After more than three years of rebuilding, the Nationals enter the offseason with a very clean long-term payroll outlook, young core players emerging at multiple spots on the roster, and a front office that sounds motivated to get back into contention sooner than later.
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Here’s one: Does Gallo take the 2.5m cash, thinking he can find 5.5m under someone’s cushions, equaling the 8m option he (and Boras) has for next season? Any other agent and easy call, but never tell with the perpetually greedy boras. I see no chance Gallo finds a guaranteed mlb deal period if he chooses the opt out, but we shall find out soon enough.
lol are you aware of how bad Gallo has been? It’s a mutual option so it doesn’t matter anyway. But he’s not getting a ML deal this offseason.
I wasn’t calling for him to go out. Questioning the rationality of Boras. A player in his right mind, who put up the horrid numbers Gallo did would smartly take the 2.5m, but this is a combo of Gallo/Boras..
Man, yearly team Outlook is member only now? That was one of my favorites. That’s a bit of a body blow. All well.
I just come for the comments. These articles are perfect.
Nationals off-season outlook.
Discuss amongst yourselves.
I say whoever the teams 3 most knowledgeable fans are should give a right up. We can all get a good laugh at the dozens of people who think they are the best. But people will go to whoever they like the best. For teams with only 1 or 2 fans someone with general knowledge will have to step up.
I’ll give my shot. Not my team. Not a team I follow closely. But they have plenty of payroll available. Reloaded the farm system nicely. I think they can be a 500 team. Little luck get a wild card. Braves and Philly seem setup for next year and beyond. Mets will be trying and have the $. So wild card is best bet with some luck. Young mlb foundation. Just a tuff division. But farm, foundation, payroll is setup to compete. No reason they can’t get 80 some wins and for years to come. Just in a division with 3 of the best gms in baseball and they can all spend 230 to 300 million. Brutal.
No worries. I can summarize for you, the Nats outlook is bleak & depressing. Next! Ahahaha!
Putting a previously free series behind a paywall is certainly a choice. I don’t see that working out very well
If only pure news items aren’t going to be paywalled going forward, Twitter/X is probably the way to go instead of MLBTR. You’ll even get your news faster!
I would love to see the nats spend a ton and get competitive in the NL east next year, they would be even tougher then the NL west if they have 4 playoff caliber teams
I would advise not spending $. Weak free agent class. Let other teams over spend and then clean up with the bargains. Extend your own players for a much better return.
A team with a losing record trying to right itself by spending big in free agency is a recipe for disaster.
You’ll just have a very expensive, mediocre at best, team.
*cough* Texas rangers *cough*
Always one ignorant who thinks naming the exception disproves the general point.
As a Nats fan, I hope they spend, and I think they will spend some money, but I don’t see a run at Soto or even Alonso as even remotely plausible. Mark Lerner isn’t his Dad. Ted’s the guy who pushed for them to spend even if it was more than the team itself could reasonably afford..Ted did Strasburg’s deal directy with his agent over Mike Rizzo’s objection.
The Nats have not spent since Ted died, and it’s not just because they’ve been in the midst of a rebuild. In 2023, someone in the Lerner family objected to the settlement the Nats had reached with Strasburg that would allow him to retire, and the team not to have him on the 40-man during the offseason. Somebody in ownership reportedly wanted Strasburg to agree to more team friendly terms. The team self insured Strasburg’s deal, so none of that money is offset by insurance. Mark Lerner isn’t going to spend like his Dad, especially when the family’s real estate holdings took a serious beating in 2020 and have yet to recover.
Secondly, the Nats love deferred money deals. So they still owe Scherzer $15 million and Corbin $10 million in 2025.
Rizzo’s said they don’t want to acquire a free agent that “blocks” a prospect in the minors. He did the ill fated short term deal with Nick Senzel for that reason. He then hedged his bet on House when he acquired 3B Cayden Wallace from the Royals for Hunter Harvey at the deadline. Wallace was the Royals 2nd round pick in 2022. I would be stunned if Rizzo signed a 3B.
Ruiz is a terrible defensive catcher, and he’s got a long term contract. I would not be surprised if the Nats “big” signing this offseason is a good defensive catcher who can help develop the young pitchers and allow the team to move Ruiz to 1B.
@NavalH. Great insight. Thanks.
In regards to ownership strategy, sounds like “Like father, NOT like son”. Didn’t know Ted mettled. IE negotiated the Strausberg deal though Rizzo advised otherwise. So Mark stays out of it and lets Rizzo do his thing?
Ted was born in DC in 1925 and got his college degrees from GWU in 1949. As a lifelong resident, he *really* wanted to bring a World Series championship to DC. He knew the one way he could help was $$. However, he didn’t interfere with the exception of the Strasburg deal. To be fair, Rizzo wanted to extend Strasburg too, he just didn’t think the $ and length of the deal was a good idea because of Strasburg’s injury history. Sadly, Rizzo was right on this one. Ted did listen to Rizzo on the Corban deal, which also turned out very badly. So both of them made mistakes.
Because Ted was the family patriarch, he could tell everybody in the family to shut up and go away if they objected to spending $, Mark can’t, he’s got several minority owners in the family., and the family’s not a “baseball family” it’s a real estate family. IMO if the 2020 season had been a normal season, they’d have cashed in on the WS championship for a year, driven up the franchise value and then sold the team. Thanks to Bud Selig, the O’s own the Nats broadcast rights forever, so the TV/streaming deal isn’t great and they don’t make anywhere near the $ the Mets and Phillies do. Unless you’ve got an owner who’s just in it just to win games (and those are few and far between IMO) that’s a problem.
As for Rizzo, he was forced into the new world of analytics. Their entire front office around him has been replaced in the past few years, and they just overhauled their Dominican operations because the only players who have worked out are Soto and Luis Garcia, Jr., and he looked like a bust until this season.
Lastly, I think people forget that before they got Jayson Werth to come to DC, the Nats strategy under Stan Kasten was to build from within like the Braves. I think they’re back to that strategy and will stick with it. The biggest FA signings the Braves have ever made IMO were Maddux and Fred McGriff, and that was a *long* time ago. People also forget that when the Nats won in 2019, that season didn’t start off well and they had one of the oldest rosters in MLB. Rizzo doesn’t want the Nats organization to be a World Series or Bust organization, and they don’t have the $ to ever try to “spend themselves” out of a bad deal like the Mets and Phillies can.
Like “… and the family’s not a “baseball family”, it’s a real estate family.”
Rizzo’s said they don’t want to acquire a free agent that “blocks” a prospect in the minors.
That’s just a excuse not to spend $. I never seen someone get blocked. If you can hit they will gladly find a spot for you. And if someone becomes the first blocked player they could simply trade someone. We got someone cheaper and better than the veteran. Ok. Trade the veteran. Problem solved.
Unless you *can’t* trade the veteran. Corban’s example #1 of a guy Rizzo couldn’t trade if his life depended on it. The only way you get out of a long term bad deal is to eat some $$, and the Nats cannot afford to do that. Their local TV deal is $60 million a year, that’s it. The majority of their broadcast rights are owned by the O’s, and it’ll be that way *forever.* if he signs a guy like Bregman to a high $ long term deal, he’s stuck with him. House and Wallace become trade bait if they work out, and that’s the exact opposite financial strategy Rizzo wants. He wants long term cost controlled players.
Well said …wonder if its possible Rubenstein might be willing to negotiate on broadcast rights moreso than Angelos ever would have. That might help the Nats bring in more cash and some higher dollar FAs that can help the team win which will again bring in more cash. Really a competitive team is win win a few smart free agent signings could put this team right in the playoff hunt. Start w 1B,DH, another SP, and possibly another catcher would be nice.
Watched Baseball all day, not one mention of Pete Rose. Baseball should be ashamed!!
Even Offseason Outlooks are going to be paywalled now?
Seriously?
Might as well just use Twitter/X instead of MLBTR at this point. It’s faster and it’s free.
I dunno what’s on x but individual team fan sites will talk about the off-season all off-season long article after article.
If these are that important to you it’s 2 or 3 bucks a month. If you enjoy reading these articles and no other source is as good it’s a reasonable amount. Obviously X isn’t as good or you wouldn’t be in here commenting. It’s faster and free but yet here you are. It’s not better.
I’m just here for comments. They could just put a headline Juan Soto signs. That’s it. No article. Someone in the comments will put Wow. Someone will say he isn’t as good as Jankowski. Someone will say he should have learned the Roger Beshens Football Slider (I wonder who that would be). But eventually someone will tell me what team and for how much.
Hi King Floch. I sent you an email, but it bounced back. Hit me up here if you’d like to discuss.
mlbtraderumors.com/contact
Twitter is a ridiculous cesspool. If you think that place is better than MLBTR, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
RIP outlook series (Chats gone too?)
Outlook for White Sox. Pain
If I never showed up. A dozen comments in 7 hours. Might as well be behind a paywall.
These may do better on days with 0 or 1 playoff games. Other teams will do better. Yankees vs Marlins.
As much as I come to this website 30 bucks for a YEAR is a BARGAIN. It used to cost me 50 cents a day for the USA Today newspaper for in depth baseball stats and stuff. How much is that for 2 MONTHS? $30.
Bargain I tell ya.
Great article btw Steve Adams
Who were the non-tender candidates for the Nationals?