Have you ever played the “blame game”? It’s easy to point a finger at others, and when you do that — three fingers are usually pointing back at you. For some, it is difficult to choose accountability as you look into the mirror. After a firing of bosses, some use that as the excuse that the system was flawed — and maybe it was in partial terms. For others, it’s just a clean slate.
Almost every Washington Nationals player should have done their own introspective on what went wrong-and-right in their 2025 season. Some could decide to blame their previous manager and/or coaches for their shortcomings. In fact, only one MLB coach was retained in his previous role, and that is Sean Doolittle who will return as the Assistant Pitching Coach. Per a source, Gerardo Parra will move from being the MLB first base coach to a front office position (TBD) in player development. Even most of the front office personnel weren’t retained.
If you truly believe that issues were caused by someone other than yourself, there is a do-over to prove it was a system failure — not a personal shortcoming. Most likely, not all will improve — but the players who can show improvement will raise some eyebrows for sure. There could be a fair share of, “I told you so.” Results matter when you choose baseball as your job.
Players will have 2026 to prove themselves … again. How much time and rope they get from the new management is unknown at this time. Think of all of the minor league prospects who are off the Top-30 rankings. Then you have several top prospects on the MLB roster who didn’t live up to their prospect rankings. This is a time for some second chances.
Look at the best ranked player in the 2023 draft: Dylan Crews won every award for position players in college including:
- Golden Spikes Award: Named the best amateur baseball player in the country.
- ABCA Gold Glove Team: Recognized as one of the top defensive outfielders in NCAA Division I, finishing the season with a perfect 1.000 fielding percentage.
- Bobby Bragan National Collegiate Slugger Award: Honored as the nation’s top college hitter.
- Consensus First-Team All-American.
- College World Series All-Tournament Team.
During his 2023 season at LSU, Crews batted .426, a .567 OBP, and a 1.280 OPS, with 18 home runs, 70 RBIs, and reached base in all 69 games he played. Crews was drafted at №2 overall by the Washington Nationals. His MLB career batting average is a poor .211 with a subpar .634 OPS over 116 games.
So what happened to Crews?
The 23-year-old didn’t forget how to hit. When his LSU teammate, Paul Skenes, was playing at Air Force, Crews homered off of him in their first matchup. Crews has hit off of many good pitchers in college. And he hit well in the FCL and Single-A in his first taste of pro ball, while only struggling in a small stint in 2023 in Double-A. Crews repeated Double-A to start 2024 and hit, and then was promoted to Triple-A and hit. He was a late season callup for his MLB debut in 2024 and struggled, and scuffled again in 2025. We will ask again, what went wrong in the Majors for Crews?
The same could probably be said for other top prospects like Brady House and Robert Hassell III who both struggled in their first MLB season in 2025. Even the second half for James Wood in 2025 was a struggle. CJ Abrams has slumped in the second half of the past two seasons.
Because Keith Law of The Athletic made this public on Oct. 23 of last year, we will give you an example of a player who would fit in this scenario of needing a do-over. And we confirmed Law’s claim in his article through a departed front office former employee of the Nationals. What Law said was that 2024 first round draft pick, Seaver King, had his swing messed up by someone in the Nats organization “encouraging him to change his swing to pull the ball in the air more.”
Our source gave us the name of the Nats’ player development person, and we contacted this person for comment through their LinkedIn — and he never responded. That player development person was retained by Toboni and elevated to a player development strategy role. King would be that perfect example of a player deserving of a clean slate. After what we saw first-hand in the Arizona Fall League, King is on his way to showing that he was worthy of that first round selection by the Nationals.
Seaver King in the 2025 Arizona Fall League; Photo by Steve Mears for TalkNats
Players will have 11 new coaches plus Doolittle at the MLB level in addition to new manager Blake Butera. On top of that, the Nats have a new President of Baseball Operations, Paul Toboni, and a new GM in Ani Kilambi. Add to that, the team has several other new front office people.
Last week and as we previously sourced, Toboni had the coaches come to Washington, D.C. for an executive retreat ahead of their inaugural minor league development mini-camp that opens later today with nearly 50 prospects participating initially at the team’s facility in West Palm Beach, Florida.
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— Toboni said
I said that my goal is to make the Nationals the envy of sport.
To me, that means an organization defined by our relentless pursuit of excellence, strengthened by our connection to each other and fueled by our positive energy. As a result, we become an organization that players and staff are itching to join because they know it’s where they will develop and thrive most; a place that energizes our loyal fans and attracts new ones, and where success is achieved – and sustained – over time.
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By the way, here are the MLB-level coaches: Grant Anders, Andrew Aydt, Matt Borgschulte, Doolittle, Victor Estevez, Dustin Glant, Michael Johns, Simon Mathews, Shawn O’Malley, Corey Ray, and Bobby Wilson. And Tyler Smarslok as field coordinator. That is 12 coaches in total with 11 who are new to this team. Toboni and Butera have added three additional coaching positions to the MLB staff over what the team carried last year.
Also, the Nationals have added more boots on the ground with the hiring of two additional roving hitting coach coordinators and two more pitching coach coordinators for the minor league system. These coaches get the title of coordinators.
Pitching:
Sean McGrath – Upper Level Minor League Pitching Coordinator
Will Hawks – Lower Level Minor League Pitching Coordinator
Grayson Crawford – Director of Pitching, Minor Leagues
Hitting:
Russ Steinhorn — Upper Level Minor League Hitting Coordinator
Phillip Cebuhar – Lower Level Minor League Hitting Coordinator
C.J. Gillman — Director of Hitting, Minor Leagues
Coaching matters. It always has. The person who places all the failure on the players without considering if there was an issue with the coaches is adding to a systemic failure in blame shifting. Measuring failure is easier to identify in statistics because that removes the subjectivity. And many times it is on the players. But you cannot make blanket statements and entirely exclude the coaches from the equation. ” … We’re not going to finger point here and say it’s on coaches. It’s never on the coaches …” was part of the infamous rant from the previous manager who was fired exactly 21 days after uttering those words. Now listen to the words of Toboni:
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— Toboni said
… [I am] a strong believer in the value of coaching. I’ve been on the receiving end of it as a player. I know how magical it can be when you have a coach that you really connect with, that you feel they care for you — you feel yourself getting better, and how addicting that can be. There’s huge power in that.
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New beginnings. It all starts now.
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