The Nationals announced that infielder Adrian Sanchez and three right-handers – Aaron Barrett, Austen Williams and Paolo Espino – have cleared waivers and been outrighted to Triple-A Fresno. Meanwhile, the club has reinstated catcher Tres Barrera from the restricted list. Washington now has 37 players on its 40-man roster.
The 30-year-old Sanchez saw time in each season from 2017-19, but he only managed a .263/.280/.331 line and failed to hit a home run during that 166-plate appearance span.
Barrett was a solid part of the Nationals’ bullpen from 2014-15, but injuries (including Tommy John surgery) have limited him to four innings since then. He threw just 1 2/3 frames for the Nats this year. Williams didn’t factor in for the disappointing Washington club in 2020, while Espino totaled six innings of three-run ball.
Barrera, meantime, is back on the 40-man roster after receiving an 80-game suspension for performance-enhancing drugs in July. The 26-year-old, who spent most of 2019 in Double-A but did have a brief debut with the Nats, denied ever “knowingly” taking a banned substance.
Is this the first time we’ve seen someone outright to a minor league affiliate, since the season was cancelled and now MLB incorporates MiLB?
I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure the players who weren’t sent to the Alternate Site were considered as being outrighted to a minor league affiliate. For example, Joe Mantiply was outrighted to AAA Reno a couple days ago. I’m not sure if players are sent to minor league affiliates only when they play for a team that didn’t make the playoffs but it seems to be a case.
There were several rounds of Players waived at the end of the season who sent to the alternate site. The assignment did not always happen at that point so some of the news of players being assigned is just finishing up a transaction form last month
Aaron Whitefield
Outrighted to Triple-A Undefined Location actually isnt it?
Nationals contract with Fresno was up at end of last month, I believe . I would bet DC would LOVE to find a closer proximity AAA affiliate .
curious to see if 2020 counted towards affiliate agreements. my guess is given the MLB control over MiLB ae a whole they could chose to make them roll over if they wanted to.
No doubt about that.
Can we all agree that we hate the nats? Almost as much as the Astros
Not even close.
I hate you as much as I hate lima beans. Almost as much as eggplant.
Bravesfan – why would i hate the Nationals. Did they bag on garbage cans and cheat like the Astros…..or do they just happen to be in the Braves division.
Substitute the word Braves for the word Nats & we can agree
BravesFan. Trolling yet another Nats article, I see.
You vent that hate, baby. Yeah, just let it out.
Most teams will wait until the WS is over, but will all 30 mlb teams will DFA, non-tender, reassign players off the 40 man roster. The Red Sox will remove 13 to 15 players most of which were pitchers who were waiver claims or low end free agents partly to make room for Rule 5 additions. MLBtraderumors covers some of these, but not all.