With the team reeling there isn't much to say here but we generally start out with right so...
Unqualified Successes
James Wood is a bonafide star. All-Star. HR Derby participant. On pace for 40 homers, 100 RBIs, and 100 walks. He strikes out a bit much and never developed the skills in the field you'd hope but at 22 he's one of the best bats in the game and likely to get even better. He's a build around player.
MacKenzie Gore is an ace. Maybe not a Skenes level but he'd be #1 on a number of teams. He has matured and has figured out how to maintain a level of control that makes him that much better. A stud that you can build a rotation behind
Brad Lord made his way to the majors are looks to be a solid addition to the bullpen while Jose Ferrer has gotten over some early season bumps to also settle into a nice spot. Both at 25 and under control for years you can imagine them as pieces of a solid pen once the Nats commit to or find the couple shut down arms they need.
Qualified Successes
Kyle Finnegan has settled into that "he's the closer" role where he's not any better really than your other good relief arms but he has the job and does it well enough not to lose it. In the old days you could flip that for something but teams are smarter now. In the new days these guys are valuable because they let you use your truly good arms when you really need them. The Nats don't have truly good arms. So Kyle is really just another decent pen arm, which is fine, but circumstances mean it's not a big win.
CJ Abrams' talent is getting more consistent. Say what you will about his attitude (up and down apparently) and ability to play SS (only down) but he's a high energy electric player with 20+ HR power and the speed to steal 50+ bases if the Nats were so inclined. Also he's 24. He's got a skill set you need to figure out how to control or flip for an arm.
Alex Call continues to be a nice surprise. He's generally been a solid to good defender but the bat was a question. While it's nothing to get excited about from a 30 year old who's not going to get better it's undeniably been good. He's a solid player you got for nothing and that's always a plus
Amed Rosario didn't suck, he was ok. He's sort of the bench guy good teams have, able to play a lot of positions (though not well) and hit fine. A good sub to have when a guy goes out for a couple weeks. Unfortunately that's not the team the Nats are but that's not Rosario's fault.
Squint and you can see success
Mike Soroka was a gamble. When healthy he's perfectly decent holding down a back of the rotation spot. It's a low bar but it's probably the first one you set out for this signing.
Without an injury the Nats can walk out of 2026 with a build around bat an ace-level pitcher. Every team would want that. They've managed to check off some of the top 2 boxes in the checklist. The problem is the next 10 or so.
6 comments:
Category: "Not Failed (yet)." Irvin, Parker, Crews, House.
Irvin, specifically, I think is what he is: a solid, even above-average, fifth-starter kind of guy in the mold of Kyle Gibson. He'll have some good games, he'll have some bad games, and he'll eat innings (averages nearly 6 per game). That's a really useful player to have at the back of the rotation. The major problem with him is that he's the current #2 in the Nats' rotation.
There's a set of neither success or failure that's Garcia, Tena, Irvin, Parker. Garcia is who is is which is ok for the Nats, might be the 8th or 9th best player on a good team. Tena can surprisingly hang with the bat in a "not terrible" way but can't field but is basically free. Irvin and Parker are both 4th at best rotation guys which is what you aim for out of non-prospect minor leaguers but really they are placeholders. You found your minimal need there.
There's also a set of "unresolved" : House, Lile, Crews, Henry, Lara. Even I, who is more down on Crews than any of you who seem to love Crews like he's Jesus will not call him a failure because injured year one isn't going well.
I'd label House, Crews and Henry more as "not yet succeeded" in recognition of the fact that they've already shown in the majors a set of tools / stuff / peripherals that should produce success. I think each is 80%+ to settle in and perform well enough to hold down a roster spot through free agency. For Crews and House that's 2.5+ WAR/year true talent and, while for Henry the bullpen role caps his upside much lower, that's still another probably solid arm to group with Lord and Ferrer.
Agree that Irvin, Parker, Garcia, and Young are good enough to be among the worst players on a good team, but not so good that it's hard to imagine scenarios where they get squeezed out. (I'm not as high on Tena or Lara and group them more with Lile and Hassell as guys who aren't quite good enough but are young enough that they still may make the final dev step. I wouldn't want to count on any specific one of those guys, even for a bench role, but once an org builds up a few guys like that, you can almost count on someone making breaking through.)
Dezo nailed the Call situation in his comment on the last post - he's worth more to a lot of teams than he is to the Nats. His age means you won't get credit for his full window of control, but I'd think he'd be worth as much as Lane Thomas was. I hope the new GM can pull off a deal like that.
Also, this isn't a very important point, but Wood has improved his defense! It's gone from terrible-and-almost-unplayable to fine-for-LF. Even if he's done improving, I don't think there's any urgency to move him to DH. I mean, there are still a lot of futures where that move makes sense, but he's already improved enough that the team doesn't have to force it.
Lastly, if we're talking about 26 and beyond, I think you need to add 80% of Herz to the "qualified success" list. TJ recovery seems to have a much better success rate if the player has already had success in the majors. I guess you could also add Gray to the "good enough for a roster spot" list too, though I've never really been very high on him.
Agree re: Wood's defense. There are unsurprisingly not many plus defenders in LF around the league but Wood is solidly in the top 1/3 to 1/4 for his position. While you'd of course love for him to be better, his defense is solidly neutral and that's plenty good. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/outs_above_average?type=Fielder&startYear=2025&endYear=2025&split=yes&team=&range=year&min=q&pos=7&roles=&viz=hide&sort=5&sortDir=desc
https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/fielding-run-value?year=2025&team=&min=500&pos=7
Harper, I think this is right about Wood’s defense. He’s gone from a DH in waiting to “fine.” We’re still too early in his career to trust the defensive stats all that much but I looked into it closely a month ago and his trends were pretty startling (i.e., consistent improvement over time). You are right to point out that Soto never got better even though he was young. Wood *has* gotten better—we don’t know yet whether it’s the new normal or just a blip and he’ll turn back into a DH in waiting. I don’t think the current state of the evidence warrants a strong conclusion either way.
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