The Nats traded Robert Garcia for Nathaniel Lowe from the Rangers. It's a solid, if unspectacular move that makes the Nats better, without giving up too much or costing them a lot of money leaving them the ability to do other things to help the team.
The good is pretty obvious. Lowe hits around .260+ walks about 75 times and hits about 17 homers. That's good enough for a 110+ OPS+ which is good enough for Top 10-15 offense in the MLB (1st base has taken quite a dip). Pair this with a Top 5ish defense at the position and you have one of the better first baseman in the league. In a sense in production he replaces what Jesse Winker would have done for the team if he stayed for the full season, though in a wildly different way, maybe even a little better.
What's the downside? On the Lowe side not much. You could definitely argue that what the Nats were really lacking was power and that's the one thing Lowe doesn't bring. This is something that Carlos Santana or Paul Goldschmidt, both signed for about the cost of Lowe, have. He also had his worst power year of his career last year. Is he on the downslide? It's one thing to hit 17 homers. It's another to hit 12.
You can also look at last year and see it's not just luck, pretty much ALL his fancy stats like hard-hit%, barrels, even things related to his patience like chase % went down. If this is the start of a decline he doesn't have too far to fall before he's below average at the plate. And if it was an aberration. one could say the ceiling on Lowe is about as "low" as it could be. He's just good. That's it.
But back to good, Lowe will turn 30 next year so while he could crash next year, you'd be better betting on that from Santana or Goldschmidt. And while Walker isn't OLD (sorry Anonymous commenter) he is old and a better bet to crash thought not to the level of the guys nearing 40.
What about Robert Garcia? I think people are underrating the impact of this move. It's not that Robert Garcia was great. He was a the kind of pitcher that could be special. A lot of Ks, very few homers, and solid against all sides of the plate. But he walked just a few too many and gave up just a couple too many hits and had a bit too much bad luck to be more than good. Can he get to special? Probably! but at 29 next year you generally don't feel bad betting on things just continuing on as is.
No the problem isn't Garcia, the problem is the Nats. Robert Garcia was one of only TWO pitchers that the Nats have in the pen that seemed likely to be good. (Derek Law being the other) Right now the Nats pen is a huge gaping hole and when they are currently relying on a lot of young inexperienced arms and only brought in oft-injured arm to help this spells trouble.
But lucky they have a bunch of money left to help solve this problem!
Soroka was a good move IF they did other things to the rotation. Lowe is just a good move. It's not game changing but it's the type of move that makes sense no matter what the Nats do the rest of the off-season. Hopefully this isn't all they do of course.
18 comments:
Why would Soroka alone not be fine? I mean yes we all would like Burnes, but outside of that or MAYBE a Max, why would we push one of our young guys out of the rotation? Right now you go in with Gore, Irvin, Parker, Herz, Soroka and I suppose Cavalli finishing his rehab to try to finally come back. Gray will be back too. Signing anyone else means we don’t get to see what the kids (who showed promise) can do in what is hopefully the final year of a rebuild.
Otherwise agree with the post , I like the move. Subtle without giving up a ton though Garcia is indeed underrated.
@sheriff. In theory, you only need five starting pitchers for five starting slots. In reality, teams typically need 6-8 starting pitchers to make it through a season. More is not unheard of.
Think injuries, innings limits, slow recoveries from surgery, regression in young pitchers that require they work though problems back in the minors, failure of a swing pitcher to be able to sustain starts (Soroka possibly, but hopefully not). Actually, its an advantage that several of our young pitchers still have options, providing an easy pathway if you need to stash someone. It is a truism of baseball---you can never have too much good pitching.
Here is the MLBTR take on the Mets rotation.....arguably counting 9 pitchers available to start...and that's with a more experienced top 5 than the Nats.
Mets have now signed three notable free agent starters: Manaea, Frankie Montas, and Clay Holmes. Those three will join Kodai Senga and David Peterson in the rotation, with Paul Blackburn, Griffin Canning, and Tylor Megill offering additional depth. Top prospect Brandon Sproat is another arm who could start for the Mets at some point in 2025.
Wasn't there some discussion here last season that Herz may be better long-term in the bullpen? Maybe both he and Soroka eventually end up there while doing spot starts/bullpen games as needed. It would be great if the Nats find one more dependable rotation guy, but there really aren't too many left out there.
I'm doubling down on Walker being OLD! Since 2022, there have been 14 batter seasons with wRC+ > 100. That's less than 5 a year. Sure Walker might be one of them next year, but I wouldn't bet the house on it. And that's just better than average! Garcia might be special, but there is way too much variance with relievers to care about a guy with some good stats for one season.
That's fine. My general opinion is
under 23 "Young"
23-28 "Prime" (not exactly true but hey my blog)
29-33 "Not Young"
34-37 "older"
38+ "OLD"
I can't really justify calling Walker OLD! I think there is a significant chance that he is not good ever again, though. That isn't really true of Lowe
Sure, I understand that. But these are all guys signed to be (or are already established) MLB starters. So then who does not make the rotation if we have all of these guys? None of them are AAA level.
I'm just glad that I was wrong about Rizzo not picking up a quality 1B. While I would have preferred Walker, I like Lowe more than Goldschmidt (coming off bad year, age) or Santana (serious age risk), and the defense (with the Nats' otherwise meh-to-bad fielding infield) plus two years of control elevates him over Naylor in my mind. And I actively did not want Alonso, whose bat has only been good (wRC+ in the 120s) over the last couple of years rather than exceptional yet is likely to require being paid in years and dollars like he was exceptional to pry him away from the Mets (who I suspect will sign him for 5/$125 or thereabouts if no one else outbids them).
As for the rotation situation, I think the issue here is not only the numbers (with Gray and Cavalli, the Nats could be thought of as being seven deep but that's with injury concerns all over the place) but the quality of the starters. Gore is fine. Herz was pretty good last year and deserves the chance to prove it in 2025. But Parker and Irvin are more like "solid back-end guys," useful to fill out a rotation and spare the pen but that's basically all. Soroka hasn't been an effective starter since 2019, Gray is coming off injury and pitched poorly for a couple of years before that, and Cavalli hasn't been to the majors yet. The Nats needed a high-quality pitcher at the front end of their rotation, maybe two. Pitching improvements that would push one of Parker or Irvin out of the rotation knowing we'd probably need them to step in as #6. They didn't need another question mark. Signing Soroka to be a high-leverage reliever with his good stuff and coming off his success in Chicago would have been a solid move and made the Garcia trade even more understandable, but publicly promising him a rotation spot makes it likely there's nothing else happening unless someone gets traded.
@Sheriff. It is a near-certainty on April 1 that the Nats will need at least 6 starters for 5 slots. As noted below, the Mets are assuming they need to be ready with 9--even thought their core starters are more established than ours. Best problem for a team to have is to one or two swingmen who take an occasional start or contribute to a bullpen game. Also, our young pitchers have options and go to Rochester for a month to work on a new pitch.
I think you may also be overestimating the certainty that Irvine, Parker, and Herz are established MLB starters. Soroka was terrible last year as a starter; only showed quality as a reliever. He is a great candidate to be tried as a starter, but it comes with big question mark. Gore is best of the group in terms of potential to be an ace--so far he has been serviceable, not nearly lived up to his pedigree. Not being negative about any of the guys....just being realistic about why Rizzo knows he needs to deliver another pitcher or two.
The starter depth question feels tricky to me.
One on hand, even with solid pitcher health last season, the Nats still needed to give their opening day SP7 19 starts.
Right now, the Nats look to get 5.5 seasons from their top 6.. The best of Lord, Lara, Alvarez and Stuart is an SP7 that I'm very comfortable with. But, every year, plenty of teams need to go to SP8 or SP9. The second or third best of that quartet is a much dicier proposition. And Steven Grossman is correct - our starters almost all have question marks, even beyond the ever-present risk of injuries.
So signing another pitcher makes sense to me in a vacuum. The problem is that, unless we sign Burnes or Flaherty, we'll be bumping Parker to AAA because we signed 2 FAs that didn't perform better than he did last year and don't project to better median outcomes this year. And that just feels like dirty pool to me. I know it's all a business, and that kind of thing can happen during the option years, etc, but it rubs me a little wrong.
So we'll see what the team does, and I expect I'll have mixed feelings either way. (My preference is to obviously sign Burnes if we can, but I recognize that's unlikely.)
The starter depth issue bothers people more than I think it should. Spring training performance will be weighed with past achievement and upside potential.....and within that framework, the best 5 healthy pitchers will be given starting jobs. If we have Burnes or some other presumptive #1, he starts even if ST performance was poor. Probably the same with Gore, but his leash will be shorter. Of the next four (Parker, Irvine, Herz, Soroka) and assuming good health, three will make the rotation and the fourth will go to the bullpen. I wouldn't assume it is Parker-- it will be decided on performance and potential. The odd man out may well be Soroka. Contrary to how some have interpreted the situation, he was not guaranteed a starting spot; he has been given the opportunity to compete for one.
That’s fair, but to piggyback off of our discussion earlier in the thread, it is true that the nationals young guys could fall off or get hurt, but as of now they are not so you would be having to throw somebody in the bullpen that did nothing to deserve it (and I don’t mean in a John Lannan type of way). Sure Cavalli can start in AAA since he’s (STILL) making his TJ return, but unless they absolutely fold you can’t put Gore, Irvin, Parker, or Herz in the pen. We can worry about Gray when we cross that bridge.
I think you're overestimating how much ST results will or should influence the team's thinking. I guess if someone loses two ticks on their fastball, or if Parker's or Herz's control regresses badly, that might be enough to earn them a spell in AAA, but I guarantee the team doesn't really care if any of these guys throw to a 3.00 or 5.00 ERA over 15 innings of practice.
Likewise, Soroka certainly doesn't have the rotation spot locked up all year, and very possibly not even past April, but I expect it will take a rather extraordinary development for him to drop out of the OD rotation. Rizzo has never pulled the rug out of an FA signing like that.
SMS - Correct. OD rotation, health withstanding, I see as Gore Parker Irvin Herz Soroka. I’m hoping for the best in that they just want to start Cavalli in AAA to build him up and call him up based on how he does.
@Sheriff and @SMS. I applaud your sense of fairness about how players are treated. I tend to think of this as Mike and Davie's problem, but I am going to give that a rethink. Certainly you want FA's and draft picks to see your team as being supportive and fair. I guess fans, too?
Relative to ST, I think that performance matters, but I agree that results do not. If a ST goal is to experiment with a new pitch, you don't want to mark someone down for being hit hard. Likewise, a batter trying a new stance shouldn't worry about immediate results.
However, the coaches know who doesn't look sharp, who arrives in less than optimal shape, whose curveball isn't dropping the way it did before, or who suddenly can't hit breaking balls. All that matters even if it doesn't immediately cost someone their role in the batting order or rotation.
With Burnes signing with Arizona, Nats are officially on Jordan Montgomery Trade Watch
Interesting bringing Josh Bell back. I suppose he couldn’t really do worse than what we were getting from the DH spot last year.
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