The Nats new GM reached back out to his old team and made a trade you just don’t see that often; prospect for prospect, two minor leaguers (essentially) for each other, both of whom are at the cusp of MLB production.
Jake Bennett heads to Boston straight up for Luis Perales a 22yr old RHP starter who got a cup of coffee with Boston this year.
From a prospect ranking perspective, MLBpipeline had Bennett as our #11 and now has Perales as our new #5, so in theory our farm system improves marginally. In reality, whether it was Bennett or Perales in our AAA rotation to start 2026, both would be expected to matriculate up this year. Perales is only 22 as an international signee, and has more upside/more risk, while Bennett is considered more floor/more consistent.
Keith Law had some interesting analysis in the immediate wake of the trade, noting that Bennett (and the Nats pitching dev staff) had done little to improve upon his offerings in his time here (either in terms of velocity or adding breaking pitches), whereas Boston has had success in helping its arms improve. Something to think about; Boston must have seen something it thinks it can improve upon with Bennett, while Toboni rolls the dice on a higher upside arm that he’s familiar with.
Here’s what our rough SP depth chart looks like right now on the 40-man:
- Likely opening day rotation: Gore, Grey, Cavalli, Alvarez/Irvin/Parker competition
- Likely starters->bullpen: McGarry, Lord, Williams
- To the DL: Herz
- To AAA: Perales, Lao, Eder, Cornelio
That’s not a bad AAA rotation to start, adding to it Luckham, Shuman, and Ogasawara as 5th candidates
Anyway, odds are we’re not done seeing trades. Big question is whether he will move Gore now or try to leverage desperate teams at the 2026 trade deadline … and if he can convince other teams that Abrams is really a shortstop.
I have recently discovered the baseball trade value site and find a few things interesting.
Alvarez is rated higher than Bennett; Abrams is rated higher than Gore; the Nats came out ahead on both of their recent trades.
I’m not sure what to make of it but there seems to be validity to it.
FredMD
16 Dec 25 at 11:44 am
I think this trade is really good example of the relief valuation conundrum we were discussing last week.
Everyone seems to agree that Bennett is more likely to stick as a starter but less likely to develop into an elite pitcher regardless of role. Based on what I’ve seen/read, I prefer Bennett. Not by a ton, but if both of these arms were in the system, I’d definitely have Bennett ranked higher.
Now I’m wondering if that may be based on an outdated sense of the WAR equivalence where even a mediocre innings eating SP4/5 is basically as valuable as an elite reliever. And yet with the Ferrer trade and others we’ve clearly seen teams value solid or better relievers more than their expected WAR would imply.
Here’s some hypothetical probabilities. Let’s even cap both upsides and say each has a 20% chance of being an SP3 or better. Let’s say that Bennett has a 30% chance of being backend starter, a 30% chance of being an up-and-down SP6 and a 20% chance of busting. Perales has a 20% of being a very good reliever, a 20% chance of being a usable bullpen piece and a 40% chance of busting.
By WAR, this works out for Bennett to generate 20%*3+30%*1.5+30%*.7 = 1.26 expected WAR per season. Perales, meanwhile, gets only 20%*3+20%*1+20%*0.5 = 0.9. (Feel free to suggest another set of probabilities or outcomes – this is just meant as an example, though approximately 1 WAR / year is probably about what I’d expect from most FV45s.) That valuation slightly but clearly prefers Bennett, and those numbers line up pretty close my intuitive sense of the trade.
But I’d contend that teams clearly value their 0.5 – 1 WAR relievers more than they value 1 WAR starters or position players. I’m not entirely sure why, and I’d be very interested in a mathematical model that makes sense of this. Maybe it’s as simple as the public systems using the wrong replacement values. Perhaps we need to look to leverage and usage flexibility as value-adds. But in the meantime, even if we don’t understand why, I think we have to reckon with the fact that this is how the actual marketplace values these players.
SMS
16 Dec 25 at 1:05 pm
Funny that Longenhagen over at FanGraphs had basically the exact opposite take on the trade: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-red-sox-and-nationals-trade-big-league-ready-pitching-prospects
He reported that Bennett came back with increased velocity from TJ. He also preferred Bennett’s upside to Perales’.
With that said, Longenhagen caught Bennett in AFL, whereas Law was likely to have seen Bennett in Wilmington, so maybe they can both be right?
Will
16 Dec 25 at 3:53 pm
I never had much faith that Bennett was more than the next Jake Irvin. That type of player is fine if you don’t plan on contending, but I had difficulty seeing a lot of ceiling.
I have no idea whether they got something “better” in Perales. Time will tell.
As Will and I both noted at Nats Prospects, this does seem like a yet another move that kicks the can on down the road at least a couple of years at the MLB level. Law makes a similar inference.
The other thing is that higher-ceiling guys generally have more trade value, so while this may seem like a more-or-less equal-value deal right now, Perales may help bring back something better on down the road.
KW
16 Dec 25 at 8:21 pm
Todd, if that’s the “Likely opening day rotation,” then Toboni hasn’t done his job. The conundrum, of course, is that they need to improve but also likely will be trying to make that improvement with Gore subtracted from the equation.
Alas, several of the free agent pitchers at the level I hoped they would sign a couple are coming off the board, with the Nats not even in play. They have taken a flyer (as of today) on Japanese league success Foster Griffin, a 30-year-old lefty who . . . has a profile that looks similar to Bennett’s. Griffin is said to have placed a priority on signing with a team where he has a good chance to start.
KW
16 Dec 25 at 8:39 pm
@kw … well, yea. I should have said “if the season started tomorrow, the opening day rotation would be …”
That opening day roster may get worse before it gets better.
Todd Boss
17 Dec 25 at 8:47 am
Todd, on the bright side, you don’t necessarily even need to sign good players to outperform Williams’ 6.21 ERA, Parker’s 5.68 ERA and Irvin’s 5.70 ERA from last year. You just need average or below average starters, not some of the league’s worst.
Among SPs with at least 70 IP, these three were 8th, 15th and 14th worst (out of 200, so sub 10th percentile) in the majors, respectively. Those 3 accounted for literally half of the team’s starts (80) last season. League average ERA was 4.16. All it takes is just signing guys were are only below average to pretty significantly improve the rotation.
If we could assemble a rotation of basically league average players (guys like Soroka, so I’m not even talking about big expensive signings), the team would improve massively. Still not good enough for contention, but at least we wouldn’t be at risk of 100 losses.
Unfortunately, it looks like we’re in for another year of reclamation projects. Let’s hope Griffin can net us something even better than Franklin/Cruz in July.
Will
17 Dec 25 at 10:04 am
Does anyone know what Griffin’s long term control looks like?
He’s old, but he only has 1 year of MLB service. And he was only overseas for 3 years, so he hasn’t earned free agent rights as a foreign professional either.
His contract definitely was reported as a 1 year deal and not as an IFA bonus with the usual amateur contract. Does anyone know how that’s possible? And what are the Nat’s rights and options next year and beyond?
SMS
17 Dec 25 at 12:40 pm
He’ll become a free agent. For example, Scott McGough returned from Japan after bouncing around in the minors for years (also with less than 10 MLB IP). He was there for 4 seasons, then signed a 2 year deal with the Diamondbacks. When those 2 years ended he hit free agency (and signed a new minor league deal with Arizona).
On options, I think we’d retain Griffin’s two remaining. To continue the McGough comparison, it looks like he was optioned to AAA in 2024, while still on that 2 year MLB deal.
Will
17 Dec 25 at 4:57 pm
If Griffin is doing well in June/July, I’d look to extend him, not trade him. That’s not exactly a position of depth.
Assuming Gore is traded, we’re currently looking at a rotation of Gray, Cavalli, Griffin, and . . . They really need a ready-now starter in return for Gore and/or Abrams. Herz hopefully will be ready by mid-season. I wonder whether Irvin has any trade value as I’m not excited about the Nats using him as a starter or reliever. I’m curious to see how Parker’s funk works in relief.
As Will notes, it wouldn’t take much to improve on last season’s starters. That said, even a set of “league-average” starters isn’t what they need to contend. Gray’s career FIP is 5.51, and neither Cavalli nor Griffin has proven anything at the MLB level.
In short, there’s still a lot of rotation-building work to be done for the club to get to decent. They need some arm health and some breaks mixed in with trades and free agents.
KW
17 Dec 25 at 5:40 pm
@Will – Fair enough, but how does that work?
As near as I can tell, he’s a minor league free agent who was in demand enough to negotiate a guaranteed $5M.
But normally minor league free agents are still subject to arbitration and control regulations until they earn major league free agency or get DFA’d off the 40-man roster.
Right? If Orelvis Martinez makes the team, he doesn’t become a free agent at the end of the season, does he? What’s different about Griffin?
The Scott McGough example does seem to be a parallel, as he was never DFA’d. He became a free agent when AZ declined a team option in Nov 24. He also signed a MiFA deal with AZ later that offseason for $1.25M – so unless AZ desperately needed the roster spot, they didn’t have the option of keeping him on as pre-arb, where he would have been cheaper and easier.
So I’m sure you’re right, but I still don’t understand why.
SMS
17 Dec 25 at 8:11 pm
Griffin: as best as I can tell from Roster Resource/Cots, here’s how his career has gone:
– Drafted 2014
– Added to their 40-man Nov 2019 to avoid Ruile5
– Signed 1yr pre-Arb deal Feb 2020, burns first option, gets a month of service time in September
– then DFA’d and non-tendered after 2020 season. Interestingly, he wasn’t outrighted, which I think KC could have done. Or, maybe not, b/c 202 would have been his 6th pro season, but he was a HS signee, so they could have controlled him for one more year.
– He then signs right back with KC a new MLFA deal. So now he’s a year to year MLFA. But, after 2021 he would have been that anyway. Maybe this was a pre-arranged deal to free up 40-man space.
– Plays in their minors all of 2021
– signes a MLFA deal with Toronto for 2022
– Added to 40-man and gets a year of service time in 2022, then released to go to Japan.
So, now he’s a 30-yr old one-year FA who has 1.034 days of service time and 2 options.
It’s a decent question; normally he’d be subject to arbitration. I bet the Nats could tender him a contract and offer him arbitration for 2027 but he’d likely reject it to retain his freedom.
Todd Boss
18 Dec 25 at 10:04 am
I’m pretty confident that being a year-to-year minor league free agent doesn’t suffice. Joey Meneses, for example, was very clearly still under the typical control restrictions after he made the team with the Nats.
Playing in Asia seems to be key to this weird loophole.
Incidentally, I’d think that coming back with full major league free agency rights would make playing a season or two in Japan very attractive.
Obviously, there’s a capped level of talent that ever reaches MiFA (or is voluntarily released to pursue an opportunity overseas), but you’d have to extremely confident that you’d have better dev support in the minor leagues to prefer “sign a minor league FA deal and, if I can improve to a 1+ WAR/yr player, I’ll get 2-3 years of pre-arb and probably age out of my prime sometime during the arb years” over “sign with a Japanese team and, if I can improve to a 1+ WAR/yr player, come back and immediately be able to get paid ~$8M per WAR”.
SMS
18 Dec 25 at 11:35 am
I asked the RosterResource guys at FG, and they said it’s a negotiated clause in the contract routinely included for players coming from (or back from) Asia.
Which I think means that any player not under contract could negotiate a similar clause, but typically only Asian professionals have enough clout to do so.
Now what I’m wondering is if a rule blocks any draftee from playing a couple of years in Japan and coming straight over. Maybe you need to be 25 years old to dodge IFA bonus restrictions, but still, imagine a very high profile college player. The typical path is: drafted at 21 for, say, a $7M bonus and then paid $50k for a 2-3 years and then paid 800k for 2-3 years and then 3-4 years of wages depressed through arbitration. Can’t choose what city you live and work in until you’re 30.
Or skip the draft, go to Japan. Get paid $500k (conservative guess – a player with decent hype might clear $1M/year even without MLB experience) for 3-4 years, and come back as a 25 year old unrestricted free agent. Even if you’re only able to secure a $2M/1 type tryout deal that first year, you’d own your potential upside and that would be hugely valuable.
Maybe there’s a worry that the Japanese dev system wouldn’t be as good, but they are producing plenty of players that MLB wants to sign, so there’s got to be some profiles for whom that would make sense.
SMS
18 Dec 25 at 3:17 pm
SMS, read up on Carter Stewart. He attempted to do just this, though he seems content to stay in Japan. There will certainly have been commentary on how he could/n’t circumvent the rules by going to Japan after getting drafted.
Will
18 Dec 25 at 4:30 pm
@Will – Thanks for that. Very interesting. It sounds like his scenario is working out along the lines that I hypothesized.
He was younger than my example, so he’s had to stay in Japan a lot longer than I was thnking to be old enough. Probably only reaching FA a year or so ahead of schedule.
On the other hand, he’s also made out better in Japan than I was thinking these players would. His initial deal was $6M/4 and his extension was another $10M/2. So he’s made basically the same as he’d have made in bonus and arbitration and he’s reaching FA year early. I can’t imagine he has many regrets.
I think it makes even more sense for a college player and I’m surprised no one else has taken that path since.
SMS
18 Dec 25 at 5:21 pm
Let’s start by Griffin being decent before we worry so much about what comes next. 😉 Before three days ago none of us had ever even heard of him!
For what little it’s worth, all the more trying to project stats while coming from Japan, Fangraphs (Steamer) is pretty bullish on him: 2.1 fWAR, 3.92 ERA, 3.98 WHIP.
KW
18 Dec 25 at 9:02 pm
On another post, I had mentioned the Phillies as a potential suitor for Gore’s services. With the addition of Kilambi in the front office, I wonder whether that might become more of a possibility.
The Phils would be very high on any list of win-now teams. Their roster is filled with guys in their 30s. They also have at least two premium prospects with whom to start conversations: Andrew Painter (SP) and Aidan Miller (SS/3B). I doubt you could get both for Gore, but you could get one plus a couple of other pieces, and Kilambi would know those pieces well.
Flipping Gore’s two years of control for Painter’s six would make a lot of sense.
Painter plus Justin Crawford for Gore — who says no?
KW
19 Dec 25 at 2:21 pm
Put me firmly in the “Andrew Painter is the most overrated prospect in baseball” camp. Painter had a historically good 2022. Like Travis Sykora 2024-2025 good. Really, really good. The problem is that he has never again replicated that. He was injured for the entirety of 2023 and again 2024. He came back in 2025, and was a shell of his former self. His stuff and velo was down, and he just wasn’t very good. At all. He had a 5.40 ERA AND 4.94 FIP in AAA. Back in 2022, Painter was a revelation, but like thousands of arms before him, injuries have taken their toll. What drives me nuts, though, is that Painter has been weirdly impervious to getting docked in prospect ratings. He has now been a pro for over 4 seasons, and has exactly one good season to show for it. He didn’t throw a single inning for 2 whole years and still managed to stick around most top 10/20 overall prospect lists. Meanwhile, Sykora has only missed 2 months and he’s already dropped off some top 100 lists. Whoever does PR for Painter or the Phillies should get hired by the Nats, because Painter is the most unjustified top prospect I’ve ever seen.
Yes, there’s a chance Painter regains his 2022 level. But odds are way stronger that the several significant injuries have taken their toll, and he’s just not very special any more. That risk isn’t worth top 100 prospect value to me.
I still think the Red Sox are a good trade partner, despite the Bennett deal. Cubs, Diamondbacks, and maybe the Giants too? The Dodgers can never have enough riches either…
Will
21 Dec 25 at 9:26 am
LOL, I confess to having some similar reaction to looking at Painter’s numbers vs. what the gurus have to say. (Law still had him #7 overall in his midseason update.)
Some AAA numbers from 2025:
A: 5.40 ERA, 4.90 FIP, 1.55 WHIP, 9.37 K9, 3.88 BB9, age 22
C: 5.35 ERA, 4.26 FIP, 1.55 WHIP, 9.97 K9, 3.74 BB9, age 26
If you believe Cavalli (C) is an MLB starter, then you can believe that Painter (A) is as well. (I’ve never been fully convinced about Cavalli.)
The reason I pointed toward Painter is that he’s the highest-rated SP among the prospects of the teams that make the most sense as a trade partner for Gore, unless the Mets want to upgrade from Nolan McLean to more of a ready-now sure thing. MLB.com is really the only shop that is high on McLean, though.
Of course it would be really ironic if the Mariners were to trade Kade Anderson for Gore. He’s not as close to MLB-ready as I’d like, but I’d take it.
KW
21 Dec 25 at 11:47 am
Pretty surprising to see the White Sox of all teams sign Murakami for only 2/$34m. For that measly of a deal, I sincerely hope the Nats were in for him too. The White Sox aren’t in a much different position than the Nats. At best, they’ll be competitive in 2027, the year Murakami’s contract ends, so this isn’t exactly an enticing deal. More likely, they offered him guaranteed playing time to give him a chance to showcase himself for a big payday at age 27. The Nats could’ve made that same kind of offer. Too bad.
Will
22 Dec 25 at 10:25 am
On Murakami, there was reporting that there were teams that were interested in offering a longer term contract with a lower AAV, but that Murakami left money on the table to bet on himself. It’s quite possible that the Nationals were one of those teams. Certainly a longer term deal would make sense with the Nats looking to open a window. And Toboni has said that he plans to be in the Asian market, although he also said that right now their priority is to get the organization up and running as quickly as possible.
John C.
22 Dec 25 at 10:51 am
Like I’ve often said – for any given player there are all kinds of perfectly fair justifications why a deal doesn’t work out. But when it doesn’t work out for any of them, the most likely explanation is that the team is unwilling to spend money.
Maybe they’re merely tanking and intend to spend money in a few years, which is not behavior I want from ownership but not the absolute worst case scenario. The worst case is the other option: that they’re committed to rent seeking long term. And I refuse to spend my time and attention supporting a team run that way.
SMS
22 Dec 25 at 11:45 am
( a bit late to this discussion)
re Carter Stewart, I wrote about him here in May 2019 when he started his Japan gambit. https://www.nationalsarmrace.com/?p=15806
Basically, in 2019 he committed to a 6-year $7M deal in Japan, then re-signed a 2yr/$10M extension for 2025-26 but missed the entire 2025 season with an abdominal injury.
I still think, based on the logic I laid out in the 2019 piece, that he’s probably “ahead” of where he would have been had he signed with a MLB team, in terms of money and free agency eligibility.
Todd Boss
22 Dec 25 at 6:59 pm
It is worth remembering that Toboni was part of the Bosox team that flushed $90 million down the Masataka Yoshida toilet. That would make anyone a little gun-shy of the Asian market.
Murakami has frightening K numbers. The Nats already have one of those guys in the middle of their lineup.
KW
23 Dec 25 at 9:29 am
@KW + John C – now do one on why O’Hearn isn’t a good fit and why we should be glad the Lerners aren’t wasting $30M on him.
Look, I admit that I don’t know all of the machinations involved, and I can imagine plausible courses of action where I’ll have to come back here and give a mea culpa, but I think we should all be realistic and recognize that it is way way more likely that the plan is to cover 1B with spare parts.
SMS
23 Dec 25 at 3:09 pm
@Todd – thanks for linking to your old coverage of Stewart. I’m right with you in terms of amateur players trying to fight back after being screwed repeatedly in CBA after CBA. I would absolutely love it if 2 or 3 of the top profile guys started rejecting the draft in favor of Japan every year. And I’m a little confused why no one has followed Stewart’s path. Maybe folks are waiting to see if he’s blackballed by the cartel or if he’s actually able to execute the return. Because you would be sacrificing a fair bit of upside if you had to stay in Japan for most or all of your career.
I do wonder why you think that Japan path more attractive for high school players than college ones. The standard control covers at least half of college draftee’s primes and often more. The Japan short cut gets you free agency in 4 years instead of 8 or 9. I get that high school draftees are held down in the minors longer, and avoiding that would be attractive, but the most important lever in terms of expected future earnings is age when FA is reached. And while the year or 2 HS draftees get is nice, those 5 years college draftees recapture could be easily worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
But, either way, I love it and I’ll be rooting for Stewart if/when he comes back stateside.
SMS
23 Dec 25 at 3:22 pm
Because 2/$29M is a lot to pay for a 32-year-old who Steamer projects at just 1.1 fWAR and 13 homers. Murakami certainly would have a higher potential ceiling than O’Hearn, but also a lower floor if he can’t make contact.
You could probably get more production than O’Hearn from Hoskins or maybe even Goldy for a lot less.
Look, I want as much as anyone else for the Nats to start spending. It’s going to be hard for Toboni to build a contender with the Foster Griffins of the world.
There’s also the “suck tax” to consider, as we’ve discussed. O’Hearn was projected to get 2/$24M, so the Bucs paid a suck tax of $5M. Is he worth it? Probably not. But do I envy that Pittsburgh actually seems to be sorta trying? Yes.
I’d send Lile to camp with a 1B mitt. I know he’s not the length that would be ideal for the stretch, but what’s lost in terms of the stretch likely would be less than what’s lost by letting him continue to play OF.
KW
23 Dec 25 at 9:16 pm
@SMS: I think the answer to, “why don’t more people go to Japan” is simple: its freaking Japan! Halfway around the world, new culture, new language. Without sounding too stereotypical … American prep baseball prospects from typically baseball states like North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Texas, Louisiana, etc aren’t exactly known for their cosmopolitan approaches to life.
As for why Japan is better, lets play the typical career and compare Japan to D1 to Prep:
– IFA: sign at 16, rule-5 eligible four years later. Added to 40-man at 20, play 3 more years in minors before out of options=23, 3 years pre-arb=26, 3 years arb to FA = 29.
– Prep: sign at 18, rule-5 eligible four years later. Added to 40-man at 22, play 3 more years in minors before out of options, now you’re 25; 3 years pre-arb = 28, 3 years arb to FA at end of age 31 season.
– D1: sign at 21, rule-5 eligible three years later: added to 40-man at 24, play 3 more years in minors before out of options = 27, 3 years pre-arb = 30, 3 years arb = 33. Its actually WORSE than for a prep kid
– Japan/Stewart plan: sign 6year $7M deal at 19, play out contract to 25: complete Free agent.
Stewart made $7M by the time he was 25; if he had signed as a prep, at age 25 he’d have just finished his third year of pre-arb salary, or around $750k/year, after 3 years of absolute pittance in the low minors. He would have had a signing bonus though … but 1st round signing bonus plus 4 years of non-arb pay plus 3 arb years is not anywhere close to $7M. AND he’s a FA at that point, not pre-arb. If he’s worth $10M/year at age 25, he gets $10M a year. If a pre-arb guys is worth $10M on the open market, for hte next three seasons he’ll earn $4M/$6M/$8M.
Todd Boss
24 Dec 25 at 1:35 pm
Shoot, don’t sent LIle (5’11” soaking wet) with a 1B mitt; send James frigging Wood (6’7″) with the mitt.
Todd Boss
24 Dec 25 at 1:36 pm
I don’t claim to be a great reader/understander of defensive stats, but most claim that Lile is worse than Wood, perhaps significantly so. That’s the basis of my argument.
Also, there are plenty of first basemen who weren’t really tall. Bagwell and Palmiero (3 GG) are listed at 6-0, as were Gehring and Killebrew, as was Keith Hernandez, one of the defensive greats at the position (11 GG). Steve Garvey was (maybe) 5-10 (4 GG).
KW
25 Dec 25 at 5:13 pm
Speaking as a life-long infielder … when we stuck my 5’9″ buddy at 1B, it’s an awfully small target over there 🙂
https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders/major-league?pos=all&stats=fld&lg=all&type=1&season=2025&season1=2025&ind=0&startdate=&enddate=&month=0&team=24&qual=0&sortcol=12&sortdir=default&pagenum=1
There’s our entire 2025 team at Fangraphs defensively. Luis Garcia was an astounding -17 in DRS .. at 2B! Do you know how bad a defender you have to be, to be that low in DRS from that position? That’s amazing. LIle indeed had a -10 DRS in 445 innings, while Wood was actually right at a 1 DRS in more than 1,000 OF innings.
Fair enough. I had no idea Lile was that bad defensively. Honestly what the team should be doing is this:
– if we’re gonna keep Garcia, stick HIM at 1B
– find a 2B on the FA market
– Keep Abrams at SS until we can move him, then let someone else realise how bad he is there.
– Lile bounces between 1B, LF, and DH.
A sad state of affairs, when Brad Lord is your 2nd best fielder via DRS.
Todd Boss
27 Dec 25 at 7:42 pm