{"id":18783,"date":"2025-01-24T12:55:05","date_gmt":"2025-01-24T17:55:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=18783"},"modified":"2025-01-24T12:55:05","modified_gmt":"2025-01-24T17:55:05","slug":"st-2025-nri-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=18783","title":{"rendered":"ST 2025 NRI Analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/House-Brady-via-primetimesportstalk.com_.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/House-Brady-via-primetimesportstalk.com_.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-17188\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/House-Brady-via-primetimesportstalk.com_.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/House-Brady-via-primetimesportstalk.com_-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">House is the highest profile NRI this year. \n Photo via primetimesportstalk.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>You know we&#8217;re getting close to Spring Training when the annual press release goes out announcing Non-Roster Spring Training Invitees (NRIs).  The Nats <a href=\"https:\/\/www.masnsports.com\/blog\/nationals-announce-2025-spring-training-non-roster-invitees#:~:text=The%20Washington%20Nationals%20announced%20their,Mike%20Rizzo%20made%20the%20announcement.&amp;text=C%3A%20Andrew%20Knizner%2C%20Caleb%20Lomavita%2C%20Max%20Romero%20Jr.\">announced the initial crop this week<\/a>, immediately forgot at least a couple guys who have ST invites on their transactions page, and probably will add more as they sign up veteran FAs, but for now here&#8217;s who we  have:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Note: the NRIs are <a href=\"https:\/\/docs.google.com\/spreadsheets\/d\/186nm-v5F-zTCoR2Be7TFYM3e2cZ-gYi2WVqJLEkHdmc\/edit?usp=sharing\">color coded purple on the Big Board<\/a> for tracking)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Starting Pitchers: Brad Lord, Tyler Stuart, Konnor Pilkington, Jarlin Susana, Joan Adon,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Relief pitchers: Daison Acosta, Marquis Grissom Jr., Clay Helvey, Jack Sinclair,,<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Catchers: Andrew Knizner, Caleb Lomavita, Max Romero Jr., and Brad Lindsley (left off Nats announcement)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Infielders:<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Brady House, Yohandy Morales, Cayden Wallace<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Outfielders: Daylen Lile, Andrew Pinckney, Franchy Cordero (left off press release)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The list includes a huge chunk of our projected AAA roster: i&#8217;d say of the 16 NRIs listed here, 14 of them will be in AAA to start the year.  In fact, the only ones who won&#8217;t be in AAA are Susana and Romero, both probably heading to AA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>NRIs are important.  Believe it or not, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=18411\">more than a dozen of 2024&#8217;s NRIs<\/a> eventually played in the majors last year, some with pretty significant roles.  So this group collectively will play a big role for the 2025 team.  Traditionally 3-4 will make the team out of ST to open the season, while others get called up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>NRIs generally fall into several categories:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Top Prospects getting their first shot with the big boys<\/strong>: this describes at least Susana, Lomavita, House, Morales, Wallace, and Lile.  I suppose Pinckney is here as well since he doesn&#8217;t qualify for any of the other categories.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Starters to eat split squad innings<\/strong>: I would throw Lord and Stuart in this bucket, along with Adon.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Catchers<\/strong>, because we need people to catch all these ST bullpen sessions: Knizner, Romero, Lindsley<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Veteran MLFAs who were promised the NRI as a condition of signing<\/strong>: Helvey, Plington, Cordero<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Under-the-Radar relievers who might be useful middle relievers<\/strong>: Acosta, Grissom, Sinclair<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p>Is Adon still a prospect?  After four option years, what exactly does the team need to see here?  Perhaps they&#8217;re planning on converting him to relief, so he&#8217;d fall into category #4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The team has already signed a dozen MLFAs for 2025, but only a couple have NRIs.  This in and among itself is a message, but some of the non-NRIs are surprising.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>We have a MLFA 28yr old catcher CJ Stubbs on the AAA roster right now: no NRI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Andrew Alvarez is slated to be in the AAA rotation; no NRI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>We&#8217;ve heard people rave about reliever Carlos Romero: no NRI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The only lefty reliever in AAA Garvin Alston?  no NRI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>We&#8217;ve signed several aged 28-30 MLFAs who got assigned to AA straight away, an indication they&#8217;re just org arms.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>We&#8217;ve also signed several younger relief arms this month, all in the 23-25 range, newly 6-year FAs after being young IFA signings; these kind of guys may need more seasoning and aren&#8217;t candidates to join the bullpen.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>A few rule-5 candidates we talked about at length but no NRI include Solesky, De la Rosa, Made, and Shuman, which probably tells us what we need to know about the organization&#8217;s thought about these guys.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Who&#8217;s likely to make the team out of this list?  Probably a bit early to predict, but I only count 9 total relievers on the entire 40-man right now, one of whom is out with TJ.  So, there&#8217;s opportunities here for especially the arms who can slot into bullpen spots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We didn&#8217;t really talk about the top prospects in camp.  Of them, House seems the most likely to win a starting job, based on the lack of a FA 3b signing.  We&#8217;ve litigated him to death; no he&#8217;s not ready, he probably needs to prove himself for a half season in AAA.  The rest of the prospects all seem slated for either AA or AAA to get more time in the minors.  I&#8217;m intrigued by Morales&#8217; potential &#8230; but the team has basically  bought itself enough 1B\/DH cover that it seems unlikely for him to break camp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thoughts?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You know we&#8217;re getting close to Spring Training when the annual press release goes out announcing Non-Roster Spring Training Invitees (NRIs). The Nats announced the initial crop this week, immediately forgot at least a couple guys who have ST invites on their transactions page, and probably will add more as they sign up veteran FAs, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,4324],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-natsgeneral","category-prospects"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18783"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18784,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18783\/revisions\/18784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}