The Nationals are entering the third full season of their rebuild, and their lackluster offseason was emblematic of a team more focused on the long-term picture than even feigning an attempt at competing in 2024.
Major League Signings
- Joey Gallo, OF/1B: One year, $5MM
- Dylan Floro, RHP: One year, $2.25MM
- Nick Senzel, 3B/OF: One year, $2MM (eligible for arbitration through 2025)
2024 spend: $9.25MM
Total spend: $9.25MM
Option Decisions
- Declined $3.3MM club option on CF Victor Robles (Robles was arbitration-eligible and remains with the team after agreeing to a lower-cost one-year deal)
Trades and Waiver Claims
- Selected SS Nasim Nunez from the Marlins in the Rule 5 Draft
Notable Minor League Signings
- Zach Davies, Eddie Rosario, Matt Barnes, Jesse Winker, Richard Bleier, Robert Gsellman, Juan Yepez, Derek Law, Luke Farrell, Stephen Nogosek, Travis Blankenhorn, Spenser Watkins, T.J. Zeuch
Notable Losses
- Carl Edwards Jr., Dominic Smith, Michael Chavis, Cory Abbott, Victor Arano, Hobie Harris, Jeter Downs, Roddery Munoz
The Nationals lost 91 games last season and entered the offseason with a fairly modest $110MM committed to the 2024 roster. With ample room to add starting pitching and players at various positions around the diamond, the stage looked to be set for some offseason dealings. General manager Mike Rizzo seemed to suggest as much early at last year’s Winter Meetings.
“We’ve got several holes to fill,” the veteran general manager said. “We’ve got our work cut out for us this year, and I think we’re going to take our aggressive approach when it suits us and wait for the market when it suits us. I think we’re going to be busy here. … I think we’re going to be aggressive again this year looking for a bat that can play the corner infield, be it third base or first base or DH or left field, or a combination of all three of those. And then we’ll resort back to getting more pitching.”
Rizzo went on to indicate that he’d be comfortable offering multiple years to free agents “in the right situation.” It was an encouraging slate of comments for Nats fans who have been tracking a series of ballyhooed prospects throughout the current rebuild and looked to the 2024 season as a year that could see the team begin to turn the corner.
Fast forward several months, however, and many of those claims ring hollow. The Nationals spent under $10MM in free agency, didn’t make a single trade and, despite having the No. 5 waiver priority in baseball, didn’t place a claim on a single player all offseason.
Washington did indeed add some corner bats, as Rizzo alluded to, but the impact of those acquisitions doesn’t look to be particularly high. For the second straight season, the Nats bought low on a non-tendered former top prospect to take over at third base. Unlike Jeimer Candelario, however, Nick Senzel isn’t simply coming off one down season. The former No. 2 overall draft pick has never had an average offensive season in parts of five MLB campaigns. He’s a career .239/.302/.369 hitter — about 23% worse than average, by measure of wRC+, which weights for the hitter-friendly home park in which Senzel has spent his entire career to date (Cincinnati’s Great American Ball Park).
Health has been a major roadblock for Senzel, who’s been on the injured list seven times in his big league career (to say nothing of multiple notable injuries from his prospect days). If the Nats can finally get Senzel healthy, he’d hardly be the first former top prospect to thrive in a change of scenery. He’s still just 28 years old, and the Nats will only owe him a $2MM salary this season. If he performs well, he’ll be a viable trade deadline chip but also could be a multi-year piece for Washington. Because he’s three weeks shy of five full years of MLB service, Senzel will be controllable through 2025 via arbitration.
The Nationals have already said that Senzel will be the team’s primary third baseman, which displaces their own in-house former top prospect, Carter Kieboom. He’s out of options and now ostensibly looking at a bench role. It shouldn’t come as a surprise if Kieboom himself is moved in a change-of-scenery deal later this spring — perhaps even following a DFA. It’s understandable that the Nats feel ready to move on from Kieboom after myriad injuries and parts of four unproductive big league seasons — but it’s at least a bit surprising that they’re doing so in favor of a player with a very similar career trajectory to date.
Across the diamond, it appears Joey Gallo will get another opportunity to try to recapture the Rangers form that’s increasingly becoming a distant memory. He’s still just 30 years old, but Gallo’s bat has cratered since being traded from the Rangers to the Yankees back in 2021. The slugger belted 110 home runs in just 1716 plate appearances from 2018-21, including a pair of 40-tater seasons, but since being traded, Gallo has a .166/.293/.396 batting line. He’s still walked in 14.5% of his plate appearances and hit for plenty of power, but his already problematic strikeout rate has ballooned to 40.5% in a significant sample of 970 plate appearances.
Gallo won’t cost the Nationals much, but at this point he’s two and a half seasons removed from being a productive hitter. If he goes on a huge first-half run, he could build up some trade value, but even if he’s hitting reasonably well, he’ll be viewed as a volatile rental whose ’21-’23 track record makes it tough for a team to surrender much of note in a trade.
The remainder of the lineup is largely set with in-house names. Shortstop CJ Abrams posted an ugly .300 OBP last season but saw his strikeout and walk rates improve in the season’s second half. He’s also one of baseball’s most impactful baserunners, swiping a hefty 47 bags in 51 tries, and quietly connected on 18 home runs last year. There’s legitimate breakout potential for him this season if he can continue to build on last year’s second-half gains in his K/BB profile.
On the other side of the bag, Luis Garcia Jr. will reprise his role as Washington’s everyday second baseman in what figures to be a make-or-break year of sorts. The 23-year-old was one of the sport’s top infield prospects before making his debut as a 20-year-old in 2020, and while he’s shown off the premium bat-to-ball skills that helped him garner praise (12.4% strikeout rate in ’23), he hasn’t done much else. Last year’s .266/.304/.385 slash (84 wRC+) is right in line with his career .265/.295/.395 output (85 wRC+). He’s been a sub-par defender thus far and hasn’t hit for power or provided baserunning value. He’s young enough to take another step forward, but if it doesn’t happen in what’ll be his fifth season with big league playing time, the Nats might have to look elsewhere for a long-term answer.
Then again, one need only look to center field to show the organization’s patience with homegrown talents. Victor Robles will be back for an eighth season despite not showing much since a promising start to his career. From 2017-19, the once-elite prospect — he ranked among the top 10 in all of MLB at Baseball America, MLB.com and Baseball Prospectus — hit .258/.327/.431 with premium defense. Dating back to 2020, however, he’s a .225/.302/.313 hitter (72 wRC+) in nearly 1100 plate appearances. Back problems limited him to 36 games last year, and his typically excellent defensive grades plummeted. The free agent market offered some affordable alternatives (Kevin Kiermaier, Harrison Bader, old friend Michael A. Taylor), but the Nats opted to stick with Robles, who’ll reach six years of service in ’24 and become a free agent next winter. If he’s healthy and performing even reasonably well this summer, he’ll be a trade candidate.
In right field, the Nats will again give Lane Thomas everyday at-bats and hope he can build on last year’s .268/.315/.468 showing. Thomas hit 28 homers, swiped 20 bags and played a fine right field. He’s only controlled through 2025 and was the subject of plenty of trade chatter last summer. That’ll likely be the case again come July.
Behind the plate, Keibert Ruiz will again serve as the primary catcher. Ruiz popped 18 homers, struck out in just 10.3% of his plate appearances and hit .260/.308/.409 (93 wRC+). He’s already signed long-term under an eight-year extension.
Joey Meneses is likely to open the season as the Nats’ primary designated hitter, but some of the shine has come off the late-blooming slugger after an out-of-the-blue breakout in 2022. Menseses hit .324/.367/.543 with 13 homers in just 240 plate appearances as a rookie in ’22. He saw nearly triple the at-bats in ’23 but still hit just 13 homers with an overall .275/.321/.401 output. For a bat-only player, that won’t cut it moving forward.
Left field is the only real spot that’s up for grabs heading into the season. The Nats dished out minor league deals to Jesse Winker and Eddie Rosario in hopes one can step up to fill that spot. Rosario is the more capable defender and is coming off a better 2023 showing. Winker, at his peak, was the more productive of the two — at least against right-handed pitching. Neither will cost much if they make the roster. It’s unlikely either will return much in a potential deadline swap, even if they’re performing well, but the pair of veterans gives the Nats a short-term bridge to prospects like James Wood, Dylan Crews and Robert Hassell III.
On the pitching side of the roster, the Nats will effectively roll out the same staff that produced some of the worst results in the game last year. Zach Davies, another minor league signee, is the only addition of note. The Nats have plenty of payroll space but will eschew even modestly priced upgrades in the vein of Michael Lorenzen and Mike Clevinger, both of whom remain unsigned.
That will pave the way for a group of Patrick Corbin, Josiah Gray, MacKenzie Gore, Jake Irvin and Trevor Williams to lead the team in starts again, pending any contributions from Davies and top prospect Cade Cavalli, who’ll eventually return from 2023 Tommy John surgery — likely on a limited workload. Washington is lacking in top-end pitching prospects beyond Cavalli, though names like DJ Herz, Jackson Rutledge and Mitchell Parker could factor into the rotation at some point.
The hope will be that Gray, Gore and Cavalli can all take meaningful steps forward, but there’s reason to express skepticism despite the former top prospect pedigree of each. Gray has never walked fewer than 10.5% of his opponents in his two and a half MLB seasons, and last year’s 20.5% strikeout rate was a career-low. He finally managed to somewhat curb his highest-in-MLB home run rate (2.30 HR/9 in ’22, 1.25 in ’23), but he did so at the expense of strikeouts and more free passes. Gore was immensely homer-prone (1.78 HR/9) but missed bats at a strong level and did reach a new career-high innings total (136 1/3). Cavalli was viewed by some scouts as a future reliever before he had Tommy John surgery, and he’ll now be under a tightly managed workload.
Despite Rizzo’s earlier proclamations about needing to add pitching help and being willing to make multi-year offers in the right setting, he changed his tune dramatically just a couple months later: “I just couldn’t find that starting pitcher that was going to impact us at this time, for not only the right amount of years but the right salary at this time,” Rizzo said in mid-February.
It’s a puzzling statement when each of Alex Wood, Jakob Junis, Frankie Montas, Jack Flaherty and Martin Perez inked one-year contracts (for under $10MM, in the case of Wood, Junis and Perez). Each of Kenta Maeda ($24MM), Nick Martinez ($26MM), Michael Wacha ($32MM) and Sean Manaea ($28MM) inked two-year deals with prices that would’ve kept the Nationals’ payroll in the $140MM range, if not a bit lower. The Nats peaked at a $197MM payroll in 2019 and were at $135MM or more in each season from 2014-22.
It’s a similar story in the bullpen, where myriad arms signed short-term deals that the Nationals could accommodate. The Nats’ only pickup was righty Dylan Floro, who has a nice track record but struggled in ’23 while battling a wildly unfortunate .401 average on balls in play despite better-than-average hard contact numbers. Floro is a perfectly sensible pickup, possibly even a bargain, but the Nats have such an undefined bullpen that it’s surprising he was the only one.
Between Floro and the trio of Kyle Finnegan, Hunter Harvey and Tanner Rainey — all controlled only through 2025 — Washington will have plenty of relievers to peddle this summer. Veterans Matt Barnes and Richard Bleier could work their way into that group after signing minor league deals. Another one-year pickup could’ve given them another, though, and while the return on such investments is rarely of note, the Nats clearly had the payroll capacity to at least take a shot.
Perhaps the general dearth of activity stems from uncertainty regarding the future of the team. The Lerner family was reportedly exploring a sale of the club for the past couple seasons before announcing in late February that those efforts were being halted. It’s plenty feasible that current ownership handcuffed Rizzo and his staff in fairly significant fashion this winter, not wanting to take on long-term commitments while exploring a sale of the team. Rizzo, the rest of the front office, and ownership would never publicly state as much, but it’s fair to wonder given the minimal payroll outlay and the number of areas on the roster that remain ripe for an upgrade.
Regardless of the reasoning, the results are what they are. The 2024 season looks like another bleak year for Nats fans, one plagued by lackluster pitching performances and subpar offensive production. But the ongoing rebuild could begin to bear fruit later this season, setting the stage for a more interesting ’25 campaign. Wood and Crews will likely be in the majors by then. Corbin will be off the books. Cavalli could be both healthy and largely free of an innings cap. And the Nats only have $43MM on that year’s payroll, perhaps setting the stage for a more aggressive run through free agency following the 2024 campaign. That’s shaping up to be a deep free agent class, headlined by old friend Juan Soto in addition to Pete Alonso, Corbin Burnes, Max Fried and Alex Bregman — among many others. This offseason was as quiet as they come, but next winter could be more interesting.
Solid 72 win team
Nationals seems only slightly ahead of the A’s and at par with Royals on paper, so 72 wins seems high.
“Nationals seems only slightly”..The Nationals are light years ahead of Oakland. They’ve found a starting catcher, a couple of starting pitchers and a starting SS just off the top of my head. I doubt Oakland has any of that. I could see the Nats approaching 80(75+) wins since they already won 71 gms last year.
Right ! So solid 72 win team is well said imo. I’m always atleast slightly impressed with nats
The Nats were not an easy out last year. They battled some teams pretty tough and I’d assume they learned from that. I’m a fan of all teams really(except NY teams)and when the Strasburg/Corbin contracts finally end I expect(hope) them to flourish.
JD Davis would be a cheap option at 3B.
Joey Gallo has been looking like a sun-bleached dog turd this spring training.
Joey Meneses is a much better hitter than Gallo IMHO.
Jacob Young should be the starting CF, not Victor Robles IMHO.
With Brady House, James Wood and Dylan Crews on the way, Nationals’ fans have some room for optimism.
Abrams will be a middle infielder for Nationals for next decade barring injuries.
Will they extend Lane Thomas? It seems unlikely
I gave them a D for dog turd
Senzel made sense because Rizzo said he didn’t want to sign anybody that blocked a prospect. Kieboom hasn’t been in the Nats plans at 3B for a couple years. The 3B prospect is Brady House. He’ll start the season at AAA. If Senzel somehow has a good first half like Candelario did, he’ll get traded at the deadline and House gets called up.
The Nats never had any intention of signing a big $ this offseason. They owe Corbin and Strasburg $35 million each. Corbin’s gone after this season, but Strasburg’s contract is uninsured and they can’t come to an agreement on retirement. They’ll be paying him $35 million a year until after the 2026 season. They also owe Scherzer a deferred $15 million a year until the end of the 2027 season.
Actually, IMO the Nats most significant “development” is off the field. They just announced they’re putting MASN on Fubo. Previously, streaming was only available if you had MASN on cable or satellite.
@Naval, Scherzer’s deferred $ already funded at time of each annual deferral. Freeing up Corbin’s $ definitely will help them.
Doh!
The “moves” they made were plenty reasonable. But they should have got into the starting pitcher market and bought some innings to protect some young arms.
I still believe this team isn’t that far away. They should flex some market muscle and buy.
What market muscle?!? The Nats are financially a mid-market team. Both the Nats and Orioles are hamstrung by the MASN mistake,
The Nats and O’s are only making $60 million each per year from that deal. When Ted Lerner was alive, he spent money regardless if the team was profitable or not because he wanted to win a World Series. O’s fans hope Rubenstein will do the same thing, because big TV/streaming $$ isn’t happening for either team. Ever.
Now that the Nats are run by Mark Lerner, the family hasn’t shown that they’re willing to spend big $ to win. Not only that, but somebody in the Nats ownership group objected to a potential Strasburg retirement deal, which is why he hasn’t officially retired, and probably won’t until after his contract expires. (Which forces the Nats to put him on the 40-man during the offseason.)
I seriously doubt they’ll make a run at Soto when he’s a free agent.
There is a tremendous difference between buying innings on the starting pitcher market and competing for Soto this winter.
The Nats aren’t going to win this year. They just aren’t. Garcia and Gallo are holes, Menesis is 31, and only Mike Rizzo believes Lane Thomas is more than a platoon OF.
More importantly, if Gore and Gray fail to take another step forward and become #1-2 starters, that part of the rebuild will have failed. Spending on middling “innings eaters” in a year where almost everything needs to go right to even finish .500 is a waste of money.
I’m not talking about winning anything. But there is value in keeping your team in games and having a chance to evaluate your players in a competitive environment.
Whatever man. Root for the owner’s profit margin if that gives you piece of mind. Best of luck to you guys.
They already have Patrick Corbin and Trevor Williams to eat innings and they’re almost certainly going to add Zach Davies too.
Debatable whether they could still use another arm to swing between the rotation or bullpen as needed. Someone like Michael Lorenzen might have value as a potential trade chip but would that outweigh the cost of outbidding the market for him?
Idk why this post is tinged with a constant why didn’t the Nats spend tone. They are still a year or two away and have almost 100M in Corbin, Strasburg and Scherzer providing nothing in 24.. they are mid rebuild and are still resetting payroll and accumulating talent…
Also with the new draft lottery rules it’s productive to go for as high a final lottery pick as they can in 25 before they are kicked out of the t10 again the following year as the rebuild finalizes.. the spending will come as the prospects arrive later in 24 and the next few years…
The Nats should have the payroll space to take on another underwater contract or two, to buy a few more prospects, if they can find a willing trade partner.
The Nats don’t have a potential 1B prospect who’s even close to ready, so Gallo’s sticking there regardless how bad he is..
Yohandy Morales likely gets moved to 1B because of Brady House, but Morales has only played 37 games at 1B after getting drafted last year. He’s only played four games at AA. IMO, if he makes it it’ll be 2025 or 2026.
Trey Lipscomb can play 1B, but IMO it’s more likely he replaces Garcia at 2B when Davey Martinez gets tired of him.
Yepez has looked good in limited action so far, I think the change of scenery could help rebound his career. If Gallo is struggling and Yepez is cruising in AAA, then he might very well end up as their primary 1B for much of the year, even though the glove is suspect.
That’s a stank ass team.
Steve Adams
“He’s a career .239/.302/.369 hitter — about 23% worse than average, by measure of wRC+, ”
“Gallo has a .166/.293/.396 batting line. He’s still walked in 14.5% of his plate appearances and hit for plenty of power, but his already problematic strikeout rate has ballooned to 40.5% in a significant sample of 970 plate appearances.”
Come on, man.
Provide wRC+ for both
Steve Adams
“From 2017-19, the once-elite prospect — he ranked among the top 10 in all of MLB at Baseball America, MLB.com and Baseball Prospectus — hit .258/.327/.431 with premium defense. Dating back to 2020, however, he’s a .225/.302/.313 hitter (72 wRC+) in nearly 1100 plate appearances”
Come on, man
Provide wRC+ for both
Dom Smith has a 1..318 OPS with the Cubs this spring. Just sayin’. Perhaps the Nats can get him back for a bag of blue crabs?
When your big offseason signing is Joey Gallo, you get an F.
Any team that signs Gallo for 5m gets an F from me. And that was their big move!!!
For all of the Joey Gallo haters out there, as I am one, he has a higher career OPS than Dave Kingman. Kingman was so awful that he played mostly on terrible teams (he had a total of nine career postseason at bats)
Kingman played for four teams in 1977 at the age of 28 and proceeded to hit 266 home runs the rest of his career.
Joey Gallo will not go away anytime soon.
Rizzo is not great at filling holes.
D. Not as many interesting buy-low deals as in recent years.
Too many reclamation projects not enough effort in the FA market. This team needs better SP for sure….gonna get rocked again. Still not enough power in the lineup and going to throw the rookies to the wolves….last place again.SSDD.
The Nats are doing what they did back in the day when they ended up signing Steven Strasburg and Bryce Harper as the first pick in the draft two years in a row. Adding high quality free agents will certainly help them win games, but that will also reduce their chances of getting a top 5 draft pick they can build around. They’re going to be happy to again have maybe a 70-win season that will possibly give them a chance at acquiring a future star with one of the first few picks in the draft. Once Wood, House, Hassell, Cavalli show their potential and worth at the Major League level – then the Nats will snag “Jayson Werth” and “Max Scherzer” free agents that will draw additional quality free agents to the Nats. This is probably a plan that is another two or three years away from completion before they’re competitive again.