This 2024 season is almost over for 18-teams that will not be heading to the postseason. The Washington Nationals will be one of those 18. With just over 10 percent of this season remaining, the Nationals will continue to evaluate their current roster to see who could fit for the 2025 team. Opening Day is just 199-days away!
Over this past weekend and through the end of the season, the front office and coaching staff will hold exit interviews with all players at each level that the team plans to retain. Each of those players will be given detailed offseason plans. This is a key in the player development system.
Additionally, general manager Mike Rizzo will do his annual autopsy on the season. He will look at what went wrong — but also what went right. Then there will be a key meeting with principal owner Mark Lerner. They will formulate their plan and discuss budgeting.
That is how the Nationals offseason starts. Nobody knows how it will end because free agents will determine where they want to sign. Rizzo cannot force a player to sign. The Nats learned that with free agent, Mark Teixeira, before the 2009 season. The Nats offered him the most money per former-GM Jim Bowden, and Teixeira chose to sign with the Yankees. That’s why it takes two to tango as they say.
Most likely, the Nats will return at least 20 players from this 2024 roster to make their Opening Day roster for 2025. The main needs are to fill first base, top of the rotation, left-handed DH, and a hi lev bullpen spot. While the Nats could fill-in each spot internally, they will also look for upgrades in the free agency market as well as making trades.
We also know that plans can change. This isn’t like shopping at a grocery story. This is like bespoke curating for one-of-a-kind pieces. There is only one Juan Soto, and he will have several suitors. Only Lerner knows the initial budget. That dollar amount could signal the end of the rebuild or another year of more of the same. Whatever it is, we will know from actions — not words.
The fans have heard the words before. Now put your money where your mouth is. The team’s window is open for business.
“…A couple of shrewd offseason acquisitions…”
— Rizzo said last month
Can those be shrewd impactful acquisitons with high WAR projections? Shopping at the “bounceback” aisle in the store is a roll of the dice. For every Jesse Winker, you usually get a few stinkers like Eddie Rosario, Nick Senzel, and Matt Barnes. Add to that the retention of Joey Meneses Jordan Weems, and Travis Blankenhorn, and you have over a -4.0 WAR off the roster.
While you certainly can’t hit on every move, you hope to better where you were the previous season while the window is open. As of this morning Jacob Young is 2.9 WAR, Luis Garcia Jr. 2.8 WAR, and CJ Abrams at 1.6 WAR. More encouaging news is James Wood at 0.9 WAR in less than half a season, and Dylan Crews at 0.4 WAR in just two weeks.
You can extrapolate and interpolate and maybe Crews will be a 5.0 WAR player next year. Maybe Wood will be 2.0 WAR or improve at a greater factor. Suffice it to say, the 2025 roster should be better just from the current pieces. On top of that, a young roster should progress versus an older roster dealing with age regression.
So why not be optimistic.
