The Nationals announced Wednesday that they’ve claimed right-handed reliever Sauryn Lao off waivers from the Mariners. He’s been optioned to Triple-A Rochester. Infielder/outfielder Darren Baker was designated for assignment in a corresponding roster move.
The 26-year-old Lao made his major league debut with Seattle this summer but has only pitched 3 1/3 innings in the bigs. He’s allowed three runs with a 4-to-1 K/BB ratio in that tiny sample of work but has otherwise spent the season in Triple-A Tacoma, where he’s pitched quite well. In 69 innings of relief with the Mariners’ top affiliate, Lao logged a 3.13 ERA with a hearty 25.9% strikeout rate against a 6.7% walk rate.
Originally signed by the Dodgers as an amateur, Lao is a former third baseman who’s still relatively new to pitching. He moved to the mound full-time in 2023 and has shown a quick aptitude for relief work. He’s posted a sub-4.00 ERA in each of his three minor league seasons since transitioning to the mound, and he hasn’t shown the type of command troubles that are common for former position players. To the contrary — he’s faced 748 hitters in his three minor league seasons and only walked 51 of them (6.8%).
Lao isn’t a flamethrower but sits at a roughly average 93.5 mph on his four-seamer. He pairs that pitch with a sinker that also sits 93 mph as well as a slider and changeup both in the mid-to-upper 80s. Since he was just selected to a 40-man roster for the first time this year, Lao is in his first minor league option season and will be optionable for two more years. If he can carve out a role for himself in D.C., the Nats can control him all the way through the 2031 season.
Baker, 26, is the son of Hall of Famer and former Nationals skipper Dusty Baker. He made his big league debut as a September call-up with Washington last year, going 7-for-14 with a pair of doubles. He’s spent the past three seasons in Triple-A with the Nats, regularly hitting for average but contributing virtually no power. Baker has only walked at a slightly above-average clip as well, leaving him with an overall .274/.345/.336 batting line in nearly 1300 Triple-A plate appearances. Baker runs well, evidenced by an 83-for-99 showing in stolen base attempts across 309 Triple-A contests.
Defensively, he’s spent the majority of his career at second base, with more than 2500 innings at the position. He’s also logged a bit more than 1000 innings in the outfield — 968 of them coming in left and 58 in center field. Washington selected him in the 10th round of the 2021 draft.
Now that Baker has been designated for assignment, he’ll head to outright waivers. He hasn’t cleared previously and doesn’t have the service time to reject a minor league assignment, so if he goes unclaimed he’ll stick with the Nats as a depth option.
JT Snow will not stand for this aggression.
Darren Baker abides.
I was wondering if that was the same little boy. That’s crazy.
Did I miss Dusty Baker getting inducted into the Hall of Fame???
Everyone did.
I don’t think Johnnie deserves it.
Not as a player. Even though he has more career hits than Andruw Jones.
But he does deserve it as a manager. The guy won EVERYWHERE he went.
Keith law wrote a book called smart baseball. He didn’t understand why the nationals had just hired him.
Not unexpected for Darren Baker. Nationals need some pitching depth and he’s really not anything special. If he wants to see some success, he’s got to get his Max EV above 111 consistently. It’s getting there but still not perfect. All the best for him to find another team. Unfortunately for him, he’s getting up there in age so his clock is running out for a 2B man. He might end up being a decent bench player at some point but probably not a starter.
If Darren never plays another MLB game, he will end up with a higher career batting average than his father. And nearly everyone else that ever played the game for that matter.
Dude hits .500 and is DFA’d. Yikes.
Oh, and Dusty is a HOFer now?
Even worse. He hit .500 in his September audition LAST YEAR and didn’t even get a single call up this year. What is the point of keeping a guy on the 40 all year if you have no need for his services and no intention of giving him a chance. Send him somewhere he might at least get an opportunity.
New interim GM may have something to do with it. I’d guess Baker was a holdover from the Mike Rizzo era.