Instrux Roster Revealed, AFL Roster Report
The news hasn’t quite slowed down, as we got official word via Baseball America of who’s going (or went) to Instrux and a report from The Nats Report on who’s slated to fill out the roster of the Saguaros; I think you’ll agree it’s, um, not much of a surprise.
Looking over the Instrux roster (if you have trouble with the link above, you can go here, here, and here), there’s no red flag or smoking gun: Every 2021 draft pick was invited. It’s not really any larger than in years past, which one might expect given the missed season and/or limited capacity for the alternate training sites.
As for the AFL guys, the six (of the seven that will be) named by The Nats Report are:
- RHP Cole Henry
- RHP Todd Peterson
- RHP Jackson Rutledge
- LHP Evan Lee
- C Israel Pineda
- SS Jackson Cluff
We’ll see how reliable this list turns out to be, but it seems about right to me: All but Lee spent significant time on the I.L. and Lee checks the box for a Rule 5 candidate. One would think that the seventh player would be a position player so per Todd Boss’s Draft Tracker, here are the remaining Rule 5 position players:
- Gage Canning
- Cody Wilson
- Jacob Rhinesmith
- Onix Vega
- Cole Daily
- Kyle Marinconz
- Justin Connell
My guess is that the seventh player is dependent on the other teams’ picks, i.e. whether there are enough IFs or OFs to fill out the roster.
BA DOUBLE DIPS… AGAIN
No sense picking ten different players for each league, right? Consequently, Cade Cavalli is the #6 Pick for the AA Northeast, which included this bon mot:
Several evaluators thought Cavalli might have better command working a few ticks down in his velocity range, and that he struggled most when approaching triple-digits. Most had his ceiling as a No. 1 or 2 starter if his command progresses.
The best news on the Instrux roster is Yasel Antuna is listed as an outfielder. Imagine how much better he’ll be at the plate without dealing with constant failure on defense.
There were 5 shortstops listed on the FCL Nats, they can find someone to replace him there.
The 3 H.S. batters are there too. Keep them working.
There are 8 catchers listed; where to put them in the spring?
Mark, sorry, I posting about Antuna to OF at the same time you were! Let there be rejoicing in all the land!
Dancing in the street news!
Cool grey couch , Luke !!!
The big news on the Instrux roster is that Antuna is listed as an outfielder. The organization has finally accepted reality.
Another notable appearance is Pablo Aldonis. The Nats gave him a hefty IFA bonus of $1mil in 2019. And for reasons unexplained, he’s still yet to set foot on a professional baseball diamond. We saw Andry Lara and Roismar Quintana this season (the other 2 high value signings from 2019), but no news on Aldonis, but it’s good to see he is around and presumably healthy. Hopefully, reports on him will trickle in, because he’s a bit of a black box to date.
Also wish Antuna was being sent to AZ to play OF. He REALLY needs the hitting experience at that level in that league to get him ready for the step to AA (that he should have already made). Maybe he’s the PTBNL.
Rutledge and Henry make a lot of AZ sense, and it will be a big deal to see if they are healthy and making progress this fall.
Pineda was the catcher I expected to go to AZ, although at this point, with all the catching talent the Nats have acquired and with Pineda Rule 5 eligible, the AFL gig would seem more like a trade showcase opportunity for him.
Evan Lee and Peterson are SEC relievers the Nats have been trying to turn into starters. Um, our MLB relievers suck, and we signed some pretty awful ones off the street who sucked even worse. Why, oh WHY, does the organization try to make everyone a starter instead of developing relievers to be relievers?
Fortunately, the Peterson as a starter experiment only lasted a couple weeks in June, and seems to have died a quick death then.
That was just jaw dropping !
Jake Cousins 2017 Nats pick now a stelller Brew Crew bullpen arm .
Jake Cousins, awesome story from Nationals release, to independent ball, to MLB! Appreciate you bringing up that name.
I had missed that about Cousins. Wow. The Nats flat-out released him after just two season. He had a 2.70 ERA with their big club this year. Number of Nat relievers with an ERA under 3: ZERO.
Just emphasizes the gulf in developmental approaches between good clubs (Brewers, Dodgers, Rays, etc.) and the Nats. Cousins immediately doubled his strikeout rate upon joining the Brewers. Cousins was never a power pitcher. At Penn, he also struck out far less than 9 batter per 9 IP, usually around 6. Then upon joining the Brewers he’s consistently sat at 12-14 K/9IP. That’s a sign of having really good scouting and development approach. Someone saw something in Cousins to tweak and unlock a completely different player. The Ray and Dodgers do this all the time and reap massive rewards from it. Meanwhile, I wonder what the heck the Nationals do. It feels like nothing at all.
FanGraphs wrote a fascinating article about Patrick Corbin’s struggles and a slight technical tweak to his delivery that could be the difference between Corbin of 2019 and Corbin of 2021 (https://blogs.fangraphs.com/a-potential-fix-for-patrick-corbin/). It’s insane to me that a writer for FanGraphs and not the team of professional analytics and development people didn’t 1) identify this themselves, or 2) act on it. It’s a fascinating article that’s well explained, and definitely worth a read. But it’s yet another piece in a long line of examples of developmental failures within the Nationals organization. We’re so clearly being out-smarted by the majority of organizations these days, and don’t seem in much of a hurry to stop falling behind. This gap is going to become so much more apparent over the next few years, as we lean into our inadequate player development approach to rebuild this broken team. It’s going to be needlessly more painful and problematic than it should be with a smart, forward-thinking front office and scouting and analytics department.
Justin Connell strikes me as a curious Instrux omission. He had a solid year at the plate at A+ (.293/.356/.398), albeit without a lot of power, and he finished with a very strong Sept. (.362/.423/.574).
I thought for sure the Nationals would name Matt Cronin to the AFL squad. He’s only thrown 30 innings this season, after missing a month to injury. But perhaps, like Cavalli, he was gassed by the seasons end. Since returning from the IL, he wasn’t close to as dominant as before, only striking out 5 in 5.2 IP, while walking 4, and a 7.94 ERA.
Evan Lee, meanwhile, never threw more than 34 innings in a season his career (college included), and has already doubled that (77 to date) this season. On the bright side, he is finishing strong. Through his first two months, he posted a 5.67 ERA, while in the latter two months, he’s put up a 3.30 ERA.
I’m most excited to see the power arms in Rutledge and Henry taking the rubber for (hopefully) 40% of Surprise’s starts. Both have a ton of innings remaining to log, and Henry, in particular, has been electric. Hopefully, Rutledge can regain that form from 2019.
Unfortunately, our hitters, like usual, are very unexciting. Hopefully Rhinesmith or Connell get a well-earned appearance to add some excitement at bat.
Cronin isn’t on the Instrux roster, either, so I guess that means they are shutting him down.
Frankly, the Nats had several pitchers coming back from injury this summer who didn’t pitch well. That has to make one wonder whether they were rushed back too soon.
I see that Cate is on the Instrux roster, one of the few AA guys. I’m not sure what he will get from pitching to Instrux guys, but he needs to find his confidence somewhere.
Speaking of guys coming back from injury, it’s good to see Tyler Dyson on the Instrux roster. He got off to a terrific start — 0.98 ERA after five appearances at A+. After two struggling starts in June, they shut him down. He then had three brief outings in the FCL in August.
It’s weird to think of a guy who was once a 1/1 prospect thought of as under the radar, but that’s Dyson. He turns 24 in December, so he’s still got a couple of years to put it all together.
The Nats acquired Pitcher Aldo Ramirez from the Red Sox for Schwarber. Ramirez pitched poorly in limited innings for the FCL Nats. Was he injured?
Yes — “right elbow tendinitis.”
Isn’t that a prerequisite for any Nat pitching acquisition?
Guess that means TJ is inevitable and Aldo will reappear in 2023
MLB.com’s list of Nats prospects in the Arizona Fall League doesn’t include Evan Lee, but it does include Donovan Casey and Drew Millas.
Casey seems like a weird one to me. He’ll be 26 by Opening Day, and he finished two full levels higher than everyone else the Nats are sending (aside from Jackson Cluff, who was injured all season). I’d rather see Lee in that setting than Casey.
Agree that Casey is a weird selection. I do think he’s the most likely OF in the mid/upper part of the system to have a chance to really stick at the MLB level. But AFL usually is A+/AA guys, and Casey has already pretty much mastered AA. Maybe they want to give him an opportunity to get his groove back after AAA struggles.
Is Casey Rule 5 eligible? If so, maybe the Nats are trying to figure out what they need to do with him.
Yes, Casey is Rule 5 eligible, and yes, he probably is a borderline/difficult decision for the Nats. The way he played at Harrisburg would suggest that he might have a chance to stick on an MLB roster, while the way he played at Rochester wouldn’t exactly confirm that notion.
It’s a given that Casey will be added to the 40 man in December. There will be lots of room.
He was great at a .965 OPS in August then fell apart in September. He will spend at least the 1st half of Rochester and we go from there.
Still don’t understand how the Nats only managed to get Ruiz and Gray for both Sherzer AND Turner. That should have been the haul for just one of them, not both together. I mean Casey and whoever was the other one just seem like trade fillers at this point. I don’t know, feels like the Dodgers didn’t give enough considering the incredible years our guys/are having, regardless if they are pending free agents or not.
The elephant in the room is the expiring CBA. We’re not gonna know how it affected things until after it’s settled, but my gut says that uncertainty depressed valuations. The good news is no news — usually when things aren’t going well, one side or the other (well, usually the owners via their reliable waterboys, a.k.a. Olney, Rosenthal, and Heyman) leaks but so far it’s been quieter than a Republican subcommittee on civil rights.
Evan Lee was a puzzling inclusion from the start. He’s already thrown twice as many innings this season than he ever did before. That’s generally a red-flag for inclusion at the AFL. Makes sense that there was some incorrect reporting.
Millas’ inclusion is a bit puzzling too, especially when coupled with Pineda. Millas isn’t R5 eligible until next winter, while Pineda is already R5 eligible. I don’t know why they’re naming both of them to the squad. Given Pineda’s pretty awful season, I can’t see any clubs taking a flyer on him in the R5 draft. If he can barely hit .200 in A ball, imagine the horror show in the majors!
Casey is such a wild card. His 2021 season might be the most Jekyll and Hyde season witnessed in a long time. Hitting .303/.361/.483 in AA with the Nats and Dodgers, then just hopelessly falling apart after his promotion to AAA (.179/.245/.291). What’s most insane is that Casey was fantastic the first two weeks in AAA hitting (.326/.392/.522). Even witnessing Yasel Antuna’s start to the season, I haven’t seen a player appear so lost at the plate. In September, Casey hit .117/.188/.195, but worst of all was his 40% strike out rate in that period, including a 3 week spell when he struck out exactly 50% of the time.
It seems to me the solution for Casey is to go home and rest, but being R5 eligible that’s not a good option for the Nats. I hope he’ll regain that good approach he showed to start the season, but I don’t see any reason why he will.