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Another Week to Go…

Here’s your obligatory post to let you know the site has not gone dark, which may actually be appropriate given current events.

About the only thing remotely related to Washington’s minors of late is this admonition from BA about the Nats’ inability to draw walks up and down the ladder. It’s acutally a, um, minor miracle that the Senators were able to score close to the league average despite being dead last in BBs—a figure matched by the Blue Rocks, natch—and dead last in HRs hit.

But let’s not spoil the post-mortems season reviews, which aren’t due for another couple of weeks. In the meantime, maybe you can celebrate National Black Dog Day?

7 Commments

  1. Thanks for sharing that article. I knew we were bad at taking walks. I didn’t know we were statistically the worst at it!

    Those sortable org stats are also quite enlightening. In addition to be really bad at taking walks, the Nationals are also 4th worst in strikeouts, and 2nd worst in power. That’s an awful trio of factors to be bad at! Yet another data point to illustrate how stale our player development has gotten.

  2. Without must else to look forward to, I was checking out the AFL rosters, and the Scottsdale Scorpions, our affiliate this year, has a really unbalanced team.

    The roster currently displays 9(!) infielders and only 2 catchers and 4 OFs. This is potentially a good thing, as 2 of those 4 OFs are our guys, Petersen and Petry, meaning there’s a pretty clear path to a lot of playing time, which is always a big issue in the AFL. Weirdly, the Astros named Zach Cole as one of the other OFs to the roster. Yet Cole was playing in the majors in September, and would’ve likely been playing in the playoffs at the same time as the AFL, if Houston hadn’t collapsed at the finish line. What a weird thing to do. Cole, if you weren’t aware, was really good in the MLB, putting up a .880 OPS in 15 games. I’m not really sure what the purpose of an AFL trip is at this point. He’s already demonstrated he’s good enough.

    Among the 9 infielders, only 1 (D’Andre Smith) has any experience in the OF, so even though he’s primarily a 2B, I expect he’ll see ample time in the corner OF spots. But among the other 8 infielders, including Seaver King, only one of them has ever played even an inning at 1B (Parks Harber), but even Harber isn’t a 1B. He’s played more at 3B in his career (Max Anderson also played 1B in college, but hasn’t played there once in his 3 year minor league career). Which means that Ethan Petry is also the 2nd most experienced 1B on the team! He just might end up playing every game between LF and 1B.

    What this also means is that there’s basically 8 players for 3 positions: 3B, SS and 2B, Seaver King included. And again, the problem here is that Kevin McGonigle, #1 prospect in baseball, is one of them. McGonigle has primarily played SS, but most scouts predict he’ll end up at 2B. In the AFL, they always make sure that the top, top prospects play regularly, which leaves even less playing time for the other 7 middle infielders. I just don’t see how King gets much of any playing time. Perhaps some odd DH appearances? It’s a really weird roster, but it seems like on the whole, while King may lose out, Petersen and Petry will really benefit.

    On the pitching side, Bennett will almost certainly be in the rotation. But what about Linan? 2025 was his first season used primarily as a SP, and I’d expect they’d want to continue with that, but looking at the other arms on the roster, there seems to be a lot of SPs (7 counting Bennett and Linan), so I’ll be curious to see how they’re used. Simpson, Aldonis and Amaral will obviously be used in relief.

    The season kicks off on Monday, and there’s a good chance Bennett will toe the rubber, as the highest rated SP on the Scorpions roster.

  3. I’d just like to throw in that according to my counting, 499 players have appeared in a game for a Nat (this doesn’t include players like Steven Fuentes or Donovan Casey that were called up but didn’t play). So we just missed having the 500th appear this year.

    1. Wow, that’s almost too perfect to be true! The Nats have existed for 20 seasons, meaning we’ve averaged almost exactly 25 unique players per season, which, until recently, was the exact amount allowable on a major league roster.

      OD ’26 will thus usher in the 500th (and 501st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, etc.)

      1. These are approximate as I haven’t checked all recent transactions.
        It’s as of the last day of the season (doesn’t include new free agents)

        48 with Nats or affiliates
        59 with other MLB teams or their affiliates
        15 became free agents during this season (still unsigned)
        4 in indy ball
        28 in foreign leagues
        25 in managing/coaching (including 2 MLB managers)
        3 broadcasters
        3 deceased

    1. Baker certainly is one who mostly proved me wrong. We thought he pretty much was drafted as a favor to his dad, and perhaps he was. But he hit wherever he was, even in the majors (7 for 14 for a cool .500 average). Baker’s career minor-league average is .280, and .272 just at AAA. He’s never had much pop, though. If he was “shortstop capable” he would have had more utility value.

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