I just want to say I'm not down on Wood. By "scuffling with pop" as noted in the comments I mean "Geez, he's striking out a lot and that's not getting better over the year in fact it's getting worse and while he can hit homers and walk some, I don't think anyone is hoping he becomes a better fielding modern Dave Kingman. Especially because in this day and age when every pitcher in the majors strikes out a ton of batters you probably aren't even getting a Kingman, instead you are looking at a 40%+ K rate and like an average below .200 and that's not going to work. But really this is just what he would do if you for some reason stuck him in the majors today and why would you do that?"
With his profile right now I would not want him in the majors even with proven HR power and a decent eye. This is a mild... disappointment? That seems like a strong word. It's not the ideal situation Nats fans were hoping for when it was clear early in the year that Wood was better than High A. The ideal situation would have been he showed he was too good for AA too. That hasn't happened. A great situation would be that he struggled at first but then started to hit better as the AA season went on. That hasn't exactly happened as he started well enough, then struggled, then got back to good though with more Ks.
So this is not ideal and it's not great given where Wood was in May BUT outside of that at a macro level the Nats have a 20 year old with major league power and maybe a good eye in AA. That IS great.
To start 2023 he might be a 21 year old in AA looking to turn the corner from good AA player to star AA player you have to move up. Or he might even start in AAA just to see what happens. All this is positive and good and I'm sorry that after April and May Wood has struck out so much to throw a tiny bit of doubt on how good he could be, to justify ticking down his high ceiling just a bit, to slow down when he might be an impact major league player by a half or full season, but that is what happened. It's ok! You'll still probably have your 22 year old guy bopping homers with some K issues to work out as he did in the minors in the lineup in 2025. Again apologies you don't have a no doubt star being pegged for the lineup in April 2024. Well other than maybe Crews. So apologies you don't have A SECOND no doubt star being pegged for the lineup in April 2024 .
Now if you don't mind I've got a nonsense Boz column to read, walls to punch, and if I don't break my hand a post to write tomorrow.
12 comments:
Oh no, Boz compared Lane Thomas to Ryan Zimmerman (we all knew this was coming).
Enjoy the rest of the comparisons in that article
It feels like we're conflating a few questions with Wood.
I agree that he didn't dominate AA pitching right off the bat as he were entirely unaffected of the promotion. And by a single stat (K% - which I admit is a very important stat), his trend line is flat and not showing improvement. But I disagree about whether he's done worse than we should have expected on 5/28 and about what his AA performance means about his long term projections.
As a 20 year old at AA, his walk rate has held up, his defense has showed well, and his in-game power is incredible. Maybe his HOF chances took a slight hit over the past couple of months, but the chances that his 2026 true talent level is that of an ML all star have only increased.
@ocw5000
To be fair, Boswell did NOT directly compare LT to Zim. He compared the aggregate offensive output of LT, Garrett and Meneses to Zim, LaRoche and Ramos.
But weird as it is to say so, it is also correct that LT's 2023 OPS+ (currently 125) does actually match up with 2011-2015 Zim (between 107 - 121 each year). Zim's 2009-2010 peak was higher than LT this year, but that's not the Zim the article is talking about.
FWIW, a comp I like to use for Lane Thomas and the current Nats is John Lannan (aka "Bambi" for some of us). Lannan was the OD starter for those awful 2009 and 2010 Nats and still a pretty decent MLB starting pitcher for the 2011 Nats (who essentially reached .500 on way up).
But by 2012 Lannan was back in Syracuse. Not because he was worse (Bambi was a critical 4-1 down the stretch in 2012 when he was brought up to fill the rotation slot opened up when Strasburg was shut down). The Nats Opening Day starter for 2009-2010 was the best paid AAA pitcher in 2012 because the rest of the Nationals had gotten BETTER.
I see that possible parallel with Lane. Barring injury or collapse, he's earned the right to start for OD 2024. But by OD 2025, the combination of Crews, Wood and RH3 (or possibly Pinckney, Lile, Young or Vaquero--even Green if something amazing happens) LT will be either fighting to keep his starting job or settling in as 4th OF/mentor for the NextGen Nats.
That 2025 team we hope is our "new 2012"--not likely to get 98 wins, but 90-94 and WC contention within range!
By 2026 we have to think at least one of the "not Crews/Wood" Nats OF pipeline will be MLB-ready. LT will be a free agent that year, so it could be a win-win for both player and club.
Anon @ 1:19
I won't disagree. My take is that when he made the move there was a certain feeling in the air that Wood was on the fastest track to the majors. He no longer is, and the increase in the K rate over the season could present a problem. It wasn't a "should have expected" but "what the fans were running with". You can get a sense of it from the end of Jesse's column here with the "well Soto was 19" stuff.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/05/25/james-wood-size-nationals-prospect/
He's not saying that but he's noting the general sense of the fans.
But yes if you aren't one of those fans and you looked at Wood this season, you'd want to see him hang in AA and he is totally hanging in AA at 20. So the overall year has been positive. Is the chance of him being an All-Star better... I don't know. I'm big on Ks but I feel like his chances of being in the majors is better so then it becomes a percentage thing. Like a 40% chance of making it with a 50% chance of being a star isn't better than a 60% chance of making it with a 40% of being a star... Ok I'm getting lost in math here
Interesting consideration of CJ on FG. Asks whether or not he is the real thing.
@Harper
That's fair enough. And there's a lot of handwaving imprecision to my estimates. I don't have a full projected distribution from today to compare to one from 5/28 etc. So I don't really want to get into the granular math of it either.
I just think it isn't fair to expect anyone to be Juan Soto, including (at the time) Juan Soto. Both Bryce (at 19) and Rendon (at 22) actually scuffled to league average production when they were first promoted to AA. Wood's overall line (.227/.323/.488 for a wRC+ of 118) is maybe just on the high end of that when you take into account the high K%. But the trend line, outside of the strikeouts, has been pretty great. The 30 day period in question was .250/.339/.583 for a wRC+ of 145, and that basically can't be bad news even with the strikeouts.
Interesting read. Seems like they lean ‘yes he is’ while hedging (classic, reasonable take Fangraphs)
I think the main thing I got from the CJ article is that he needs reps. Reps to improve his defense, reps to improve his baserunning instincts, reps to get a better feel for the zone. So by sticking him at the top of the order where the goal is more "get on base" than "drive in runs", and inherently getting more ABs, he's going to get the reps that he needs. I'm optimistic about his progression. He may not be a 6WAR player, but he could be a 4-5 WAR player, which is still a top 10 SS and occasional all star
Sure Harper will touch on it soon, but the WaPo article on Stras's retirement was tough to read. Sucks not being able to go out on your terms
Everyone on this site probably knows that the Nats won't save any substantial amount of money....just have some greater say in when and how it will be paid out as part of a negotiated settlement. As @CP notes, this is really about Stras being stuck in "having to keep trying even though there are no realistic positive outcomes." Sad that he is in pain, but at least he now gets to move on with his life by working toward things that are possible. I hope he will achieve those the way he achieved being a great winning pitcher.
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