Rangers Acquire MacKenzie Gore
The Nationals have sent left-hander MacKenzie Gore to the Rangers for a package of five prospects, per announcements from both clubs. The five players are shortstop Gavin Fien, right-hander Alejandro Rosario, first baseman/outfielder Abimelec Ortiz, infielder Devin Fitz-Gerald and outfielder Yeremy Cabrera. Gore and Ortiz were the only players with 40-man spots, so the deal is 40-man neutral and no corresponding moves were required.
Gore, 27, has been one of the more obvious trade candidates of this offseason. Back at the start of November, MLBTR’s list of the top trade candidates of the winter had him in the #1 spot. That was partly due to Gore’s appeal as a potential budding ace and also the team’s situation.
The Nationals have been stuck in a rebuild for quite a while now. They won the World Series in 2019 but haven’t finished above .500 since then. They traded players like Max Scherzer, Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber and Juan Soto in 2021 and 2022. It was hoped that Washington could be back to relevance by now but the rebuild stalled out. Things dragged to such a degree that heads rolled. President of baseball operations Mike Rizzo and manager Dave Martinez were both fired during last season.
Paul Toboni, previously an assistant general manager with Boston, was hired to replace Rizzo as the front office leader. The general expectation in the industry is that he will get some time to turn the ship around and get the Nats into contention again, as opposed to having the pressure of trying to win immediately. Gore is only two years away from free agency, making him a trade candidate in those circumstances. As a Boras Corporation client, a contract extension was probably going to be hard to put together.
On top of all that, there’s Gore’s track record and affordability. He was once a top prospect, getting selected third overall by the Pades in 2017. He was flipped to the Nats as part of the aforementioned Soto trade. Gore hasn’t quite lived up to his potential yet, with a 4.19 earned run average in 532 1/3 innings. However, he looked on the verge of a huge breakout for most of 2025.
Last year, Gore made 19 starts for the Nats through the All-Star break. He logged 110 1/3 innings in those with a 3.02 ERA. His 7.7% walk rate was a bit better than average and his 30.5% strikeout rate was quite strong. That strikeout rate was behind just four other qualified pitchers in baseball at that time. Tarik Skubal led the pack at 33.4%, followed by Zack Wheeler, Garrett Crochet and Hunter Brown.
Unfortunately, Gore wasn’t able to stick the landing. He went on the injured list at the end of August due to shoulder inflammation. He was reinstated about two weeks later but then returned to the IL late in September due to a right ankle impingement. Around those IL stints, he tossed 49 1/3 innings with a 6.75 ERA. That bumped his season-long ERA to 4.17.
Despite the poor finish, Gore remained an enticing player. The strong run to the All-Star break showed his ceiling and it’s an appealing arsenal. He averaged over 95 miles per hour with his four-seamer last year while mixing in a curveball, slider, cutter and changeup. He’s also quite affordable. He’s going into his second of three arbitration seasons and will be making $5.6MM this year. He’ll be due another raise in 2027 before he’s slated to reach free agency.
The trade market for starting pitching has been robust this winter. The Orioles sent four prospects and a draft pick to the Rays for three years of Shane Baz. The Cubs sent three players, including their top prospect, to the Marlins for three years of Edward Cabrera. Last night, the Mets sent two of their top prospects to the Brewers for one year of Freddy Peralta.
Gore’s track record of success isn’t quite as long as Peralta’s but Gore offers an extra year of control. Baz and Cabrera offered one extra year compared to Gore but haven’t shown the same kind of ace upside and both have checkered injury histories. Given the difficulty in evaluating the future outcomes of prospects, it’s impossible to say which package will provide the most long-term value.
For the Rangers, it’s understandable that they would prefer the trade route to free agency this winter, as there have been signs that money is tight. The team and manager Bruce Bochy parted ways at the end of last year with the club’s financial uncertainty cited as playing a role in that break-up. Pitching coach Mike Maddux departed for the Angels, with some suggestion that may have been financially motivated as well.
In terms of the roster, the Rangers traded three years of Marcus Semien to get five years of Brandon Nimmo, with Nimmo making less annually. Various reports from December suggested that the club couldn’t even afford mid-market free agents like J.T. Realmuto or Luis Arráez.
But upgrading the rotation was still on the to-do list. The club saw Merrill Kelly, Jon Gray, Patrick Corbin and Tyler Mahle all depart via free agency at season’s end. They went into the winter with a strong one-two of Jacob deGrom and Nathan Eovaldi, but a drop-off after that. Jack Leiter seemed to earn himself a rotation job with a 3.86 ERA last year but his strikeout and walk rates were only average-ish. Jacob Latz had a good season in a swing role but hasn’t been a full-time big league starter yet. Kumar Rocker is a former top prospect but hasn’t put it together in the majors yet.
Gore immediately upgrades the group, especially if he can get back to his first-half performance from 2025. He slots into the front three with deGrom and Eovaldi, bumps Leiter to a back-end role for now and perhaps creates a competition for a fifth spot between Latz, Rocker and others. There is a cliff over the horizon as Eovaldi and Gore are both slated for free agency after 2027. deGrom’s deal has a club option for 2028, with the value conditional on Cy Young voting and inning tallies, though he’ll be 40 by then. But for the next two years, the rotation has a strong core three.
To get that rotation upgrade while avoiding the free agent market, the Rangers have had to part with a notable pile of prospects. Fien appears to be the headliner here. The Rangers just took him 12th overall in the 2025 draft. They gave him a $4.8MM bonus to get him to forgo a commitment to the University of Texas. Still just 18, turning 19 in March, he’s a long-term play.
Baseball America lists him as the #3 prospect in the Texas system. He gets high praise for his offense but with bigger questions about his defense. Most evaluators expect him to be moved off shortstop in the long run, with third base or the outfield corners potential outcomes.
Kiley McDaniel of ESPN writes that the Red Sox really wanted Fien in last year’s draft but they didn’t pick until 15th, three spots behind Texas. Toboni was running Boston’s draft as assistant general manager at the time. Now that he is running his own front office, he apparently made Fien a priority and has used Gore as a means of getting his guy.
Fitz-Gerald, Rosario and Cabrera are a few spots behind Fien on BA’s list, coming in at #8, #13 and #14 respectively. Fitz-Gerald is a 20-year-old infielder who was drafted in the fifth round in 2024. He got into 41 games between the Complex League and Single-A last year, slashing .302/.428/.482. A left shoulder strain prevented him from taking on a bigger workload. He seems to do a decent amount of stuff well without a standout tool. BA suggests a future as a multi-positional player with a bit of pop and speed.
Rosario, 24, was a fifth-round pick in 2023. He had a strong season in 2024, posting a 2.24 ERA between Single-A and High-A, but has been on the shelf since then. He missed 2025 due to an elbow injury and is soon set to undergo Tommy John surgery, so he’ll miss the entire 2026 season as well. His strong 2024 campaign made him a top 100 prospect, with BA having him at #49 going into 2025, but he’ll be a long-term question mark after two entirely missed seasons. He’ll be Rule 5 eligible this coming December.
Cabrera, 20, was an international signing out of the Dominican Republic. He spent last year in Single-A with a strong walk and strikeout profile but only eight home runs. He’s considered a strong defender in the outfield and he stole 43 bases last year.
Ortiz, 24 next month, has the least prospect hype of this group but is the one closest to impacting the major league club. He split last year between Double-A and Triple-A, hitting 25 home runs and walking in 11.7% of his plate appearances. He had a combined line of .257/.356/.479 and a 124 wRC+. He was added to the Texas 40-man roster a couple of months ago to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft.
Though his numbers in the minors look good on the surface, he has a propensity to chase breaking balls. Evaluators fear that will limit him to being a platoon bat in the majors. He’s also not a strong defender or baserunner, so he needs to hit to carry the profile. Washington has a pretty wide open first base/designated hitter mix, so he can force his way in there if he hits. He also has three option years and can be kept in the minors if he doesn’t.
With four of the five players being long-term plays, it would appear that Washington is just trying to grab whichever players it considers the most talented, as opposed to trying to rush a move towards contending in the near term. Perhaps that was isolated to this deal of their biggest trade chip but it could perhaps indicate that the club is generally operating with a long lens. For the Rangers, losing most of these players won’t hurt them in the short term but it does cut into the system more broadly. As of August, BA ranked them 26th in the league in terms of overall system talent.
CJ Abrams has also been floated as a trade candidate for Washington but with less certainty than Gore as he has three years of club control remaining. The Nats could now pivot to marketing him but his stock is also down a bit due to a poor finish to his most recent season, and in 2024 as well. Perhaps they will hold him for another season to see if he can raise his trade value.
It is clearly an offseason about loading up on future talent for the Nats. They also traded reliever Jose A. Ferrer to the Mariners for catcher Harry Ford and right-hander Isaac Lyon. This deal adds five more intriguing young players to the pipeline.
It also opens up more rotation chances for their other pitchers. As of now, they project to have Cade Cavalli, Foster Griffin, Josiah Gray, Brad Lord, Jake Irvin and Mitchell Parker in the mix for starts. Arms like Jake Eder, Luis Perales, Riley Cornelio and Andrew Alvarez will be looking to push in there as well. Perhaps the Gore deal with be followed by the Nats signing a veteran to eat some innings but they could also leave space for the guys in that group.
Due to Gore’s appeal, he reportedly drew interest from half the teams in the league. Some of those clubs moved on to other trade candidates or signed free agents. For those still on the hunt for starting pitching, the market is drying up but they may still have options. As mentioned, a lot of the trade candidates have already changed hands. The Red Sox may have enough depth after their Ranger Suárez signing to flip someone else. The Royals may be willing to part with someone. Free agency still has Framber Valdez, Zac Gallen, Chris Bassitt and a few others.
Jon Heyman of The New York Post first reported Gore was headed to Texas. Jeff Passan of ESPN first laid out the five-for-one framework. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News first reported Fien’s inclusion. Spencer Nusbaum of The Washington Post first mentioned Rosario. Grant then reported Ortiz and Fitz-Gerald, followed by Andrew Golden of The Washington Post adding Cabrera.
Photos courtesy of Brett Davis, Eric Hartline, Kevin Jairaj, Joe Camporeale, Imagn Images
Nationals Designate Riley Adams For Assignment
The Nationals announced that catcher Riley Adams has been designated for assignment. That’s the corresponding move for their claim of right-hander Gus Varland, which was previously reported.
Adams, 30 in June, has been with the Nats for the past four-plus years. Originally drafted by the Blue Jays, he came to Washington in the 2021 deadline deal which sent lefty Brad Hand to Toronto.
He was mostly an up-and-down guy through the end of 2024, never appearing in more than 48 games in any individual campaign. He exhausted his final option in 2024 but stuck on the roster through the 2025 season. Overall, he has appeared in 263 big league games with 849 plate appearances. He has shown a bit of pop by hitting 21 home runs but also struck out at a 32.5% clip. He has a .211/.287/.354 line and 78 wRC+. Outlets such as FanGraphs, Baseball Prospectus and Statcast have all graded him as a poor defender.
The Nats acquired catcher Harry Ford from the Mariners in the Jose A. Ferrer deal last month. Ford should share the bulk of the big league playing time behind the plate with Keibert Ruiz. Even if Ford needs more time in the minors, the Nats also have Drew Millas and Mickey Gasper on the 40-man roster. Millas and Gasper have options, so perhaps that led to Adams getting squeezed out.
Back in November, Adams and the Nationals avoided arbitration by agreeing to a split deal which would pay him $1MM in the majors and $500K in the minors. Since his service time is at least three years but below five, he would have the right to reject an outright assignment but would have to walk away from that money in exercising that right. It seems there’s a decent chance he’ll end up sticking with the Nats as non-roster depth after clearing waivers.
Photo courtesy of Sam Navarro, Imagn Images
Nationals Claim Gus Varland
The Nationals have claimed right-hander Gus Varland off waivers from the Diamondbacks, reports Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com. Arizona designated him for assignment last week after signing righty Taylor Clarke to a one-year deal.
Varland, 29, is the older brother of Blue Jays setup man Louis Varland. He missed most of the 2024-25 seasons due to injury, most notably a significant lat strain. He didn’t pitch in the majors this past season but logged 26 1/3 frames between the Dodgers and White Sox in 2024, turning in a 3.42 ERA, 23.5% strikeout rate and 7% walk rate. Varland sits 95-96 mph with his four-seamer and complements the pitch with an 88-89 mph slider and a rarely used show-me changeup that he’s tossed at only a 5% clip in the big leagues.
Varland has generally been hit hard in the upper minors but still throws relatively hard and shows a penchant for missing bats and limiting walks at a passable clip. Home runs have been a modest issue, but he’s also been plagued by lofty BABIP numbers and low strand rates. Assuming he’s healthy now, there’s little harm in a rebuilding club like the Nats taking a speculative look in hopes that he can hold down a bullpen spot. Varland still has a minor league option remaining, so even if he doesn’t break camp with the Nationals, they can send him to Triple-A Rochester without first needing to pass him through outright waivers.
Nationals Claim Mickey Gasper, Designate Andry Lara For Assignment
The Nationals announced that they have claimed utility player Mickey Gasper off waivers from the Twins. Minnesota designated him for assignment last week when they claimed Vidal Bruján, another utility player. The Nats designated right-hander Andry Lara for assignment in a corresponding move.
Washington’s new president of baseball operations Paul Toboni is already familiar with Gasper. Toboni was an assistant general manager with the Red Sox when that club took Gasper from the Yankees in the minor league phase of the 2023 Rule 5 draft. Gasper made a brief debut with Boston in 2024 but was traded to the Twins last winter. Between the two clubs, he has a .133/.250/.195 line in 133 big league plate appearances.
Toboni and the Nats are putting more stock in his minor league track record, where he has generally had a strong approach at the plate and has also provided defensive versatility. He took 588 Triple-A plate appearances over the past two years with 22 home runs, a 13.8% walk rate and 13.6% strikeout rate. He produced a combined line of .312/.420/.531 in that sample, production which translated to a wRC+ of 154.
In terms of the glovework, Gasper has plenty of ability to move around. He has experience as a catcher, plus the three non-shortstop infield positions and has spent a bit of time in left field as well. He has even more versatility when considering he is a switch hitter who has options remaining.
Despite the strong numbers, Gasper isn’t likely viewed as a core piece. He was originally a 27th round draft pick back in 2018 and took a while to get to the majors. Though he has a short résumé, he’s already 30 years old.
But for the Nats, there’s a logic to bringing him aboard. Washington is rebuilding and has a roster in flux. They project to have CJ Abrams and Luis García Jr. on the infield but both are theoretical trade candidates, with Abrams controlled for three more seasons and García two. Brady House was once considered the third baseman of the future but he hit poorly in his first taste of the majors. Prospect Harry Ford could be the catcher of the future but he has just eight big league plate appearances.
Amid all that uncertainty, Gasper gives the club a bit of depth all over. As the season rolls along, there will be inevitable injuries and fluctuations in performance, plus potential transactions. Gasper can bounce around to multiple positions in the big leagues or be kept in the minors as depth, depending on what happens with others on the roster. He has less than a year of service time, meaning he can be cheaply retained for the foreseeable future, if he manages to hold onto a roster spot.
To bring aboard Gasper, the Nats have bumped Lara off the roster. Now 23, he was added to the 40-man roster in November of 2024 to keep him out of the Rule 5 draft. At that time, he had just wrapped up a strong minor league season. He tossed 134 2/3 innings between High-A and Double-A with a 3.34 earned run average, 24.3% strikeout rate and 8.1% walk rate. His 2025 didn’t go nearly as well. He made his major league debut but allowed 14 earned runs in 14 1/3 innings. He also struggled in the minors, with a 7.55 ERA in 56 inning across multiple levels.
Lara was an international signing of the previous front office. President of baseball operations Mike Rizzo was fired in 2025 and eventually replaced by Toboni. It seems that Lara’s poor season in 2025 and a shake-up in Washington have pushed him off the roster. The Nats will now have a week to figure out Lara’s fate. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so they could take five days to explore trade interest. Lara still has a couple of club options, which could help him land with another club as depth.
Photo courtesy of David Richard, Imagn Images
Nationals, Zach Penrod Agree To Minor League Deal
The Nationals are in agreement with lefty reliever Zach Penrod on a minor league contract, reports Will Sammon of The Athletic. The Dynamic Sports Group client would be paid an $800K rate, marginally above the minimum, if he makes the MLB roster.
Penrod is a former Red Sox farmhand who made seven appearances for Boston in 2024. Nationals president of baseball operations Paul Toboni was an assistant general manager for the Sox at the time. Penrod worked four innings of two-run ball, albeit with five free passes (four walks and a hit batter) against three strikeouts.
The Red Sox designated Penrod for assignment last May in the aftermath of the Rafael Devers trade. They’d acquired two players on the 40-man (Jordan Hicks and Kyle Harrison) in that deal and needed to drop someone from the roster. Boston traded Penrod to the Dodgers for cash. He spent six weeks on the 40-man roster but didn’t make a big league appearance with Los Angeles. They ran him through outright waivers in August, and he elected minor league free agency at the end of the season.
Penrod is coming off a rough year in Triple-A. He allowed almost eight earned runs per nine over 33 1/3 innings. Penrod’s command was unworkable, as he walked more than 20% of opposing hitters. The 28-year-old southpaw has always struggled to throw strikes but has a three-pitch mix (fastball, slider and changeup) that intrigued the Nats. He sits around 95 MPH on the heater.
Washington’s bullpen is wide open. Their only reliever with even two years of MLB service time is righty Julian Fernández, and almost all of that has come while he’s been on the injured list. (He has 10 career appearances.) Every reliever on the 40-man roster has minor league options remaining, with only Rule 5 pick Griff McGarry required to stick on the MLB roster. There’s ample opportunity for minor league free agents to try to earn a spot.
Mets Still Looking To Add To Rotation, Outfield
Bo Bichette was a somewhat unexpected addition to the Mets roster, so much of the team’s original offseason wishlist remains in place even after Bichette’s three-year, $126MM deal with New York earlier this week. According to The Athletic’s Will Sammon, the Mets remain on the hunt for rotation help, as well as “a versatile outfielder who can handle center field and support the corner spots.”
Looking at the list of available free agent outfielders, Mets target Cody Bellinger is the ideal fit for the team’s needs. Sammon reports that the Mets are still in on Bellinger, but only for the type of shorter-term (and presumably higher average annual value) contract Bichette received. This could be an issue since the hang-up between Bellinger and the Yankees seems to be a matter of contract length, with Bellinger wanting a longer deal than the five-year pact in the $155MM range that the Yankees reportedly have on the table.
Bellinger’s first two free agent contracts were a one-year deal with the Cubs worth $17.5MM in guaranteed money, and then a three-year, $80MM deal with Chicago that included opt-outs after each of the first two seasons. Bellinger passed on his first opt-out opportunity but changed teams anyway last winter when the Cubs traded him to the Yankees, and he then opted out last fall in the wake of a 4.9 fWAR season that saw him hit .272/.334/.480 with 29 homers over 656 plate appearances for the Bronx Bombers.
It isn’t a surprise that Bellinger is looking for some stability with his next deal, and coming off a solid platform season, the former NL MVP and agent Scott Boras have been aiming high in search of a seven-year deal. Whether the Yankees, Mets, or any team will match that ask remains to be seen, but in the Mets’ case, it would run counter to the team’s recent preference to sign players to shorter-term contracts. Perhaps a very large AAV (i.e. Bichette’s deal, or the four-year, $220MM deal the Mets reportedly offered to Kyle Tucker) would get Bellinger to budge, though if so, he could potentially see if the Yankees would also offer a similar pact if Bellinger has a preference to just return to his former team instead of another change of scenery.
Among other free agent outfielders, Harrison Bader is the only option that can truly be a defensive asset in center field. On the trade front, Sammon suggests the Astros’ Jake Meyers, the Cardinals’ Lars Nootbaar, or White Sox center fielder Luis Robert Jr. could be possibilities for the Mets, and both Nootbaar and Robert have been linked to New York already this winter.
Bellinger could also chip in at first base when he isn’t in the outfield. With Francisco Lindor returning at shortstop, the Mets’ revamped infield will also consist of Marcus Semien at second base, Bichette at third base for the first time in his pro career, and Jorge Polanco at first base for the first time in his pro career (save for one late-game cameo with Seattle last season). The designated hitter spot is open, so any of these veterans could be given the occasional DH day for partial rest and to give any of the Mets’ backups some playing time.
Sammon writes that New York views Brett Baty as a candidate to bounce around the diamond as a backup at second and third base, left field, and some first base if necessary. Mark Vientos, Luisangel Acuna, and Ronny Mauricio are also on hand as further infield depth. Any of the depth options could be dealt, of course, if the Mets view trades over bigger-ticket free agent signings as a better way to address their needs.
Turning to the pitching front, Sammon cites the Nationals’ MacKenzie Gore and the Royals’ Kris Bubic as two starters who could be “trade possibilities” for the Amazins, “though both are considered long shots” to be acquired. Within a Mets rotation full of health question marks and inexperienced arms, Bubic or especially Gore could be a stabilizing force.
Gore has been more good than great over his three seasons with Washington and might still have more upside, while the 2025 season represented the first time Bubic truly looked like a frontline arm. Bubic posted a 2.55 ERA, 24.4% strikeout rate, 8.2% walk rate and 47.2% ground ball rate over 116 1 /3 innings with Kansas City last year, before a rotator cuff strain cost him the last two months of the season. Gore is arbitration-controlled through the next two seasons, while Bubic is a free agent next winter.
Nats president of baseball operations Paul Toboni is known to be asking for a ton in return for Gore, and it could be that the Mets might have to pay a particular premium since they are one of the Nationals’ NL East rivals. Bubic’s impending free agency has made him perhaps the most logical trade candidate out of the Royals’ group of starters, but the outfield-needy Mets don’t match up too well with a K.C. team that also needs outfield help. One of New York’s infielders could theoretically be a fit for the Royals at second base, but the Royals appear to be giving Jonathan India a shot at a bounce-back year.
The door isn’t necessarily closed on the Mets signing a prominent free agent starter, though one might expect that the team would again prefer such a pitcher on a shorter-term contract. For pitchers like Framber Valdez (who has been linked to the Mets) or Zac Gallen who rejected a qualifying offer, the Mets would need to surrender two 2026 draft picks and an additional $1MM in international draft pool money to sign either player. New York already gave up that bounty to sign another qualified free agent in Bichette, and Sammon says the Mets wouldn’t be entirely adverse to giving up more QO-related penalties again for Valdez or Gallen, if the money was right.
Nationals Avoid Arbitration With Cade Cavalli
10:15am: Cavalli will make $862.5K in 2026, according to a report from MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand. The club option is worth $4MM and comes with a buyout of $7.5K, guaranteeing Cavalli $870K in total.
9:14am: The Nationals announced this morning that they have avoided arbitration with right-hander Cade Cavalli. The sides agreed to a one-year deal today that includes a club option for the 2027 season. Financial details of the deal are not yet clear. Cavalli was one of 18 players to exchange filing figures with his team after failing to reach an agreement prior to the deadline earlier this month. Cavalli filed at $900K, while the Nationals filed at $825K.
That $75K gap between the two sides was the smallest among the 18 players and teams to exchange figures. Even with such a tiny gap in negotiations, however, there was no guarantee that an arbitration hearing would be avoided. Teams overwhelmingly subscribe to the “file and trial” approach towards arbitration at this point, and the Nationals are no exception. Teams tend to hold a firm line in arbitration negotiations and are willing to fight over even small amounts of money. That’s partially because player salaries tend to build off themselves throughout arbitration, and even a small pay bump in an early year of arbitration can snowball into much larger gains for the player three or four years down the road. In addition, arbitration hearings are so focused on precedent that offering one player a salary above the usual range can create an outlier case for players and agents to use as a comparison point in future hearings.
In this case, the Nationals and Cavalli have bridged the gap by using a loophole in the arbitration system. By attaching a club option to the deal, it technically becomes a multi-year arrangement that cannot be used as a reference point in future arbitration negotiations and hearings. Without the cloud of creating a new precedent hanging over the negotiations, the Nationals were surely more comfortable being flexible with Cavalli and were more motivated to avoid what could have been a messy arbitration hearing that runs the risk of damaging the club’s relationship with a former top prospect who could remain a key part of their team for years to come.
Looking ahead to 2026, Cavalli will attempt to build off of a 2025 season where he made it back to the majors for the first time since 2022 and delivered a decent 4.25 ERA across ten starts. He struck out 18.3% of his opponents while walking 6.8%. Solid underlying metrics, including a 4.09 SIERA, suggest that Cavalli could be a solid mid-rotation arm for the Nationals next year even if him reaching the ace-level ceiling fans in D.C. were surely dreaming on when he was selected 22nd overall in the 2020 draft appears unlikely at this point. Cavalli will join MacKenzie Gore (assuming he isn’t traded before the season begins), Foster Griffin, and Brad Lord among the team’s likely starters headed into the years. Josiah Gray, Jake Irvin, and Mitchell Parker are among the possible options to fill out that group.
Nationals Sign Trevor Gott To Minor League Contract
The Nationals have signed right-hander Trevor Gott to a minor league deal, The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reports. The contract presumably contains an invitation for Gott to attend Washington’s big league Spring Training camp.
Gott returns to the District for the second time in his career, as he posted a 7.39 ERA over 28 innings with the Nats from 2016-18. This disappointing performance came on the heels of Gott’s strong 2015 rookie season with the Angels, but after the Nationals acquired the righty in a trade for Yunel Escobar during the 2015-16 offseason, Gott battled injuries and ineffectiveness while being shuttled up and down from the majors and Triple-A.
After being dealt to the Giants prior to the 2019 season, Gott struggled again in 2020 and didn’t pitch in the big leagues at all until resurfacing with the Brewers in 2022. The 2022-23 seasons saw Gott establish himself as a solid innings eater out of the Brewers, Mariners, and Mets bullpens, as Gott delivered a 4.17 ERA, 23.7% strikeout rate, and 6.9% walk rate over 103 2/3 innings.
Despite this success, the Mets chose to non-tender Gott following the 2023 campaign, and he caught on with the Athletics on a one-year, $1.5MM deal for the 2024 season. Unfortunately for Gott, he had to undergo a Tommy John surgery in March 2024, and it has now been over two years since his last appearance in a Major League game. He inked a minor league deal with the Mariners last winter, but after returning to game action at the start of May, Gott had a 7.40 ERA over 20 2/3 innings in the minors.
Now entering his age-33 season and more fully recovered from his TJ procedure, Gott heads to Washington’s camp looking to show what he still has left in the tank. A strong Spring Training might well win Gott a job, as the Nationals have plenty of openings in the bullpen after their relief corps was the league’s worst in 2025. Gott could be one of many veteran pitchers the Nats bring to camp on non-roster invites as they look for some bargains or hidden gems to help round out their pen.
Nationals Depart MASN, Turn Broadcasts To MLB
The Nationals announced Wednesday that they’re stepping away from their local broadcasting deal with the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. Major League Baseball will handle in-market distribution via streaming on the league’s MLB.tv platform and through yet to be announced cable/satellite partnerships. Chelsea Janes of The Washington Post and Mark Zuckerman of MASNsports.com were among those to cover the news.
“Today’s announcement represents a new chapter for Washington Nationals baseball,” owner Mark Lerner said in a press release. “Partnering with MLB offers us several new opportunities that will greatly improve the on-air product, including technological enhancements, the ability to work more closely with our broadcasters, and create added opportunities for our valued corporate partners.”
It officially concludes a fraught relationship with MASN, the network which had been jointly owned by the Nationals and Orioles since the former relocated to D.C. in 2005. Those two decades were marred by disputes over rights fees. The Orioles held a majority stake in the network as a condition of the Nationals relocating into their geographic territory. The sides went to arbitration to resolve calculations over rights fees, and the uncertainty was reportedly a stumbling block in the Lerner family’s efforts to sell the Nationals in 2022. The enmity also kept the teams from making any trades with one another.
David Rubenstein purchased the Orioles from the Angelos family two years later. That allowed for a fresh start in negotiations that resulted in a deal last March resolving all past disputes and settling on fees for the 2025 season. The agreement provided that the Nats could explore other opportunities in ’26.
This comes as the RSN model continues its decline around the league. The Nationals are the seventh team to turn broadcasts over to MLB. The Diamondbacks, Padres, Twins, Guardians, Rockies and Mariners have also done so. Those clubs don’t have the certainty of fixed rights fees because their previous providers were unable to meet their contractual obligations. Most of those organizations had agreements with Main Street Sports, the corporation that operates the FanDuel Sports (formerly Bally Sports) Networks.
Main Street Sports is back in hot water. The company recently missed payments to the Marlins and Cardinals. That led all nine teams that had agreements with Main Street to pull out of their contracts last week. Main Street is seeking a buyer and has otherwise said it plans to shutter operations at the end of the NBA and NHL seasons, which would leave the nine MLB teams in limbo. Evan Drellich of The Athletic writes that Main Street is hoping to renegotiate three-year deals with MLB clubs that would run through the 2028 season. Those could involve a hybrid arrangement that includes some fixed fees and a revenue sharing agreement that responds to the broadcaster’s loss of profits as consumers continue to move away from cable.
Nationals Claim Paxton Schultz
The Nationals announced that they have claimed right-hander Paxton Schultz off waivers from the Blue Jays. The Jays designated the righty for assignment recently when they signed Kazuma Okamoto. The Nats opened a 40-man roster spot earlier today by releasing Sauryn Lao.
Schultz, 28, has a limited big league track record. He made his debut with the Jays in 2025, tossing 24 2/3 innings over 13 appearances. His 4.38 earned run average in that small sample wasn’t especially impressive but his 25.5% strikeout rate and 7.3% walk rate were both better than average. His .333 batting average on balls in play and 65.8% strand rate were both a bit to the unlucky side, which is why his 3.43 SIERA was more optimistic than his actual ERA. He averaged around 94 miles per hour with his four-seamer and sinker while also throwing a cutter, slider and changeup.
He also served a multi-inning role on the farm with fairly comparable results. He logged 49 frames over 25 Triple-A appearances last year with a 3.31 ERA. He struck out 23.6% of batters faced at that level with an 8.7% walk rate.
The Nats had the worst bullpen in the majors last year. Their relief corps had a collective 5.59 ERA for the season, last in the majors by a decent amount. The Rockies, who play in the hitters’ haven of Coors Field, were second-worst with a 5.18 ERA. Washington’s group is arguably even weaker now, as they traded Kyle Finnegan, Luis García and Andrew Chafin at the deadline and Jose A. Ferrer this offseason.
Schultz gives them a fresh arm coming off a decent season. He still has a couple of options remaining, meaning he can be sent to Triple-A and back fairly regularly. He also has less than a year of big league service time, meaning he’s still years away from arbitration and even further from free agency.
Photo courtesy of Dan Hamilton, Imagn Images