So, we knew going in that 2026 was going to be another lost season. We could tell from the HS-heavy focus on players they drafted in June 2025, from the lack of any spending this off-season, and now by the increasingly curious moves they’re making in spring training.
And, honestly, I don’t entirely get what the team is doing.
The strategy should be simple: if you have no aims to compete, play the kids.
Instead, the team has endeavored to fill the MLB roster with veteran retreads. Instead of seeing if our younger arms like Parker, Lord, or Alvarez can prove out, or to let Josiah Grey get back to being his opening day starter self, we’re going to give starts to innings eaters like Mikolas, Griffen, and Littell.
Instead of having top-prospects like Crews and Hassell getting MLB at-bats, we’re going to apparently give the likes of Christian Franklin and waiver-claim Joey Wiemer those opportunities. We’re still claiming random middle infielders off other team’s waiver wires, and are quickly putting together a roster of randoms instead of a roster of home-growns. They did five waiver claims in a week and a half, then turned around and DFA’d most of them for other moves, making us (i’m sure) super popular reputation-wise in the player base.
What is this front office doing??
Are they planning on letting all these 30-something 1yr FAs showcase as trade bait in a few months? Is that what all of this is?
Because, I’ll tell you, the team this front office is putting on the field at the expense of home grown talent that the fan base actually knows, after years of trading away all their stars, is going to literally repel the casual fan. Who is going to look at the probable pitchers and say to themselves, “Oh man, we gotta go see 37yr old Miles Mikolas pitch today!”
What exactly does Crews or Hassell have left to prove in AAA? Or Alvarez, or Grey, or Parker? Eder is now 27; he NEEDS to be in the majors. They just optioned Fernandez: he’s 30. If he can’t cut it at this point, then just release him.
I dunno. This entire spring has been one small hint after another that this was the trend, but Crews’ demotion sealed it. There’s very little exciting to this MLB team this year, except maybe to see if Cavalli’s spring dominance can continue, or to see if House can turn the corner. Otherwise … it’s seemingly going to be a long year.
playing the kids is as simple as filling out names on a lineup card. developing the kids is what this group wants to do.
Crews needs to get his head on straight and Hassell needs to learn to hit lefties. if they can’t do it in AAA then they won’t be able to do it in MLB. right now Franklin is a valid prospect, Wiemer is a lottery ticket if he can develop his power stroke.
it’s along season, where they are in April is meaningless.
FredMD
23 Mar 26 at 9:21 am
Weirdly, Crews is one where I can see the logic. Not sure I agree – but it’s not unreasonable to think he’ll develop better in AAA and, if so, this is the correct move regardless of how it looks to the casual fan.
On the SPs, I’m with you but I think all the team is thinking is that these are good trade chips if any of them show well. (Plus you can steal 7th years from all those homegrown pitchers while you’re at it.)
Trading Liñan for Vivas is one of the most perplexing moves I’ve ever seen. Liñan isn’t a great prospect, but he’s rated at least as high as Vivas ever was, he’s younger and has higher error bars, he doesn’t require a roster spot until next offseason (and will have 3 options at that point) and he plays a position where you need limitless depth. Vivas is basically the same player as Tena, though maybe slightly worse.
If he was a wire pickup 4 weeks ago, would any of us even think he was a coinflip to make the team? Signing Orelvis Martinez made sense; this does not.
SMS
23 Mar 26 at 12:27 pm
I just don’t see the logic of Crews, Hassell, Parker, or Grey in AAA. Hassell last year in AAA; 310/.383/.456 mostly as a 23yr old. What exactly is he going to “learn” down there? Yes Parker sucked last year in the MLB but he was adequate in 2024, so how are they going to tell which version is the true one going forward? What does Alvarez have left to prove in AAA after he dominated in Sept in the majors?
What they’ve done is attempt to win 65 games instead of 60 by loading up on 30-yr old retread starters who I don’t think they can get a dime for in trade.
Orelvis Martinez? Released yesterday, fyi.
Todd Boss
23 Mar 26 at 12:54 pm
Orelvis Martinez may have been released, but at least we didn’t trade Ronny Cruz for him! With these FO, I guess we have to consider that a win.
And the idea with Crews isn’t that he’s going to learn anything from AAA competition, it’s that he’ll have space and support to figure out dev stuff with the coaches without having to face ML pitching or deal with ML publicity. You can be skeptical about that, but it’s a situation where we know a lot less than the team and at least from my POV their theory of the case doesn’t seem to be ridiculous on its face.
SMS
23 Mar 26 at 1:01 pm
Some of these make sense. Crews is doing terribly and needs to get right without being on TV every night. Maybe he’ll figure it out, maybe he won’t. I heard he’s resistant to coaching.
This Vivas thing, however, makes no sense at all. They traded one lottery ticket and DFA’d another one for.. a slightly better Tena?
I wonder what’s going to happen when some of these guys don’t pan out in 3 years. Are they going to do another 6 years of 100 losses? This isn’t fucking Pittsburgh – the Lerners really need to sell to someone who’ll hire baseball players.
Anonymous
23 Mar 26 at 5:05 pm
So … the Grey comment didn’t age well: Flexor sprain. Great. Might as well light the rest of his Nats career on fire.
This front office is addicted to waiver claims. Since Jan 1st: Weimer, Schultz, Gasper, Varland, Chang, Lovelady, Soriano, Waldichuk.
We might as well be the Cleveland Indians from Major League. “Who the F*ck are these guys?”
Todd Boss
24 Mar 26 at 9:16 am
As far as Crews “looking bad” in spring training … how many times have we been told that spring training stats are meaningless?
https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2026-spring-training-batting.shtml
Wood’s spring training slash line: .136/.240/.273. Gee, i guess we should send him to AAA too. Young was 4 for 44. 4 for 44!! Why is he starting? Weimer, who they just sent Crews down so that he could make the team? .154/.267/.359. Lile hit .200 for the spring. So, apologies if i’m calling bullsh*t on sending crews down because he had a .103/.206/.103 slash line. There’s something else going on.
Todd Boss
24 Mar 26 at 9:21 am
Not for nothing, but the Nats have also now created themselves a massive logjam in AAA for playing time. AAA now has these OF on the roster: Hassell, Pinckney, Crews, Franklin, Glasser (plus 3 others who likely get whacked or sent down). All five of those guys really kind of need to play to continue forward progress. We can’t just hide one of them at DH all the time b/c we also have multiple 1B in AAA (Morales, Ortiz, and Mervis if he stays).
So, who plays and who sits? Hassell, Grews, and Franklin all have MLB time. Pinckney has been in AAA two years now and Glasser is your minor league POTY.
Todd Boss
24 Mar 26 at 9:25 am
I’ll admit that I’m confused by some moves. Like SMS, I genuinely don’t understand the Vivas trade, when the club already has Tena. I also am perplexed by the lengths the team has gone to NOT DFA Joey Wiemer, to remain our 8th best OF on the 40 man (a full 20% of our players on the 40 man are outfielders!!!).
But it (mostly) makes some sense when you realize that Toboni has absolutely no intent to compete before at the earliest 2029. All his moves this offseason, with the exception of Ford, were to acquire players who will, at best, reach the majors in 2+ years, and he’s now done his best to also push Ford’s competitive window as long as possible to try and align him with the likes of Fien, Fitz-gerald, Rosario, etc. and the recent crop of extremely young draft picks.
So, that means showcasing the talent that is already here for trades. Toboni just did an interview where he said he hasn’t had ANY discussions about extensions with our current players. That means Abrams and, yes, Wood are on the trade block, since their control can’t be delayed long enough to line up with the competitive window in the 2030s. So they’ll return prospects who do align, like Gore and Ferrer already did.
This also means delaying the team controlled years for the players that aren’t quite (nearly) finished products, like Crews, Hassell, Herz, Perales, Ford, etc., who on a normal team approaching the end of a rebuild would be given ample playing time. The goal is to keep them in the minors for as long as possible to inch them ever so closer to contributing to the 2030s core. A season of Crews in the minors in 2026, means a season of Crews in the majors in 2031, hopefully along side Willits, Fien, Sykora and Susana, rather than alongside the bunch of misfit toys of 2026.
But as a result, the 2026 (and 2027 and 2028) major league roster is just basically a trade showcase. Farm-grown players like Irvin, Ribalta or Garcia are just being used to hopefully be traded at a later date. And AAAA waiver or FA pick ups are being used to hopefully be the next Amed Rosario, Andrew Chafin, or Alex Call to replenish the farm for the future.
It’s really bleak for a very long time, but in the absence of free agency spending, there’s no other choice. You need to direct ALL efforts towards a home-grown turnaround, and given that we’ve started from such a disadvantageous place, it’s going to take a long, long time to see the returns on becoming a “player development monster” as Toboni likes to put it. Normally you don’t embark on a rebuild like this after 6 consecutive losing seasons, and yet because of Rizzo’s incompetence and the Lerners’ cheapness, here we are staring down another half decade of futility.
Will
24 Mar 26 at 10:05 am
I HATE the Vivas for Linan trade. Linan tore up A-ball pitching last year as a 21yr old; we flip him for a backup infielder with middling stats and no options?? WTF. It makes NO sense to me; you can’t claim you’re building for the future and then trade away a future asset for something that only helps you in the present … and which overlaps existing personnel.
Trading Linan for Vivas makes sense if you’re a 90 win team and you don’t love Tena and you want to marginally improve your bench.
I just don’t get it. But it does make me think of one, kind of shuddering thought: this front office has NO TIES to any player here before they got here. Crews was our all-in 2nd overall pick, a darling of the previous regime … he wasn’t “their guy.” Is a Crews demotion a tacit washing of the hands type move, separating themselves from what they perceive to be prior mistakes? Rutledge demotion is exactly that; a 1st round pick who has really, really disappointed for years and years now.
just a thought.
Todd Boss
25 Mar 26 at 10:04 am
Todd, on your last point, I don’t think that the idea that they have not ties/commitment to players from the prior regime is a shuddering thought. There used to be a lot of criticism on the InterNats of Rizzo for “stubbornly sticking with his guy(s).” It seems a bit odd to then criticize Toboni for not sticking with Rizzo’s guys.
Nor to I have any sense that Toboni is actively biased against “Rizzo’s guys.” He’s sung praises of Cade Cavalli, for example. I believe the right approach is to have a dispassionate analysis of the merits of each player and where they fit into the next Nats contending team. I have no reason to believe that this is not the approach that Toboni is taking.
John C.
25 Mar 26 at 4:28 pm
About Crews and spring training stats — sure the top line numbers don’t matter in March. But Zuck was saying he was taking bad swings, making bad contact, and swinging at crap. Clearly something’s really not right, and he’s being sent down for an overhaul. I have no problem trying to do that out of the spotlight. If you think he’s got a really high ceiling, then that’s what you do.
Wil’s analysis is what bothers me. If the current FO doesn’t expect to be able to hire anyone good until 2028, blech. I might as well just give up and follow curling.
Kevin R
26 Mar 26 at 10:47 am