Five Honored with 2025 Minor League Awards
This week, the Washington Nationals announced its 2025 Minor League Awards:
- Hitter – OF-IF Phillip Glasser
- Pitcher – RHP Riley Cornelio
- Defensive Player – Christhian Vaquero
- Baserunner – Seaver King
- “Nationals Way” – Andrew Pinckney
I am a little shocked that their picks aligned so closely with mine. I’m not surprised in the least that they figured out a way to be both specious and mendacious to help prop up, as predicted in my previous post
I can totally envision the Nats naming someone like Seaver King to distract from their disappointing production… just like they did with Elijah Green last year
Ok, maybe I got the category wrong, but the underlying point is not. Thing is, this isn’t bragging. Predicting the Nats will do something tone-deaf is “Dog Bites Man” not “Ted Cruz Said Something Intelligent About Free Speech.”
And make no mistake: Seaver King did do his best imitation of Tim Raines this year. But as the James Whitcomb Riley poem goes, “When I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.”
NATS NAME NEW BASEBALL OPS PRESIDENT
Yesterday, the news broke that the Nats are about to hire away Red Sox assistant general manager Paul Toboni as the new President of Baseball Operations.
How this affects the minors remains to be seen. The word is that the Nats are still planning to hire a GM, effectively splitting apart the two jobs held concurrently by Mike Rizzo. More to come, but we can only hope that if this is true, he’ll bring along some of his colleagues and break up the band that’s been resting on 2019 for the past four years.
“break up the band that’s been resting on 2019 for the past four years.”
Check your math, Luke. It’s been SIX years….
Though Toboni doesn’t really have a choice. This is a shell of an organization at this point. Ciolek and Haas just departed, leaving total vacuum in the scouting department. Our player development department has also been operating in standby mode for a few years now, with the annual turnover of our head of international operations since Dipuglia left in 2023, and current head of player development, Longosz, being an internal replacement after Watson left. We of course have no GM, and despite his best efforts to distance himself, DiBartolo is Rizzo’s protégé, with all of his baseball experience coming exclusively under Rizzo. Meanwhile, beyond leadership, we’re known to have one of the smallest/least advanced analytics teams in the game, and until recently also one of the smallest scouting networks too, and also one of the smallest player development coaching staffs too, including being one of 7 teams to still only field one DSL team.
But we’ll find out soon whether Toboni’s hire was motivated by money (a guy this young can’t be too costly) or by an appetite for BIG changes. I’m pleased that Toboni has a good reputation, especially on the drafting/player dev side, but as best I can tell he has very little experience on the major league side, and signing free agents to big bucks. We definitely need massive overhauls on the former, but I still cannot see a scenario in which this team is even remotely competitive before like 2030 without the team doing this very differently on the latter, and opening up the purse strings – and not just on free agents. We’re starting to get to the point of wasting away James Wood’s prime years before we’re competitive. We absolutely must lock down the few real talents in our team to extensions, and that’s going to cost a lot of money, and it will only increase the longer we wait.
Pushing back on the characterizing Toboni as having a lack of experience on the MLB side. Heard from multiple sources that Toboni was the driving force on the management side to convince both his bosses and Roman Anthony reps to negotiate and agree to the 8-year $130 million contract that will keep BOS’s #1 prospect at home until at least the 2034 season. Toboni was also behind Boston locking up Ceddanne Rafaela to a team friendly 8-year $50 million deal.
Also, Toboni was not considered a candidate for the WAS DBO position because the Red Sox were about to promote him to the GM position behind only BOS’s DBO Craig Breslow. Instead, Toboni took the WAS offer which you would think (or at least hope) came after assurances that the Nats would invest in front-office improvement and make legit commitments to build the roster. We shall see, but I am hopeful about this move, and think the Nats will let Toboni cook.
Toboni was promoted to assistant GM in November 2023, before this his roles were entirely scouting/player development focused. It was at this point he became involved in MLB matters, including doing a good job negotiating deal for Anthony and Rafaela. But I don’t think it’s unfair to describe just under 2 years as “very little experience on the major league side”. But it also doesn’t mean he cannot succeed. By all indications, he’s very talented and a quick learner, and I’m excited with the hire.
I don’t think we need to even speculate as to whether he was promised investments in front-office improvements. That’s literally his job at POBO. If ownership meddles at all in this, then the job is already a poisoned chalice. Whether they’ve promised big increases to the payroll… that is the big question. Let’s see, but at the very least, they’ve hired a smart guy who is with the times, and I hope and suspect he’ll surround himself with like-minded people.
Let’s wait and see who Paul T gathers around him in the PD offices
The rebuild began with the Soto haul
Here is my sentimental pick for next Nats manager , Paul T!
Tim Leiper !
I’m counting from when they started the rebuild, not the World Series.
Yeah, I know, I was being a bit facetious here. But excuses were being made in 2020 and 2021 when we were finishing last in the NL East too.
Sam Selleck chose Clemney on pitcher of the year in farm
Riley chosen by brass
Bravo to both of them
I’m pretty sure that Luke is counting from when the Nats shifted from “trying to contend” mode to “rebuild” mode at the 2021 trade deadline.
Correct, but Will’s not wrong, either. The Nats FO has been taking advantage of DC not being a baseball town and/or its tendency to cling to the past. Take your pick.
Any kind of “take your pick” narrative – especially when those narratives are mutually exclusive (are there no real DC baseball fans, or are there baseball fans but they are hopelessly mired in the past?) starts to smack of finding justifications for a conclusion. If you think that the Nats FO has been taking advantage of … something? … that’s fine. I think that the Nats FO former regime was honestly trying to do the best that they could. Since the best that they could was looking increasingly shaky, they were relieved of their duties. I don’t really think that there’s any nefarious backstory beyond that, but hey. That’s just my opinion.
And if I hadn’t taken any PR classes at the graduate level, much less completed a master’s thesis with a strong PR component, I’d be inclined to agree. Organizations—baseball or otherwise—would be foolish not to take advantage of any dynamic that suits them. Read carefully: D.C. has baseball fans, but it is not a baseball town. It’s a football town, you need look no further than here for proof. That gives the Nats a longer leash than they might have in say, New York, Boston, or Philly.
D.C. also has a proclivity to live in the past. When I first moved here in 2006, they were talking about the now-Commanders Super Bowl appearances as if it were last year. It’s died down some, but I still hear it from time to time (e.g., Channel 4’s daily knob-slobbing on the morning news). That’s a little harder to leverage, but certainly doesn’t hurt.
Thus, take your pick. Is the lack of urgency due to the cover of D.C. not being a baseball town? Or is it because D.C., not unlike lots of other places, prefers to remember the Glory Days when faced with the dismal present? Or is perhaps a little of both, which is why I chose “and/or” and not “either/or.”
And to cover all the bases, there is the great unknown about the sale of the team. Mark Lerner has said that the team is no longer for sale. And I’m sure he meant it at the time. Was that a factor as well? Did the Nats handcuff Rizzo, et al as he certainly implied (“Navigated that ownership group for almost 20 years.”) on his way out? I don’t think we’ll ever know. But if the team is not for sale, then what gives?
Happy trails , Bob Carpenter ! See you Later !
Luke : yes the days of Jack Kent Cooke ownership
Season ticket plans were golden where most people watching Sunday games from a cinema draft house in Arlington or some pub with swag all over the place .
Interesting that the Nats hire a guy who dates back to Theo and the Athletics who made so many trades with Rizzo .
It’s finally seems they’ve caught up with the times and hired an analytical mind with both baseball and scholar acumen.
This team was living in the past and let complacency, nepotism, in breeding and straight out aversion to new technology to rule for so long it drove them into the ground.
Really think exciting times are ahead.
If any of you follow hockey, this reminds me so much of what the Habs went through by having an old school inept GM
In place for 10 years lead them to being bottom feeders for most of those years until they finally woke up and made outside the box hires for president and GM.
Fast forward 3 years after this change and we have one of the most exciting young teams in the league almost ready to take that next step towards Stanley Cup aspirations
I’m sure the same will happen here
On paper, Toboni looks really good. Unless he’s given money to work with, though, a new front office won’t be able to do any better. I’m sure he was told that by all the baseball people he consulted before he took the job. I’m also sure he sought at least some assurances about finances from the Lerners, but whether those hold true after the ink dries will remain to be seen.
All in all, I’m glad that there will be a fresh start, from the ground up. That’s really the only way it could be done at this point.
I expect a lot of trades to start happening. I expect Toboni to attempt to lock up much of the current core and trade them now if they don’t sign. The only one who is probably all but untouchable in the entire organization is Wood (and Sykora and Susana by virtue of being out for a while). I’d listen on Crews, House, Cavalli, Willits, and whoever else. Gore and Abrams lead the sign-or-trade group. I don’t see Garcia as good enough to be a long-term core piece, and I question whether Gray is.
From WP’s Andrew Golden:
The Nationals agreed to terms with INF Orelvis Martinez on a minor league deal for next year, per source.
Martinez, 23, played one game for the Blue Jays in 2024. A former top 100 prospect who received an 80-game suspension in 2024 for using a performance-enhancing substance.
Not sure if the decision to add Martinez was Toboni’s first move for the Nats or perhaps, DeBartolo’s last. Good to see the organization is looking everywhere to add talent.
I agree, they certainly seemed to be more active recently on the waiver wire
Yes we may see a de ja vu in DC with how Boston flipped assets like at the flea market bargaining .
April 2026 might see the kitchen. Cupboards very different
Woof. A season to forget at both the major league level and minor league level.
Luke, will you be doing season reviews for each team again? I’ll hold off on commenting on these, but will leave my comments on the prospects (and recent graduates) in DC this year:
The good
James Wood, superstar, for 3 months. Through the end of June, Wood was hitting .283/.386/.552.
Daylen Lile didn’t let pitchers “figure him out”. It’s a shame his AVG dipped below .300 in the last game, but an outrageously good season from Lile, hitting .302/.350/.503 in 90 games (almost the same sample size as Wood’s 3 months slash above, 84 G)
Brad Lord: followed up his breakout 2024, with a remarkably solid major league season, getting jerked between the bullpen and rotation. Somehow, improbably, Lord was statistically our best SP. Does he have the ace upside of Gore? No. But he’s much, much more consistent (and a whole year younger, to boot). I think we might have found a 4/5 guy for the rotation.
Jose Ferrer, Cole Henry, Clayton Beeter: looks like we have a few above average RPs to build on, 2 of which were home grown, a rare feat these days.
The bad
Where to begin…
James Wood, strikeout champion, 2nd half. He got found out. From July to September, he hit a measly .229/.310/.393. He also made little progress defensively. Which version will we see next season?
Dylan Crews showed little progress. His final line was basically identical to his disappointing 2024 cameo .218/.288/.353 vs .210/.282/.355.
House and Hassell weren’t able to translate their good performances in the minors to the majors. There’s still time, but I’d hoped for a bit more evidence of their potential, albeit inconsistently. Both Hassell and House’s plate discipline problems were laid bare, with a 77:8 K:BB ratio from House and 61:8 for Hassell and very little power to show for the bad approach. A new hitting coach with a plan more sophisticated than “swing at everything” will hopefully give them a better development plan to address their weaknesses.
The rotation: Gore, Irvin and Parker took huge strides backwards. Gore’s story was almost identical to Wood’s. But I have less patience here as Gore has completed his 4th professional season, and hasn’t shown any progress compared to last season, where he suffered from the same problems. Meanwhile Irvin and Parker have just had disastrous seasons. Again, I think better coaching here would help. Parker, in particular, appears to have leaned heavily into the “I don’t care how fast you throw ball 4” mantra of Rizzo, and his pitching profile is radically different from that which he displayed in the minors, with his velocity down but his control far improved. But whoever the new pitching coaching staff is, they’re going to need to work some wonders with both Irvin and Parker to try and extract back of the rotation performances from them.
Regression from Young, Garcia and Ruiz. Young’s bat and baserunning skills went from bad last season, to nearly unplayable this season. Garcia being a slightly above average bat and glove combo from last year seems to have been a mirage with him regressing on both fronts, and turning back into the player we saw in 2022-2023. Before the concussion, Ruiz cemented himself as one of the worst bats and gloves in the game. A serious DFA candidate this winter, despite having the highest salary on the team.
It’s pretty depressing. We talked about how, in lieu of more activity and spending this past winter, this season would be a “sorting” season, where we’d separate the wheat from the chaff, and set up the team window to open in 2026. Unfortunately, there’s arguably even more questions right now than there was in March 2025. Yes, Lord, Lile and Henry, among others, have announced their arrivals. But those have been offset by regressions from guys who were penciled in to be important parts of the team’s core.
Toboni has a lot on his plate.