss. House will have to show improvement in the minor leagues to earn a 40-man roster spot and a midseason call-up.
Two years ago, DeJong was making $9.2 million. As a former 4th round draft pick of the Cardinals in 2015 and a top prospect, DeJong debuted in 2017 and was the runner-up to some kid named Cody Bellinger in the Rookie of the Year voting that year. He was an All-Star in 2019 then COVID came and DeJong’s career changed at the plate. He struggled for a few years then figured something out in 2023 which earned him a trade to Toronto where he couldn’t buy a hit. The Blue Jays released him, and he had to resurrect his career last year with the White Sox. They traded him to Kansas City, and you would have thought DeJong’s stats were good enough to earn him a $4 million deal that was predicted for him for this season. Now DeJong will get a chance with the Nationals. He lives in close-by Jupiter, Florida just up the road from CACTI Park of the Palm Beaches.
At a $1 million guarantee, this is your definition of a contract with low risk and high reward for the Washington Nationals. This might signal a real battle for the last bench spot. Tena does have an option remaining per Roster Resource and could be sent to Triple-A. We will see how all of this ends up. We expect Rosario, Alex Call, and Riley Adams on the bench and that would leave one remaining spot on the bench with Tena, Lipscomb, Darren Baker, Andrés Chaparro, Drew Millas, Stone Garrett, Nasim Nuñez, and Juan Yepez in a competition for that final spot. That is eight names for one spot. Keep in mind that Adams has no options remaining.
In order to make DeJong’s contract official, the Nationals will have to open up a space on their 40-man roster. That could come via a 60-day IL move or a DFA of a player. This signing brings the Nats spending this offseason to nearly $41 million.
You know who is smiling more than anyone with the DeJong signing? Every pitcher on this team has to love this move. After enduring the stumbling, bungling, and fumbling defense at third base, the players combined for a -6.0 OAA at third base as a net-net number. Remove Ildemaro Vargas and it was -10.0 OAA at third base in the 2024 season.
Defense matters, and one constant you see in camp is how much players who struggled with defense, has become a focus. You have pitchers working on PFPs, and position players like CJ Abrams and Keibert Ruiz who worked on defense extensively in the offseason. The signing of DeJong might be a further testament that Rizzo saw that his 2024 pitching staff put up the 9th best FIP in baseball at 3.94, while the actual results was 23rd at a 4.30 ERA. Imagine if the Nats could achieve that FIP number as their ERA in the 2025 season. Defense matters analytically for that reason. Great defense will save you in the pitch count and on the scoreboard.
There are already some fans comparing this DeJong signing to last year’s Joey Gallo signing. On the surface, yes they are similar in a few regards — but DeJong hit 14 home runs over Gallo in 2024. In fact, DeJong would have led the Nats in homers in 2024 with those 24 dingers. Yes, DeJong isn’t Bregman, but this is much better than sticking with Tena at this point in time as an unknown quantity and the defensive woes. This is also better than Gallo’s 10 homers last year with that .161 batting average. DeJong hit 24 homers with a .227 batting average and a .703 OPS. DeJong posted a FanGraphs WAR of +1.7 versus Gallo’s -0.2. Why is this even a debate? It is DeJong’s 30 percent K rate that scared off some teams, and couldn’t look past that one statistic. Work on it. Bat him back in the order. Again, making this a comparison to Gallo is silly.
While defense used to be judged subjectively -or- the old way of just calculating a fielding percentage, the new-school stats of Outs Above Average (OAA) and Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) are now measured objectively by StatCast. There are dozens of archived articles on TalkNats of how defense matters, and the Nats pitchers suffered with spotty defense ranked sixth worst in MLB. Mike Petriello of MLB.com is one of the analysts who are now writing about defense these days — once considered too mundane and boring to write about, Petriello rated teams this offseason by what they did with their defense. The Nats might be a Top-5 defensive team right now. Imagine that.
UPDATED: The DeJong deal is now official with Josiah Gray moved to the 60-day IL.
“I really didn’t want to miss the beginning of Spring Training. This offer came in just right on-time. … It was mostly just about trying to get a Major League job — and let my play on the field dictate what my future would be.”
— DeJong said after his first media session
“I was slugging well. My plate discipline kind of got a little out of whack. So for me, I’m going to try to reel in my plate discipline while still maintaining my effortless power. It wasn’t like I was trying to hit home runs. It was more of a result of getting the pitches I could hit, and putting my swing on it. Now, it’s more about I need to get on-base. I realize it’s not just about swinging and hitting for power.”
What we could see is how DeJong struggled when the pitcher was ahead in counts. He was batting only .179 last year compared to .313 when DeJong was ahead in the count, and .236 in even counts. The key is obviously getting ahead in counts plus having a better approach and shorten up your swing when you’re behind in the count to avoid strikeouts and take advantage of putting the ball in play. Strikeouts have a .000 batting average.
As DeJong said, the timing was right for him to accept this offer. Fortunately for him, he did an early contract extension during his time with the Cardinals that paid him well. Now, he is another ex-Cardinal coming to the Nationals to let his play on the field dictate what his future will be. That worked for Matt Adams and Lane Thomas; hopefully it works for DeJong.
