Baseball prospects are being made close to Nationals Park in College Park, Maryland!

Graphic from Terps Baseball

As we discuss top prospects, there is something good brewing over in College Park, Maryland other than the java at Vigilante Coffee and the suds at the iconic watering hole at RJ Bentley’s. The Terps baseball team over at the University of Maryland is now ranked as one of the best in the nation, and we saw that on the big stage in the World Series this year when Terp’s alums Brandon Lowe and Adam Kolarek were key players for the Tampa Bay Rays and the Los Angeles Dodgers respectively in the Fall Classic. Continue reading

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With the Josh Bell acquisition, the #Nats starters are coming into focus!

Graphic by Izzy Rendell

Hocus pocus, things are coming into focus. Acquiring Josh Bell via the Christmas Eve 2020 trade with the Pirates was a much needed first step for a team that had the best record in the NL East for the previous 10 years. Yes, tell those Braves fans who are deniers of the facts that they are exhibiting willful ignorance if they try to cherry-pick the results. The Nats are 836-681 in the last ten years while the Braves were only at 787-730. Recall that the Braves had some dreadful losing seasons from 2014-2017. The news was even worse for the Mets and Phillies as their teams had losing records in that time span at 740-778 and 718-800, respectively. Again, these are facts.  Continue reading

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Christmas Stockings and the Nats have a Bell ringer knocking on their door!

This was an annual column written by Laura so I am filling some big stockings here. There is so much unknown with the world today that the baseball world was almost frozen in time until Mike Rizzo got Josh Bell in a trade on Christmas Eve. Last year there was Cole in the Yankees stocking in the form of Gerrit Cole and as Steve wrote yesterday the Nats got Clay in their stockings (Sam Clay), but now they have a Bell ringing some Christmas tunes.  Continue reading

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Josh Bell checks off one more priority on our #Nats list in a Christmas Eve present!

Soto pitching BP in Spring Training; Photo by Craig Nedrow for TalkNats

The Washington Nationals have clear priorities for next year, and we took a deep dive into a Top-10 at the end of September. Sure, things changed quickly when manager Dave Martinez opted to make changes on his coaching staff. If we re-did the original list we would have more names to add and different priorities today as things changed, but the original list has been close to Rizzo’s blueprint. Sure, we didn’t have Sam Clay as an acquisition target for a lefty in the bullpen, but the early moves match up well to what we saw as priorities.

Today as you know, the Nationals traded Will Crowe and one of their top pitching prospects, Eddie Yean, for Josh Bell who we have had as a top priority from the start.

Not originally a Top-10 priority, but it is up there on the list, the Nats must add a new hitting coach to replace Kevin Long unless the team comes to terms with KLong which seems like a long-shot at this point. 

So here is the updated original Top-10 priorites:

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Point-CounterPoint: Who Is the Backup First Baseman?

Photo by Marlene Koenig for TalkNats

Don: So lets talk about who the backup first baseman should be. I think we both agree that someone new needs to brought in to take the bulk of the At Bats. But who should the back-up be.

Steve: Sounds like a topic the TalkNats folks will like to discuss. I’m expecting it will be Ryan Zimmerman over Howie Kendrick and Asdrubal Cabrera (UPDATED – Howie Kendrick retired, yes, we started writing this over a week ago). But it wouldn’t shock me to go Droobs over Zim due to “positional flexibility” that Rizzo has always coveted in bench players. Actually, this will be the offseason that almost nothing will surprise me. Continue reading

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So far, Nats fans just have Clay in their stockings and a few other stocking stuffers!

If you have been following along, most MLB teams have done nothing this offseason except for go into hibernation. There is a very good chance that MLB commissioner Rob Manfred will ask for a delay and shortening of the baseball season, and we will be thrust into the same ugliness we saw all spring between MLB and the player’s union spatting off at each other on what the 2020 season would turn into. Yes, the Covid pandemic has changed lives. But here we are again. Continue reading

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Howie Kendrick went out on his own terms and as a Washington Nationals’ star!

An empty stadium at Nationals Park; Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats

Before the news was announced by the media through some anonymous sourced report, Howie Kendrick beat everyone to it by publishing his own words on his Instagram account regarding the decision to retire from baseball. For months he spoke about returning to play again, and even at the beginning of this month he reiterated that. Just three weeks later — something changed — and Kendrick called his baseball career, complete. There will not be a Hall of Fame enshrinement, but he will forever be a part of Cooperstown due to his donation of  Nats World Series memorabilia. Not only did Kendrick hit the grand slam in extra innings to beat the Dodgers in the finale of the NLDS, but then he hit the CLANG heard ’round the world in the World Series to win that. Forever a Nationals hero. Continue reading

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Pick ’em from the discount aisle; Shopping with the #Nats from Casali to Eugenio Suarez!

Davey and Mike are the first ones off the escalator: Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats

Putting together a roster in the offseason is complicated, of course. Some of it is choosing from the ala carte menu while some of it feels like you are piecing together an intricate puzzle. If general manager Mike Rizzo is choosing a starting pitcher and a backup catcher, they are not as dependent on the rest of the roster as a starting infielder or outfielder would be and as such you could pick them up ala carte. Continue reading

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Mike Rizzo admitted the #Nats financial situation was fluid; Nationals are rewarding their best fans!

When the Winter Meetings went 100 percent virtual two weeks ago, it was about as exciting as watching paint dry. The normal media scrums that would be held in crammed spaces of a behemoth hotel were replaced by ZOOM meetings on computers. On Tuesday as you know, the Nationals made general manager Mike Rizzo and manager Dave Martinez available for their post-Winter Meetings media sessions. Rizzo did his session from his home, and Davey filmed his at Nationals Park. There were no bombshells dropped except for maybe Rizzo’s revelation that the Nats “haven’t had a serious conversation about Kris Bryant in probably two years.” Otherwise, it was staying politically correct while not tipping their hands. Continue reading

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Washington Nationals hold ZOOM calls, and we have quotes for the future!

Normally during the Winter Meetings, the Washington Nationals hold their center court time at the official hotel, but everything went virtual this year due to COVID, and we never heard from the President of Baseball Operations and General Manager, Mike Rizzo. This afternoon Mike Rizzo and his manager Dave Martinez made themselves available via ZOOM.  Continue reading

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