Monday’s News & Notes
| Team | Yesterday | Today | Pitching Probables |
| Rochester | Won, 4-3 | OFF DAY | N/A |
| Harrisburg | Won, 5-1 | OFF DAY | N/A |
| Wilmington | Lost, 2-1 (10 inn.) | OFF DAY | N/A |
| Fredericksburg | Lost, 3-1 | OFF DAY | N/A |
| FCL Nationals | OFF DAY | @ FCL Astros, 12pm | |
| DSL Nationals | OFFSEASON | vs. DSL Tigers 2, 11am |
Rochester 4 Columbus 3
• Solesky 5IP, 6H, 2R, 2ER, 0BB, 6K
• Dunshee(W, 1-1) 1IP, 2H, 1R, 1ER, 1BB, 0K
• Grissom (SV, 1) 1⅔ IP, 0H, 0R, 1BB, K
• House 2-4, R, 2-2B, 2RBI
• Chaparro 1-3, R, BB, RBI
Brady House doubled in Darren Baker twice—once in the 5th to tie the game and again in the 7th—to lead the Red Wings to a 4-2 win that completed the six-game sweep of the Clippers. Chase Solesky turned in five innings of two-run ball on six hits, no walks, and six whiffs and was rewarded with a no-decision. The win went to Parker Dunshee despite giving up a run in the 8th. Marquis Grissom Jr. got the last five outs and worked around a walk in the 9th with a pickoff to earn his first AAA save. Andrés Chaparro, Franchy Cordero, and Baker also reached base twice to power Rochester’s seven-hit, three-walk offense. Roster moves: RHP Joan Adon activated from 7-Day I.L.; RHP Clay Helvey released.
Harrisburg 5 Richmond 1
• Conley (W, 1-1) 7IP, 0H, 0R, 3BB, 6K
• Santos 1IP, 0H, 0R, 1BB, 2K
• Glasser 2-4, R, BB, SB
• Wallace 2-4, 2R, BB, 2-2B, RBI
• Made 1-3, 2B, BB, 2RBI
Harrisburg led from start to finish and took the game, 5-1, and the series, 4-2. Bryce Conley no-hit Richmond for a career-high seven innings, walking three and striking out six. Erick Mejia lost the no-no and the shutout with three hits and a run in the 8th. Phillip Glasser singled twice and walked once while Cayden Wallace doubled twice, scored twice, walked, and drove in a run to pace the Senators offense.
Hudson Valley 2 Wilmington 1 (10 inn.)
• Clemmey 5IP, 3H, 0R, 5BB, 9K
• Amaral (BS, 1; L, 0-1) 1+ IP, 2H, 2R, 1ER, 2BB, 1K, 0K, WP
• Nunez 2-4, R, BB, 2K, SB
• Boisseire 2-4, 2B, RBI
Branden Boissiere’s RBI double was almost enough for the Blue Rocks pitchers to work with until a one-out triple followed by a wild pitch tied the game in the bottom of the 9th. After Wilmington went in order in its half of the 10th, Hudson Valley got a leadoff single and back-to-back walks to force in the free runner and get the 2-1 win. Alex Clemmey tied his season high in walks with five but struck out nine over five scoreless innings. Austin Amaral blew the save with the triple-wild-pitch sequence in the 9th and took the loss when he couldn’t get an out in the 10th. Elijah Nunez and Boissiere both went 2-for-4 while the rest of the lineup went 1-for-26 with a walk.
Lynchburg 3 Fredericksburg 1
• Beeker (L, 0-2) 3IP, 5H, 2R, 1ER, 0BB, 2K, BK
• Dowdell 2IP, 1H, 0R, 0BB, 3K
• Mota 2-3, R, SB, 2E
• Peoples 1-3, BB
Fredericksburg barely avoided the shutout as they lost for the eighth time in nine games, 3-1, and dropped the series, 4-2. Merritt Beeker took the loss with two runs allowed on five hits over three innings in the spot start. The bullpen combined for five innings of one-run ball, but the offense was limited to four hits and four walks, with Jorgelys Mota singling twice and scoring the lone FredNats run. He also committed two of the team’s three errors.
FCL Nationals, 12-9, 2nd place FCL East, 2½ GB
The F-Nats won four of five last week and with the FredNats struggling, the question of when some older FCL pitchers might switch places with some overmatched pitchers in Low-A (*cough* Ryan Minckler *cough* Angel Roman *cough*) should be asked soon. This week, it’s four games with off days on Wednesday and Saturday and one bus ride away from West Palm Beach on Thursday to play the FCL Cardinals.
I was going to comment recently that in addition to Nats’ TJ recovery timelines getting longer (looking more like 15-18 months than the previous rule of thumb of 12 months), it looks like the Nats are also taking a much more cautious approach to rehabbing.
In the past year, we’ve seen Cavalli, Sykora, Sam Petersen, Andres Chaparro and others get very gingerly get reintroduced after injury. Chaparro had a whole week in the FCL, Petersen has been there for over 2 weeks now. Sykora took almost a whole month to get back to his appropriate level, and is still even now working his pitch count limits upward. Same with Cavalli, over 2 years removed from his TJ.
It’s an interesting development, and perhaps a better way to manage injury recurrence.
However, with all that said, it kind of all goes out the window when Joan Adon just missed a month to injury, gets a rehab appearance in Fredericksburg. Looks absolutely terrible, and can’t locate any of his pitches, walking 4 consecutive batters without getting anyone out, before getting pulled.
And then two days later? He’s ready! His rehab ends and he gets sent back to Rochester.
Not sure what to make of that…
Farewell to Clay Helvey, another footnote in the Nats farm system’s long line of AAAA relievers.
He’s yet another awful piece of the Nats’ diabolical bullpen construction this offseason. Between DC and Rochester, we signed/acquired the following relievers this winter:
Poche: 11.42 ERA
Sims: 13.86 ERA
J. Lopez: 6.57 ERA
Reifert: 15.63 ERA (in ST, was returned before the season began)
Helvey: 9.53 ERA
Pilkington: 4.07 ERA
Weigel: 4.73 ERA
Choi: 15.53 ERA in AAA (he’s also been used mostly as a SP)
(technically a FA) Finnegan: 2.61 ERA, even though the team did their best to NOT keep Finnegan, we sure are lucky to have found our way back to him.
I think the new analytics guys may want to tweak their reliever modelling.
The analytics team needs to go out and buy a new abacus. Some of this may be bad luck, given past performances that may have been almost decent. But when you have way too much bad luck, what does that say?
Seaver King promoted to Harrisburg… Kudos to King.
Wow, that’s a bit unexpected, but not at the same time.
For one, the Nats have been rushing their genuine prospects through Wilmington with insane speed. Wood spent 42 games there. House
games 16 g, Morales 18 g, and Crews skipped it altogether. So King’s 45 stands out.
But King has had a pretty extreme home (.214/.275/.286) and away (.305/.337/.463) split, so getting him the hell out of Wilmington might just be the trick needed.
Still, even on his most recent hot streak (coincidentally on Wilmington’s recent 11 game away trip), King’s hitting .333/.340/.458. That’s good, for sure, but not great (the 0 walks in those 51 plate appearances is also a bit concerning, but the 4 Ks is very encouraging after a really really rough start). Hope he can keep it up against better pitching!
Holden Powell promoted to AAA. We are now two months into the season so maybe there will be more promotions/releases.
Powell has always been difficult to hit. him going the month of May with 1.6 BB/9 is something he’s never done. we’ll have to see if he’s found something.
Kiley McDaniel from ESPN put out his June updates top 10. The Nats top 10 looks as strong as I can remember in recent memory, with each player having the potential to become an impact big leaguer.
The only toot blan, is he has House ranked 2nd but no. 46 in his updated top 50. Susana who he has at No. 1 is unranked (he said he just missed) in that top 50. So not sure how that works.
Still it’s encouraging. Take a look
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/43639138/2025-top-10-prospect-rankings-all-30-mlb-teams-kiley-mcdaniel