In our quest to look forward we often can only remember the latest things. For the Nats that means looking to who they could draft in 2026 and checking up on last years #1 pick Eli Willitis. But the development of the next great Nats team, if soon will rely on the last few drafts. These are the ones I glossed over in my "why did things go wrong" as I was talking about the bust starting in 2020. But it's when the team took a renewed effort into getting these things right and it's worth looking back to see what the Nats did pick up and where they are standing now, starting in 2021.
2021
(1-11) Brady House (2-47) Daylen Lile (3-83) Brandon Boissiere
Rest : (7-203) Jacob Young (10-293) Darren Baker (12-353) Andrew Alvarez
The 2021 was the first year they went from the old 40 rounds to the current 20 and it gave the Nats their what looks to be their best draft since 2016. House and Lile should both start for the Nats in 2026 and Young could as well, and if not fits in at the 4th OF. Alvarez is a now older AAA SP who in the vein of Irvin/Parker came up and did well but no one expects much of. Baker is a slap-hitting org guy who got his cup of coffee presumably as a favor to his dad.
Saenz is a name I recall that you could see as just an arm that comes up
2022
(1-5) Elijah Green (2-45) Jake Bennett (3-84) Trey Lipscomb
Rest : Brad Lord (18-531)
And they followed it up with a draft that seemed to break the team. Green while still young (22 this year) can't make enough contact and is doing damningly poor for a Top 5 pick. You can't miss so badly with this pick. Bennett had to quickly get Tommy John and was just traded to Boston for a livelier arm. Bennett's not a bad bet but entering the "prove it" age with 45 innings in AA whereas Perales has a couple more years of building. Swap made sense for both teams. Lipscomb was the best they had ready for a while but he's not a major league player. Lord is probably going to be the best of the bunch a true diamond in the rough pitcher that Rizzo's team developed? Anything can happen!
Riley Cornelio, who I mentioned last post was drafted in the 7th round here and could have a place with the Nats
2023
(1-2) Dylan Crews (2-40) Yohandy Morales (3-71) Travis Sykora
Rest : Uhhhh
Crews' biggest issue is not his performance (mildly disappointing production but not out of line and with promising fancy stats) but the performance of those drafted around him. Skenes is a superstar, Langford has been a solid all around player for 2 years, Jacob Wilson an All-Star. Rhett Lowder looks like an ace if he can be healthy. Nolan Schanuel has been a useful starter for two years. Kyle Teel looks like a long term answer at catcher. And Matt Shaw should be getting another go round as a starter but Alex Bregman grabbed his spot. That's 7 out of the Top 15 picks having better career starts than Crews and a few other were HS guys who are ready to make their mark. So did the Nats get it right or wrong here? He's no Elijah Green but in context it could be a huge miss. We're waiting. Yohandy is a solid bat that's going to get a chance at some point and the same chance will be afforded Sykora is a well-liked arm.
But the draft is very "Rizzo special" with more guys who should be out of baseball than even be organizational depth.
2024
(1-10) Seaver King (1-39) Caleb Lomavita (2-44) Luke Dickerson (3-79) Kevin Bazzell
Rest : TETT (Too early too tell)
Seaver King is a work in progress with everyone loving his make-up and skills and waiting on the production to follow. Think about Dickerson the same way but less production and more projection as he's just turning 20. Lomavita and Bazzell are both C. Bazzell isn't hitting so far, and Lomavita is but it's hard to see him make it as a catcher and he might not hit well enough otherwise. These are the guys that make up a lot of the Nats personal Top 20 and as you can read it's not because they forced their way in. The other drafts have just left spots open for guys with more question marks that can't be answered with "No"s. Of course I won't deny were getting REAL early in guys careers here - first full minor league season.
If I were to take an overview the 2020 COVID draft and 2021 drafts seemed to work out for the Nats in whatever approach they took but the 2022-2023 were back to the big swings that left the minors devoid of depth in search of stars. Great if you hit, troubling if you don't. 2024 seems like it might be the same but I won't land judgment there just yet.
This is why the Top 20 otherwise is mostly trade returns. The recent years were pretty weak. If you are looking for a miracle, a Nats team competing in 2028, look to the names of the guys you have heard before - the major leaguers, guys like Susana, and names here like Sykora and hope they nearly all work out. Hope for a C to quickly emerge from the deep pool of questions - Ford, Lomavita, Bazzell and yes, Millas has a half-year to do it. Because that's the only way it'll happen. There isn't a next wave coming after this. There's a break coming before we get to Willitis and say 2029 and beyond and if that all doesn't happen that next group post-break will include guys that this group brings back in trade.
I don't think you can fault process on the Crews pick. Skenes was off the board, and, while there were a few outlier voices for Langford, Crews was the consensus BPA. Those other guys with fast starts would have been crazy reaches at 1-2 and only would have made sense if they were out on Crews specifically for some reason.
ReplyDeleteIt is true that Crews's rookie year was disappointing, but it was injury shortened and the peripherals were strong. I'm still in on him (and House to a lesser degree) and will wait to see how they do this year before I start getting worried.
I also only partly blame them for the miss on Green. It was a bad pick for us because it was obvious he needed a swing fix and we weren't the org to do it. But that was a very weak draft, and it made sense to take a big risk to get big upside. Missing the flush doesn't mean you were wrong to draw for it.
The pick that bothers me the most is King, because the chalk at 1-10 would have been Rainer, Montgomery, or Yesavage, all of whom look way way better than King does.
I also think we've seen a lot of promise from 2024's later picks. Guys on various top 30s include Kent (4th round), Petersen (8th), Tejeda Jr (14th) and Jones (15th). I agree that it is really early for those guys, so there is still plenty of time to bust, but that class is tracking as well as can be expected.
I share the opinion that Crews was the logical pick even if he hasn’t developed at the same pace as some of the others. The King pick was not good though and the Elijah Green pick was awful. Both of those were absolutely baffling at the time.
ReplyDeleteI've been hard on Crews since the beginning but I don't think I've ever actually argued the pick other than "Well it's not my job and they should have gotten the best guy they could have and maybe they didn't" Everyone was high on him before and after being picked. And also as I said - it's not like he's off his development that much.
ReplyDeleteBut in a draft that now looks absolutely loaded with talent Crews at 2 can be a miss even in the above situation
It's fine that you're hard on him, but you have to admit that after dropping that routine fly ball last night, Crews is now destined to be the next Aaron Judge.
DeleteWild theory I don’t really believe: the consensus at the time was that PIT would take Crews at #1 and the Nats would take Skenes at #2. The wild theory is that Rizzo would still be GM if that had happened. Clearly Skenes himself is not enough to make the difference between the ‘24/‘25 Nats and a playoff spot, but I think there are good reasons to think the offseason decisions not to spend money on free agents would have come out differently. For one, Skenes/Gore is what the top of a good playoff rotation looks like. And the Nats’ lineup holes were DH/1B/3B, with the first two more easily solvable with a check.
ReplyDeleteApart from whether this alternate history is plausible, is it better than the status quo? Obviously it is in the sense that ~40% of Nats games would be watchable (or even exciting!) with Skenes or Gore pitching. But, ultimately, the drafting and development failures of the Rizzo regime would have prevented the club from making a real run or having sustained success. Having Skenes on the team conceivably would have just delayed the inevitable from this perspective.
I’ll just keep saying it… it’s not the picks, it’s the player development of those picks that puts the Nats in a re-(re)-rebuild.
ReplyDelete2023 draft: everyone but Crews looking good? And wasn’t Crews as close to a “can’t miss” prospect as anyone could land in the draft? Hmmm… Just look who he plays for. I think we’d see the same thing and worse if Langford, Teel, Lowder, etc played here. Crews natural talent is the only reason he’s succeeded at all to this point. Honestly, I think Skenes is the only player the Nats maybe couldn’t screw up because he was basically an MLB-ready ace when he was pitching for LSU. Rare. And I say maybe because if he were with the Nats, he already would have had TJ at this point.
2024: Picks 9, 10, and 11… all shortstops. Griffin (9) looks like a beast. Rainer (11) looks good as well. King (10) looks like future org filler. “a work in progress with everyone loving his make-up and skills and waiting on the production to follow.” That reads like a good draft pick followed by poor player development. Rainer wasn’t the “right pick” because the pick doesn’t matter when you can’t turn said pick into anything of value.
SMS is correct with the Elijah Green take. A lottery ticket in a weak draft class overall so you roll the dice there. But is it a shocker that the player who needs the most developing fails in an organization that has repeatedly shown it can’t develop talent?
Sykora is another potential bust waiting to happen. So much talent. Performed well despite the Nats organizational incompetence. But in being so young, the longer he stays in the minors, the more time the Nats have to screw him up. And while I think injuries can be random, I think they also are indicative of said overall organizational player development incompetence.
So again to reiterate: it’s not the players picked. I think overall, Rizzo picked the right guys for the most part. But he (and thereby the organization) utterly failed to ensure these picks lead to any semblance of major league production for our home team.