We haven’t yet heard a full breakdown of the Nationals’ offseason plans following the club’s hard-to-fathom postseason exit on Thursday night. But president of baseball operations Mike Rizzo has shared some preliminary thoughts on the team’s latest NLDS disaster, as MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand reports. Despite the obvious disappointment, Rizzo suggests there’s not much to be done beyond continuing to “just keep getting there, keep giving ourselves opportunities” in the postseason. He cited a quality core both “on the current club” and “in the farm system to supplement us,” which certainly has been reflected in the regular season results. So, how can the Nats respond to the loss? “Keep grinding, keep building, keep getting quality people in here. We’re going to be fine here in Washington,” Rizzo says.
More from the East Coast:
- With a 7.84 ERA and minus-1.o fWAR across 93 innings, right-hander Chris Tillman was among the worst pitchers in baseball this year, but Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com doesn’t sense that the Orioles have moved on from the free agent-to-be. Both sides are comfortable with each other, Kubatko writes, which could lead to Tillman staying with the starter-needy Orioles on a one-year deal in an effort to rebuild his value. Tillman gave Baltimore’s rotation respectable production from 2012-16, but the shoulder issues he dealt with toward the end of last year disrupted his offseason routine and likely played some part in his difficult 2017. A more typical winter and spring could make Tillman a bounce-back candidate next year, then.
- It’s not particularly likely that the Red Sox will bring back any of their impending free agents, Jen McCaffrey of MassLive.com suggests. Out of Eduardo Nunez, Mitch Moreland, Chris Young, Doug Fister, Fernando Abad, Addison Reed, Rajai Davis and Blaine Boyer, it seems Boston is most interested in re-signing Nunez, but McCaffrey points out that he may be able to land more playing time someplace else. Should the Red Sox re-up Nunez, it could be a sign that they’re concerned about second baseman Dustin Pedroia’s health, McCaffrey observes. The 34-year-old Pedroia went on the disabled list twice because of knee issues in 2017 and only appeared in 105 games – down from 154 the previous season.
- New Marlins part-owner Derek Jeter has already made some decisions contrary to predecessor Jeffrey Loria’s advice, Jon Heyman of FanRag writes. Specifically, Loria would have retained four executives Jeter’s group fired – assistant general manager Mike Berger, vice president of player development Marc Delpiano, VP of pitching development Jim Benedict and VP of player personnel Jeff McAvoy – and parted with scouting director Stan Meek, whom Jeter kept. Jeter and majority owner Bruce Sherman will have to pay the axed execs between $6.5MM and $9MM, Heyman adds.
Is it a surprise Jeter wouldn’t take advice from Loria?
Oh to so many who trashed Verlander..washed up,trash,and so many other things…How you like him now?
Boyer remade himself somewhat thehalf year with Boston. Cpl bad games inflated his numbers there, but he was a useful blowout type reliever for them. Started using his 95-96mph fb up instead of down with the natural sink for the K last year and it worked.
Might be one of the inexpensive, bottom barrel type signs Duquette likes to make can see paying off.
Signing Nunez probably has more to do with replacing Brock Holt than anything else.
Question is, does Nunez want to be Holt or does he (and his agent) think he can get full time at bats somewhere else?
Well if he’s willing to be the super utility guy I wouldn’t be surprised to see him getting in a large number of ABs in Boston. He could keep Pedroia, Bogaerts, and Devers all fresh by subbing in at least once a week for each and also taking an outfield spot once a week. That’s gotta be around 400 ABs and he’d be the first to take over a spot for any injury.
Why would Jeter keep the Scouting Director, whose overseen drafts that have produced a putrid farm system?
They’ll get Yankees vp in scouting coming over so you may see a change in the drafts
Tillman should get a $1M base contract plus $2-3M worth of incentives. 2017 was too much of a Charlie Foxtrot to justify spending more than the league minimum for Tillman, but he’s got some tenure there in Baltimore.
How is the Nationals postseason exit “hard-to-fathom”? They do this every year.
One word …choke
Tillman should go along with three more starting pitchers like hardy but cannot see him as backup and send Davis with them
Are you missing a lot of punctuation marks, or did you just call Hardy a SP?
Samson fired them and did so before the sale closed. Samson did so because that way the costs fell on Loria. That has already been reported in the Miami press and other publications. Heyman has such a hard time with facts.
The four former Marlin’s exec are under contract to the Marlins, not an individual, so the original reporting that Jeter’s group was saving money with their firing was erroneous.
It’s so damn hard to win a World Series. Truth is, the best team doesn’t always win it. It’s such a different game -.a 5 or 7 game series vs a 162 game schedule. It’s almost as if you have to have two teams, one.for the regular season & one for the postseason.
Isn’t that the idea? The best team is the one that is most prepared for both. I’ll agree that the best team doesn’t always win, but every team has the exact same hurdles to jump. So if team A is the best during the regular season, and they have to be prepared to win in the postseason as well, then team B who barely squeaks into the playoffs as a wild card team has to be prepared to win in the postseason as well. May not be the best team, but the most prepared usually does. I personally like the current system, including the one game WC play-in game.