Who's here and who's not - Make your guesses

I'll go with NEARLY everyone gone. Garcia and Griffin sure. I'll say Williams for scraps. And hell Chaparro and Crews for some random arms because they need random arms and not random bats. 

I'll say though when the smoke clears Abrams is still here. I think they are looking to get blown away for CJ.  They won't be because the market doesn't look at an out of position guy having possibly a career year the same way they look at a Sot. Not that THAT'S the benchmark for the deal they expect - just saying you look at a guy differently who's always produced than one that's just doing it. It'll be a gamble to keep him because I think they are going to trade him eventually and whatever is the "not blown away deal" this year is likely going to be better than what you can get next year unless Abrams repeats this plate performance. 

Bring Back Max?

The Nats need pitching help.  The Jays might be doing some minor selling in the hopes of resetting for 2027. Max Scherzer is a Jay and won't cost much given his recent injuries and performance issues. So... bring back Max?

Ehhhhh

Scherzer blossomed into an ace in 2012 with the Tigers and the Nats managed to snatch him up in free agency getting his best years with arguably the second best FA contract of all time (I still say Randy Johnson's 4 Cy Young in 4 years beats it, sorry*)  He was traded to the Dodgers for what may be scraps (Ruiz has been in a slow tumble since late May - first the power, now the average) pitched well then signed with the Mets.  His first year was as good as any with the Nats, although he did miss some time. But after that at age 38 in 2023, time began catching up with him. He was still an effective swing and miss guy but he was making more mistakes. Walks and homers both went up and the Mets sent him to Texas. He made some adjustments and when he pitched in Texas he was ok, but in 2024 that wasn't even close to a third of a season. Toronto took a chance on him last year and he was a perfectly ok rotation filler but too injured to rely on, and now he's still battling injuries and is just bad. 

What happened?  What happens to all old arms. The fastball velocity goes. You can't rely on it so you shift to more breaking junk which was never your bread and butter and is now worse than your peak so the results aren't what you like. You get hurt and nothing is as good coming back. 

One of Max's bugaboos was that he was never a GB pitcher. He gave up flyballs and when he was going bad he became ScHeRzer, giving up bombs for runs. This was ok when he was missing bats and putting no one on but now he's not doing enough of either and those are three run shots, not solo ones.  

If you want a positive to Max's outing - his fastball velocity was up.  If he can tick it up a bit more that's into effective territory.  BUT he's no where near as controlled with his pitches anymore. The walks came and that may be the trade-off that he has to put out there. 

As a starter he might be able to figure out a middle ground of dialing it up early with the hopes of being on and then working smarter if he's too wild and gets himself into trouble to limit the damage. Become a wily 5 inning guy.  I can see that. But fans are asking for Max to dial it up and head to the pen.  Even if he wants that I see a guy that can't do that while controlling where the ball goes.  And if he can't hit say... 95 without having control, well that's not close to a major league fireballer. While he may have the temperment of a pen guy, he doesn't have the stuff. Too wild. No out pitch anymore. 

If the Nats want to bring him back to fill in the back of the rotation, to take care of these weird opener situations, sure. Maybe you get pucky and he can find a 2024 like finish. But as a reliever? Nah. It doesn't feel right nor would it work out.  

 

*Yeah the length does help Max, but in two and two thirds more years with the Nats than Randy spent with the D-Backs (in his initial contract before the option years) Max only threw 200 IP more. Max's best year by bWAR is still behind Randy's worse year and Randy's combined bWAR is less than 1 behind Max's. They both got a WS title. It's ok to be #2 ALL-TIME.

Monday Quickie - Still Here

One thing you have to realize about the Nats is they HAVEN'T made a big push to remain in the Wild Card hunt.  6-4 in last 10.  8-7 in last 15.  In mid June they reached 39-35 and they've gone 15-17 since and they've gone from in the WC and up a game to one game out of the Wild Card.  

The middle of the NL is extremely soft. There are no very good teams beyond possibly the Phillies (and I'm not 100% sold on them).  There are six basically equal teams looking to get that last spot.  The Nats are in good shape to be the one. 

But it's not the plan. 

The plan is 2028, with 2027 looking brighter based on this year, but it's never been 2026. 

So they trade a good bat today for a good arm tomorrow.  The process doesn't change. 

But who is going to make that push? The Padres or Diamondbacks seem possible. The Pirates and Marlins seem unlikely.  I don't know where the Cardinals stand. They were kind of supposed to be in year one of a complete tear down to the studs but then Jordan Walker suddenly became the player everyone thought he'd be 2 years ago and the pitching has been surprisingly better than average. I can't see them buying but who knows? If you don't you are wasting build around Jordan Walker which you might have for only a couple more years before you'd want to deal him... but I digress

The Nats should be in the thick of it. Will they be pressing the issue though? The first trade suggests not. That was a good deal but not a good deal for 2026. Early just started mound work.

 

The team is better than you thought they'd be.

The league is worse than you might have thought it would be. 

You hope for things to work out like this. 

Bought and Sold

 Like we said - why not both.  Bats for arms.  Mead for Early

In losing Mead they lose a power bat whose prospect history suggests could keep this up.  The major league results are spottier but he’s young enough you can see a team still buying into scouting

In gaining Early the get a rotation worthy arm who’s probably more a 3/4 but a 3/4 with lots of control left.  A spot that doesn’t have to be filled with cash or FA gambles.  That is if he can stay healthy. He already missed time with an inflamed elbow

Quick take - I like the deal. It turned nothing into a decent chance at 100s of innings  

Buy, Sell? Why not both?

 That's the implication of what we've heard from Toboni recently.  This makes sense.  The organization likely came into the year thinking SELL SELL SELL but given the team has shown themselves to have a playoff caliber offense they would be shooting a gift horse in the mouth to do that.  You want a great offense. You have it.  You want great pitching.  EH.  So the goal should be to get good pitching. Simple? 

Well it would be if you had a ton of money from owners that wanted to spend but no one believes that so instead we are left with trying to do particular sales to fund the pitching without hurting the offense. 

And now we're at the problems. 

You can't really sell good pitching because you need good pitching.  Is Foster Griffin good pitching? 

You should sell your good hitters to be to fund the pitching of now and that does make sense but the organization was planning to keep the those guys.  Can they get over their initial desires? 

Or alternatively, will they decide to gamble on those guys to replace some guys like Garcia they could sell now? 

My guess?  The latter.  Selling good guys now - Garcia, Abrams for real pitching.  

And... I don't love it. Birds in the bush are those for reasons. Every team can name more prospects they were excited about that didn't pan out. But I don't have the information they have.  If the money is not coming any time soon then it will be foolish to go in now on guys that will be gone in a couple years. But I don't think you can say anything like that for sure based on what they do. 

It's also hard. Because guys selling WANT the kids. They aren't looking to get guys for now.  So there has to be some kids thrown in. 

A lot of people are saying this is a fascinating deadline for the Nats and I agree. We could see anything from a complete rebuild to a light push for the playoffs this year and you can justify any of that. 

What do you want out of the second half of the year?

Assuming the planned Nats trajectory is "do nothing, see you in 2027" do you want a mini-run after the break to get your hopes up?

I say sure.  Better baseball is better baseball even in the pursuit of nothing.

Do you have a goal win total for the end of the year

.500 or bust! 

Do you want to see these guys traded or re-signed (let's assume reasonable market contract - which means decently big but not crazy

Miles Mikolas or Zack Littell?

Take the bag of balls.  

Foster Griffin? 

I guess trade - nice find but let me put pitching $ toward something other than a mid-rotation 30yo with half a good season in the bank

Luis Garcia

Hmmm. I've always liked him but I feel like replacing a 1B should be the easiest thing (should - the Nats have shown it's not) and you are trading high. Still he's 26. I guess I say Keep because I like my continuity but I understand.  

CJ Abrams? 

SIGN

Who do you want to win the East and make the playoffs in general and no stupid "the meteor" answers. Gotta pick. 

Phillies for the East.  Been ok with them since the Schmidt days. 

Brewers and well I don't want the Dodgers but let's be honest with ourselves. 

WC, if not the Nats - Pirates, Padres, D-backs 

In the AL. Yankees obv, Indians, oh jeez I don't like any of my choices. Texas is the worst. Seattle is a bunch of cry babies - Boston west, Houston has gotta purge all the cheaters... I guess Seattle wins out, yuk. 

Being honest again, Rays are at least in as a WC, so them and Twins and Blue Jays. I don't love the Jays but let Toronto be rewarded for trying again.  

ASB P2 - Again we argue the future

What almost every ownership group wants is obvious. They want to be the Tampa Bay Rays or possibly the Cleveland Indians.  They want to be a team that wins constantly with a low payroll. That's the goal. What's more important out of the two? Sadly the low payroll, so if they don't win that's not the worst thing that can happen.

This differs from what the fans want which is simply to win.  They want to see playoffs and championships. If the team doesn't win that IS the worst thing in the world. And that's where the conflict happens, or at least where it should happen. Now spending money is FAR from a guarantee of success, but the numbers are pretty clear that spending money is better than not spending money in regards to making that happen.

An ownership group has three options then (1) ignore the fans as they aren't the most crucial money driver unless you create a big fandom, (2) give in to the fans and spend some more money, or (3) convince the fans they are wrong and spending money is actually bad.  Despite the multiple Dodgers titles and the Yankees and Phillies always in the playoffs, they've done a very good with (3). "We can put that money back into player development!" "Sure we could have an ok team now, but don't you want a GREAT team later?"   

That's where the Nats are now... well sort of. What we know is the Nats have a do fun team now that could still make the playoffs and could have had a better shot if the Nats FO did something earlier. It wouldn't have been likely to really contend but with nothing certain for the future is it better to lean in when opportunities are presented to you?  That's the philosophy question I suppose. What is increased chances at a long set of playoff runs and real title contention worth to you? 

In theory that could be worth a lot, but I think fans tend to skew those chances, (and they aren't helped because that's what the owners are always selling you).  In their minds it's like "sure we could go to a 66% chance of a WC spot for the next couple of years, but we can have like a 90% chance of a long playoff run starting in three years if we don't!" But the reality is more like "sure we could go to a 66% chance of a WC spot for the next couple of years, but the Nats have a 20% to have another long run starting in the next couple of years, we can up it to maybe 35%!" That's what you are throwing away pushes right in front of you for.  

This is an all-time argument in baseball though and not one easily answered, because those long run results ARE so good and these short unexpected runs usually are just a couple of meaningless fun series. But it IS risk / reward.  The payoff is high, sure you could be the Rays or Indians but the risk is real, you could also be the Athletics or Pirates or Rockies or Royals...  

My question though is - do fans really want to be the Rays? The key to the Rays is the constant churn.  Have a guy, he gets good, send him off for some young guys to replace him, rinse, repeat. There is no core set of players you are rooting for, only truly a set of laundry that guys fill aged 20-27 before heading off elsewhere. If you do it right occasionally that group comes together to matter, but when they don't you have a team that is bad that also engenders no loyalty. The Rays are consistently one of the lowest teams in attendance good or bad. These things are connected. 

But maybe the Nats are already one of these teams? Bryce Harper, Anthony Rendon, Juan Soto, Trea Turner.  All stars. All gone. What made the Nationals different was never a commitment to young players to age with the team but the willingness to go out and grab 1-2 big time FAs to be the final pieces. If the Nats don't keep CJ Abrams, that's nothing new, but simply the Nats being the Nats. Where things would be different is if after that happens they don't spend any money. There is no follow-up Scherzer or Corbin. 

Really the most important thing here is we don't know what this Nats organization is going to be like. This isn't the Pirates or Rockies with decades of proof they don't know what they are doing and don't care. This Nats org could trade Abrams and use that saving to then bring in Skubal. So all these arguments about should the Nats have done more this year are sort of made in this great vacuum of knowledge.  If the Nats are a team committed to winning that just want to set-up the best team possible when spending money then no they shouldn't do anything now (or really it was ok they didn't do anything earlier - it's a bit too late now). If the Nats are a team just hoping to "out-organization" to be the next cheap-o Rays or Pirates whatever the results may be then they should have gone for it. But we don't know.  

As far as getting that knowledge the trade deadline will tell us something. The off-season will tell us more.