Nationals Arm Race

Baseball America just released an updated top 30 rank for all 30 teams in the majors, their first release of updated ranks since they published their big off-season material in January. Unlike some pundits, who barely bother to move prospects in-season, the BA staff did a massive overhaul of our ranks, seemingly re-evaluating the entire top 30, moving prospects in some cases 20+ spots based on the first 6 weeks of the season, to give our system a pretty radical overhaul.

Here’s the current ranks as of today; I’ve included their rank in the Jan 2026 data for comparison purposes, and will then list the next 10 or so names mentioned 5 months ago who are not in the announced top 30 today. I’ll also comment on the movement.

BA 5/18/26 rank	BA 1/28/26 rank	First Name	Last Name	Position
1	1	Eli	Willits	SS
2	2	Jarlin	Susana	RHP (Starter)
3	26	Ronny	Cruz	SS
4	8	Seaver	King	SS
5	9	Devin	Fitz-Gerald	SS
6	4	Luis	Perales	RHP (Starter)
7	6	Travis	Sykora	RHP (Starter)
8	5	Gavin	Fein	SS
9	24	Miguel	Sime Jr.	RHP (Starter)
10	3	Harry	Ford	C
11	15	Ethan	Petry	1B/OF (Corner)
12	7	Alex	Clemmey	LHP (Starter)
13	22	Yeremy	Cabrera	OF (corner)
14	11	Coy	James	SS
15	13	Landon	Harmon	RHP (Starter)
16	10	Luke	Dickerson	SS/CF
17	14	Sam	Peterson	OF (CF)
18	16	Alejandro	Rosario	RHP
19	20	Marconi	German	SS
20	18	Jackson	Kent	LHP (Starter)
21	30	Riley	Cornelio	RHP (Starter)
22	19	Yohandy	Morales	3B
23	12	Angel	Feliz	SS/3B
24	21	Caleb	Lomavita	C
25	23	Samil	Serrano	OF (Corner)
26	25	Jorgelys	Mota	SS
27	29	Yoel	Tejeda Jr.	RHP (Starter)
28	40+	Cayden	Wallace	2B/3B
29	37	Davian	Garcia	RHP (Starter)
30	17	Andrew	Pinckney	OF (Corner)

Here we go. Any stats are as of 5/18/26.

• Willits stays top, as he should. He’s slashing .270/.412/.440 for the season in Low-A when, had he been a normal kid, would be finishing off his High School regular season. He’s also got 24 steals in the first 36 games of the season, on pace to hit a century of SBs (which would have led the entire minor leagues in 2025). No notes.
• Susana stays #2 despite no appearances and no real timeframe for his return. The latest news as of May 5th was that he was “continuing his throwing program.” I mean, ok? it was a Lat surgery, not an arm/shoulder, so that’s one thing. But I was not expecting him to miss months of 2026.
• Ronny Cruz is everyone’s new favorite Nats prospect, and BA gives him major props, moving him from #26 in January to #3 now. Cruz was in the Mike Soroka deal last trade deadline, coming over along with Christian Franklin in a classic “one established prospect and one lottery ticket” trade. Well, that lottery ticket is looking like it’s hitting the Powerball for sure right now.
• Seaver King now in the top 5 as he has a monster slash line right now in AA (.336/.427/.562). It seems like it’s just a matter of time before he gets moved up; the guy playing SS in AAA right now is Trey Lipscomb, who unfortunately seems to have peaked as not even a “4-A guy” having already been outrighted off the 40-man. The “story” on King is that someone in the Nats player development staff tried to get him to “pull the ball in the air more” last year (according to Keith Law), and it took until the AFL for him to get back on track. I hope whoever this Nats PD guy was, is no longer. There remains disagreement in the pundits about just how “good” his defense is (Law says “plus-plus defender” while Longenhagen has him as a 30 grade defender right now … i’m not sure who’s not seeing what the other is seeing here).
• Devin Fitz-Gerald has not shied away from the aggressive promotion to High-A, and is crushing the ball in a pitcher’s park/pitcher’s league. He’s slashing .307/.423/.650 with 11 homers as a 20-year old. He’s played mostly 2B thanks to Angel Feliz’s presence in Wilmington, but has starts at SS and 3B this season. He’s one of 5 prospects we got in the Gore trade, and is the clear leader in the clubhouse for value in that trade. He’s not blocked in AA at all (2B currently manned by a MLFA in Kevin Pichardo, and the guys on the AA infield bench are org-guys who i’m surprised are still in the system).
• Gavin Fein has slipped down a bit from January thanks to a wrist injury that cost him most of April. Jury still out, but he’s just turned 19 so hard to criticize. He’s listed as a SS but has thus far only played RF for Low-A; I wonder if he moves back to the dirt with some coming mid-season promotions (Willits can’t stay in Fredericksburg all year, can he?)
• The next big riser after Cruz is Sime, going from #24 to #9. 44 Ks in 21 innings will do that for you, as will the 101mph fastball he used to strike out J.J. Wetherholt in the Spring Breakout game. Same Wetherholt who was a top-5 prospect in the entire minors and who just got called up. Big arm, big velocity, but not a big track record so far for managing his pitch counts; he’s got 8 starts but just 21 total innings as he is struggling to keep the ball in the strike zone.
• Harry Ford’s awful start has him drop from #3 to #10 on BAs’ list. I had him #2 before the season and that’s aging like … well not aging well at all.
• Petry has earned a jump up the board with a nifty 3/4/5 slash line … he should get promoted ASAP frankly. In fact, AA Harrisburg just put their starting 1B Sam Brown on the DL, so there’s a natural spot open for Petry to get moved up, perhaps by the time you read this since i’m writing this on the monday off-day for the Minors that serves as a nice little promotion travel day for guys.
• Clemmey’s ugly start (28 walks in 28 innings) has dropped him a bit down the board. Every time I write about him I remind people of his age (he’s 20 in AA), but that’s only going to tell part of the story. There’s something missing here in 2026.
• The third major riser in these ranks is Yeremy Cabrera. He absolutely torched Low-A for a month to earn a promotion to High-A. I thought perhaps his promotion would spell the end of the strikeout machine Elijah Green, but they’re still sharing the OF in High-A for now. He’s the 3rd of 5 prospects in the Gore trade, which is looking more and more like a steal the better these guys play.
• Luke Dickerson, despite some decent numbers (an .815 OPS) and others not so decent (45 Ks in 36 games) drops a bit on BA’s list to #16.
• Jackson Kent drops a couple of slots, mostly due to getting layered by the likes of Cruz/Sime/Cabrera, but he’s a sneaky solid prospect putting up very solid numbers in AA right now: 2.35 ERA, 0.88 WHIP, .176 BAA, and a 38/8 K/BB ratio in 30 innings. Maybe we’re looking at the next Andrew Alvarez or Mitchell Parker for the system: an unheralded lefty starter who dominates all the way up while getting little top-prospect buzz until suddenly he’s in the majors.
• Some love for Cornelio, putting him at #21 in recognition of his ascent to the majors. Remember guys … that’s the whole point of prospects! To get them to the majors so they contribute.
• Amazingly … Yohandy Morales was ranked #19 in January and is now #22 on this list. Reminder: his AAA slash line right now is .348/.435/.589. And he plays on the dirt. How is this production DROPPING his prospect ranking? He’s 24! in AAA! Where he’s been since May 23rd of last year. Did Morales like insult the mothers of all these prospect evaluators in the industry? Morales is one injury away from someone like Garcia or Mead from getting added to the 40-man and probably playing every day in the majors. In fact, if the team was smart right now they’d move Garcia back to 2B (where Nunez has a 53 OPS+ figure) and would put Morales into the 1B/DH carousel.
• We mentioned Angel Feliz as being the one who’s blocking Fitz-Gerald from playing his natural SS position; BA doesn’t like Feliz’ start to the season and has dumped him more than 10 spots. Interesting; he’s not hitting THAT bad (.243/.335/.371) to warrant such a precipitous drop.
• Cayden Wallace is the sole player outside the top 40 from January who’s back into the top 30 today, thanks to his excellent start to 2026. He’s slashing .276/.345/.546 with a ton of homers and playing primarily 3B. He’s kind of blocked from moving up (Glasser at 2B and Morales at 3B in AAA), but could see a move if we see a cascading set of promotions that sees Morales head to MLB.
• Davian Garcia is a bit of a divisive prospect, but has moved up 10 spots since January despite somewhat iffy AA numbers to start the season. His ERA is ok at 3.90 but he’s walking nearly a batter an inning and his whip is 1.66.

Here’s the list of players that BA ranked somewhere in the 27-40 range in January who are no longer in the top 30:

• Linan & McGarry: traded and released
• Christian Franklin: was #27 now probably in the low 30s. He’s not really any different from where he was last year; kind of the 7th man on a 7-man OF depth chart on the current 40-man roster, and not really doing anything to improve his lot on life right now in AAA.
• Alvarez was at #31; probably at the same relative spot now.
• Glasser: was #32 but is putting up just a .583 OPS figure in AAA right now playing mostly 2B. He certainly earned his promotion to Rochester and started out last year great, but not much since.
• Others in that 30-40 range include DSL types like De la Cruz, Cortesia, injured arms like Swan and Stuart, and the bonus baby Vaquero, who’s got a mid .500 OPS in High-A.

Highest player I ranked who’s nowhere to be found on either Jan or May 2026 BA list?

• Josh Randall: 4.86 ERA in high-A, but his peripherals make him look a little better. I had him #29 on my list, odds are i’d re rank him 10 spots lower right now.
• Albimec Ortiz, who is on the 40-man and is doing 1B/DH duties in AAA. He’s closer to a DFA than he is to a promotion and this ranking looks terrible just 6 weeks into the season.
• Rafael Ramirez Jr, who was kind of the forgotten prospect in the Lane Thomas trade nearly 2 years ago, has been toiling in the shadow of all our more heralded prospects in Low-A. He can play anywhere on the infield but has struggled to get onto the field ahead of Willits, James, and Dickerson (and not to mention Fein, who’s been relegated to RF to get playing time). Even given that, his numbers are solid so far this year: .269/.432/.433 with more walks than Ks. Maybe we need a promotion to get him more PT.
• Kevin Bazzell is back to producing; the catcher in High-A has a .827 OPS so far this year. Unfortunately, he’s completely blocked upstream, with Ford in AAA and Lomavita in AA requiring full-time play.
• Daniel Hernandez joins three other 2025 IFA guys who are ranked prospects (German, De la Cruz, and Cortesia) in the FCL league that just started. We finally get to see some domestic production from the four best players from that class right now.