Offseason Update: March 26, 2026
Random thoughts while we wait for the minors to begin…
…If you were waiting for the Nationals to strike a deal with the likes of Comcast, Cox, and Spectrum, your laziness cheapness patience was rewarded yesterday.
…Despite the improved content when the Nats are not on TV, when they are, well, I’ll leave that to our e-migo, Todd Boss.
…The Red Wings begin the 2026 season in Florida, but the forecast for next week in upstate New York isn’t quite as sunny (or crazy).
…MLB will be using the minors as a guinea pig once again. While MLB focuses (too much) on the the movement of second base, ABS, and the pitch clock, the reduction of throws over to 1B from two to one in AA somehow only merits a single graf, despite the SB leaders at High-A last year swiping a combined 218 bases, including 100 by the Dodgers’ Kendall George. Obviously, a lot will depend on which speedsters are in AA, but consider that Billy Hamilton stole 51 bases in 50 AA games without this rule in 2012, a slower runner still may be able to match that rate.
To find the silver lining of our bleak medium-to-long term outlook, my attention will yet again be on the minors rather than the majors. And there’s increasingly a lot to like, especially with the recent infusion of talent at AAA 😉
To pick up on the SB trend, it’s something I’m surprised to not see more of in our org. Rizzo never met a toolsy speedster he didn’t like, and even if many of these guys didn’t materialize as hoped, I would’ve thought we’d have seen some big SB totals. Last season, our minor league leader in SB was Nasim Nunez with only 36 (Nunez nabbed another 9 in DC, so 45 is a bit more impressive). But missing here are track stars, like Green, Johnathan Thomas, Dashyll Tejeda, Cristhian Vaquero, etc. But I guess when many of these guys struggle to maintain >.300 OBPs the SB opportunities are hard to come by.
But I’ll be watching some of the new youngsters like Willits, James, Yeremy Cabrera, Marconi German, and Cortesia, as they all have the potential to steal 50+.
Seems the site hasn’t updated for a couple of days. Syracuse is 2-1 with a surprising comeback win on Opening Day capped off by a sterling yo-yo defensive double play to gun down a runner at home. I hope Luke is okay. I realize this is a labor of love and life intervenes sometimes.
Ignore this post. Browser issues kept the march 26th post resurfacing when I opened the site.
FWIW, I have exactly the same issue (on multiple browers / kit) – any ideas how to fix once and for all? Private browsing, and clearing cookies, don’t seem to help…