It feels weird having a Spring without the Post or MASN telling us what's up. Having to go by Zuckerman's updates or official MLB news.
Anyway Zack Littell signs with the Nats which is good for the Nats but a bit weird. Well maybe. Littell was a reliever that got coverted to a starter in 2023. He was pretty solid in his half season there and in 2024 and put up a good ERA in 2025. That masked a pretty mediocre pitching effort though. If you were to describe his pitching it would be "I'm going to put a lot of balls in the strike zone. I'm not going to walk anyone and when I do want you to chase you'll do it but I actually don't make you miss on those chases and what you do hit you hit hard" It's a weird combination that relies on the fact most balls put into play are outs and is one of those things when guys can hit him hard enough the whole thing will come apart fast. Like "my last season in the majors I started 7 games and had an ERA of 8.50" fast. But at only 30 you wouldn't think now is when it happens. So why wouldn't a team take a chance on this guy for their rotation. Likely to throw 180 fair innings - that has major league value. I'm a bit confused. Like you'd want to give a promising rookie a shot over this pile of mediocrity but you also just need arms. You always do!
Anyway the contract includes a mutual option which is good because it may make him tradeable if he surprises to start as opposed to Mikolas that's just an old pitcher trying to pitch well enough to get another deal in 2027. It's a good move for this team so I can't complain but it does leave the question of "aren't there too many starters now?" That's fine to me. That's a good question to have, even if it's just "aren't there too many mediocre starters" Like I just said - you always need arms. The rotation will be interesting in how it sets up.
Really I'm kind of worried they let Lord, who surprised last year on a team that should now be looking hard at every stroke of good luck, fall back to the pen or into AAA for seasoning or whatever.