The Washington Nationals inconsistent offense went from 0-0-to-9 last night in such a 2025 Nats’ way, once again beating an All-Star pitcher after two straight games of being shutout. The Nats send their Minnesota kid to the mound this afternoon in Jake Irvin.
Born and raised in Bloomington, Minnesota, Irvin grew up as a Twins fan and was actually drafted out of high school by the Twins in the 37th round of the 2015 MLB June Amateur Draft from Thomas Jefferson HS (Bloomington, MN). And Irvin chose to go to college at Oklahoma and later drafted by the Nats. For those unfamiliar with the geography, Bloomington is just a 15 minute drive to Target Field on a non-baseball day.
Do you know who else grew up a Twins fan? Alex Call. He was born in Burnsville, Minnesota and grew up in western Wisconsin in River Falls. He was last night’s star for the Nats. Call’s childhood home was just a 40-minute drive to Twins games at the old Metrodome.
Last night, the Nats traded Amed Rosario somewhere around the time the game ended as news broke from Jack Curry, a Yankees’ beat reporter. The Nats get back Brown Martinez, who got injured in the DSL, injury undisclosed, and Clayton Beeter, a once highly touted 2nd round draft pick of the Dodgers who was traded to the Yankees in 2022 for Joey Gallo. Beeter is on the 40-man roster and for now, will be pitching in Triple-A. The Nats only have 4-games with today’s game, and 4-days remaining after today until the trade deadline. Rumors are flying all over the internet on who will be traded. It is that time of year to be on “hug watch” in case any player gets traded mid-game. To take Rosario’s spot on the roster is infielder Jose Tena.
Happy Birthday to Jacob Young. As of now, we don’t know if Young will stay on the roster after getting hit on his right index finger in a bunt attempt. The Nats would bring up Robert Hassell III if an IL stint was needed for Young. As of now, they are calling Young’s injury a finger contusion.
LHP reliever Konnor Pilkington was promoted to the Nats roster on Tuesday — and he had pitched in every game since Tuesday, until he finally got a day-off yesterday. Pilkington has been great, and RHP reliever Luis Garcia has been good also. He pitched yesterday in long-relief and now has 9.0 innings of 1-run ball for his new team.
The current bullpen configuration looks promising even though their best reliever, Brad Lord went back in the starting rotation last week to replace the injured Trevor Williams. You have to wonder if any of the good arms will be traded. On the negative side, Jackson Rutledge has a 6.60 ERA, and we have to see if Andry Lara can improve. We expect that Kyle Finnegan will be traded.
“Everyone’s got to contribute. We cannot be using the same guy all the time, because I don’t want to break their arms.”
— Miguel Cairo said after Wednesday’s game
The bullpen usage looks like this:
Here are your Nats’ WAR leaders with James Wood at +3.4, MacKenzie Gore at +2.8 CJ Abrams at +2.7, and . Add those up, and you get a total of +8.9 WAR. The issue is the large gap between those players and the next tier.
On defense, the OAA stats give you a good picture of the team’s overall defense which is the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good news is that besides Nathaniel Lowe, the defense under interim-manager Miguel Cairo has drastically improved. All of a sudden, Luis Garcia Jr. looks Gold Glove in the month of July.
These are your stats leaders on BBRef. There are certainly some surprises on there — good and not so good. The issue is the consistency on this team.
“Every day, I’m going to tell them we’re facing the best pitchers, to see if there’s a change. Ryan has good stuff, but today … after two days we didn’t hit that well, we came and reacted and swung at strikes and put barrels on the ball.”
— Cairo said after yesterday’s game
The Nats starting pitchers have a combined ERA of 4.79 and 26th best in MLB. You might be surprised at the team just ahead of the Nationals in the rankings. The reliever’s ERA sits at a 5.66 and now the worst in baseball in ERA.
Here is how the starters rank by ERA:
No. 5 Starter: Brad Lord 3.39 (starting/relieving)
No. 4 Starter: Michael Soroka 4.85
No. 3 Starter: Mitchell Parker 4.91
No. 2 Starter: Jake Irvin 4.81
No. 1 Starter: MacKenzie Gore 3.52
Washington Nationals vs. Minnesota Twins
Stadium: Target Field, Minneapolis, Minnesota
1st Pitch: 2:10 pm EDT
TV: MASN2
Radio: 106.7 The Fan radio and via the MLB app; In Spanish on DC 87.7 FM and La Pantera 100.7 FM/1220 AM. On Sirius/XM, tune to Channel 185 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
Line-up subject to change (without notice):
