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And Now We Wait…

Thanks to the Red Wings’ award-winning playoff run, Washington’s minors and majors seasons ended just a day apart. Thanks to an MLB-record 42 blown saves, the big club is done instead of possibly gearing up for their first return to the playoffs since youknowwhen. Though few, if any, people can honestly say they expected the team in D.C. to improve by 11 games or be above .500 through the end of July.

That confluence, along with seemingly everything that would usually fill the gap between the end of the minors and the start the Fall league (e.g., AFL rosters, team awards, instrux, Dan Kolko or Kevin Frandsen not getting fired) having already happened means we have a bit of a badly needed break here.

So thanks for the kind words in the comments and I’ll be back next month. In the meantime, enjoy your National Strawberry Cream Pie festivities.

18 Commments

  1. Luke, thanks again for another great year of coverage! I try to offer some insights on what I see on City Island to help you and the other commenters. Thanks!

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  2. Luke : enjoy the off season before any AFL coverage with sprinkled snarkles as usual .
    2027 will bring some new names to
    Random drop their newly adorned nicknames .
    It’s like being in high school gym class. There are “ guys to razz “.

    Who here senses another trade with the Yankees in the off season ??

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  3. My 40: people with (*) are bubble people who are kept around until FA’s come in. I expect 3 FA pitchers to be signed, and maybe one position player (left-handed). Would also bring in a couple of vet relievers on minor league deals.

    Pitchers
    1. C. Cavalli
    2. A. Alvarez
    3. J. Kent
    4. DJ Herz
    5. C. Early
    6. B. Lord
    7. O. Ribalta
    8. R. Cornelio
    9. L. Perales
    10. K. Nicolas (because he throws 100)
    11. Y. Cruz (because he throws 100)
    12. W. Dion (lefty, did well)
    13. E. Tolman (lefty hard thrower)
    14. J. Susana
    15. T. Sykora
    16. E. Mejia* (might offer minor league contract)
    17. Z. Kent* (they seemed to be interested in giving him longer outings)
    18. J. Irvin* (until FA starter comes in, could be bulk reliever)
    19. C. Beeter* (got worse as season progressed)
    20. E. Yean* (good numbers – but org doesn’t seem that interested)
    21. E. Swan*

    Pitchers I considered (but didn’t keep): G Varland, P. Schultz, C. Palmquist, J. Bird (I’d offer minor league deal), J. Gray (I’d offer minor league deal) J. Simpson, J. Sinclair, N. Dean (will see what happens in AFL), P. Poulin, M. Waldron, M. Parker (expect non-tender), E, Lovelady (would offer minor league contract), K. Waldichuk, M. Krook, J. Lawrence, T. Cosgrove, M. Kranick, S. Gaston, A. Lara. C. Hampton was waived.

    Pitchers who don’t need R5 protection (per Roster Resource): Grable, Lyon, Glassey, Cebert, Hartle, Clemmey

    POSITION PLAYERS
    22. K. Ruiz
    23. H. Ford
    24. D. Millas
    25. M. Romero
    26. CJ. Abrams
    27. N. Nunez
    28. J. Vivas* (they seem to like him, but would try to get something better)
    29. A. Chaparro
    30. B. House
    31. A. Ortiz
    32. Y. Morales
    33. J. Young
    34. D. Crews
    35. J. Wood
    36. D. Lile
    37. A. Pinckney
    38. L. Pineda
    39. C. Wallace
    40. T. Lipscomb

    Position players I considered: J. Tena. I presume R. Adams goes elsewhere as a FA. S. King doesn’t need R5 protection.

    This has too many position players for now, but I am holding on to some people because of Rochester hitting success. Also plan to give people from the Griffin and Luis Garica packages chances, but those people don’t need to be on the 40 now.

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    1. I’d hesitate to put Pineda in the non-bubble category. His performance in Rochester appears to be a lucky hot streak rather than him making some fundamental changes. He’s sporting a .362 BABIP, which is about .060 points higher than any rate he’s ever posted before (i.e. his contact doesn’t make him a BABIP outlier, like, say, Yohandy Morales). A BABIP drop of .060 points to his next best BABIP ever would instantly wipe away a significant chunk of his break out performance. He did, however, display power in Rochester that he’d never before exhibited: a .329 ISO vs. a MILB career of .145, and it’s backed up with generally pretty good batted ball stats (good, but not great, exit velocities and contact stats). But he really, really struggles against offspeed and breaking balls. Almost all his damage has come against fastballs. To revert back to the Morales comparison, he’s the anti-Morales, who feasts on offspeed/breaking balls and struggles against FBs, and weirdly the more I look, the more it appears AAA pitching staffs do zero oppositional research.

      Couple that with Pineda being exclusively a corner outfielder, on a team with a pretty good, young outfield, I don’t really see what he offers. With that said, he is a lefty, and management is irrationally obsessed with situational match ups, so Pineda could be our 3rd choice OF LHB after Wood and Lile, so you might be on to something there. But still, as evidenced by Pineda’s signing this past winter and recent history, there’s plenty of AAAA guys like him – Blankenhorn, Yepez, Meneses, Garrett, Rutherford, that can be had without requiring use of a 40 man roster spot. I wonder if Pineda would even re-up on a minor league deal in any case.

      I think you’d also need to add Alejandro Rosario to your pitcher list. It’s easy enough to dump Beeter off the list. He won’t find another team willing to give him a 40 man roster spot, so if he was smart, he’d try to stick with the org to get more chances in the future.

      I’d also drop Vivas, Nicolas and Kent too, and use their spots for free agents.

      But good list!

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  5. I will join the chorus; I appreciate the yeoman work that you do on this site and do not begrudge you a break at all. We’ll check back in later on the roster decisions (etc.) when the time comes.

    I do like strawberry cream pie …

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  6. well back next month means Luke is taking a couple of days off. He can use this time to tell us about his predictions for lefty reliever waiver claims in the offseason. 🙂

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  7. Six Nats minor league coaches, instructors and/or advisors won’t have their contracts renewed in 2027, including Rochester pitching coach Fernando Nieve: https://x.com/K_Williamsmedia/status/2104638237264282037

    Always hard to know what the Nats front-office is thinking about all of the arms that shuffled through Rochester and DC, would think the pitchers left-off Nattering’s list that have the best chance to make the 40 man:

    Gray
    Poulin
    Parker
    Varland

    Of the one’s on Natterings’ roster that may not make the actual 40 man:

    Mejia
    Kent
    Irvin
    Yean
    Beeter (FWIW, seems like Butera is done with him)

    Also, seems a virtual certainty that the Nats will target some higher-profile bullpen arms that it will have to sign to MLB deals; so, there will be at least a few players that make the initial 40 that will be let go whenever players are added to the roster.

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    1. while Nieve is listed as the pitching coach, it was asst pitching coach Narrron making the mound visits during the playoff run

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    2. On Mejia, maybe it’s possible to keep him on a minor league deal, but it’d be a huge mistake to lose him.

      He converted to pitching only last season, after a 13 year career as an infielder. Since then, he rose to AAA while throwing 99 MPH. After an understandly bumpy, but overall impressive first season, he improved in basically every measurable way this year.

      If you’re keeping guys like Cruz (or Nicolas) around because of their velocity and untapped potential, then you’ve gotta do the same for Mejia. Mejia might have even more upside than most arms in the org even though he’s 32, given how short he’s actually been pitching. He’s such a unique case.

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      1. I was thinking that Nicolas and Cruz were guys obtained in trades by the new regime, so would be more likely to be kept.

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  9. I like Natteringnabob’s list as a starting point. A lot will come down to the front office’s odds of there being a rule 5 draft; if there is one, then, as Will points out, Rosario is a must-add; if there isn’t one, then neither Rosario nor Sykora would be added.

    I continue to hope Pineda is add-worthy. His wOBA on offspeed is just .267. But on breaking balls it’s .378 and on fastballs it’s .580(!). Compare with Cayden Wallace: .432/.262/.307 on fastballs/offspeed/breaking. Pineda is better on all three!

    If I’m right about Pineda, then I suspect Lipscomb is the odd man out. Older, poor expected stats, and terrible swing decisions that would be exploited in the majors.

    Nats probably need two major-league quality SPs from free agency or trade. That would let us cut Kent.

    I would cut Millas and either select Adams or just go with 3 catchers.

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    1. Oops. I meant to say “That would let us cut *Irvin*”.

      Also, I should add that what would be really nice is trading some 40-man depth, especially hitters, for lower-level prospects. But everyone will probably be trying to do the same thing. We will definitely have to cut some relief pitchers, but a lot of them have quality stuff and might develop into valuable assets, and so hopefully we can keep as many as possible.

      Reply

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