The Nationals have just 36 games left in their 2024 MLB season. With a 56-70 record, Washington looks destined to suffer yet another sub-.500 finish, which they have done each year since capturing the 2019 World Series.
But one of the biggest positives from the year has been the "development of our starting rotation," Nats general manager Mike Rizzo said during his weekly appearance Wednesday with 106.7 The Fan's The Sports Junkies, which is presented exclusively by our partners at MainStreet Bank — Cheer Local. Bank Local. Put Our Team in Your Office. Member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender.
With Cole Irvin, Mitchell Parker, DJ Herz and MacKenzie Gore, "you're seeing really the development of four major league starters kinda coming together in the same season, which is unlikely to happen often," Rizzo said. "I think that's the biggest pro for me, the state of our pitching at the big league level, at the upper minor league level and at the lower minor league level has never been better for us, never flourished as much. We've never had as much depth as we've had right now."
Another positive at the MLB level is the emergence of a good corps group with Keibert Ruiz having a solid second half of the season, CJ Abrams and Luis Garcia playing well, "and then when you add [James] Wood and [top prospect Dylan] Crews in the near future, you're looking at five, six, seven players that's gonna be the corps group of your team in the very near future. That's definitely the pro."
Of course, where there are pros there are also cons.
"The cons are the growing pains," the GM told the Junkies. "All of these young players, they all don't develop and blossom at the same time. So there's bumps and in the road. Like I've said, development's not linear, there's bumps in the road, you have to live and die with that throughout the season... you score six runs against a good Phillies team on Sunday, then get shut out against the Rockies until Abrams hit the home run.
"Inconsistencies and the sometimes the lack of fundamentals are definitely the biggest cons that I've seen throughout the season and things we have to work on."
Jacob Young's future
The Nats' center fielder leads MLB in runs prevented (15) and is in a three-way tie for the lead in outs above average (17), three higher than the next nearest outfielder. At the plate, the 24-year-old hasn't quite found his footing with a .247 average, but just a .307 OBP and .319 slugging percentage for a below-average 81 OPS+ and 79 wRC+, as he ranks in the bottom three percent in exit velocity and bottom six percent in hard-hit percentage.
"He's proven to me that he's major league worthy and there's a place on this team for him," Rizzo said. "I think that his offense has improved over the course of this season. And he's got to see more pitches, take more walks, get more bunt hits – he leads the league in bunt hits, I think, with eight and leads the league with infield hits. He's an elite runner and an elite defender and an elite base runner and base stealer. So that's a lot of skills that winning ball clubs employ.
"He's turned himself into a real asset for us and a guy that's gonna be a part of the future."
To the GM's points, Young is in the 98th percentile in spring speed (29.7 feet per second) and 92nd percentile in baserunning run value, per Baseball Savant. And he's walked just 33 times in 527 plate appearances over his first big league games (his walk rate is in the 18th percentile on the year).
But the defensive value can't be undervalued, with the GM saying "analytically" and with the human eye Young is the best center fielder in baseball.
"To me he's the Gold Glove winner," Rizzo told the Junks. "A guy that just keeps improving, and getting better and better and plays every day. Plays nicked up, plays really hard in the outfield and slams into walls and not afraid of fences or walls or anything else. We're really proud of him, from where he's come from, a seventh-round pick that's really blossomed into something that's really gonna be a nice piece for us going forward."
Travis Sykora moving up the rankings
When the new farm system rankings were released, Travis Sykora, the 6-foot-6 right-hander, landed at No. 3 for the Nationals.
"He's a big physical pitcher out of Texas that we overpaid, gave him first-round money in the third-round a couple years ago," Rizzo said of the 2023 pick out of Round Rock High School. "He's a projection right-handed pitcher that really developed fairly quickly. He's an upper 90s [mph] guy, he's touched a hundred a couple times. He's got a good slider, a good changeup, good delivery. He's a horse."
Coupled with RHP Jarlin Susana (Washington's No. 4 prospect) and LHP Alex Clemmey (No. 6 prospect), Rizzo said they have "three high-ceiling, high-caliber starting pitchers at the Low-A level."
Sykora is "just scratching the surface and starting to come into his own," the GM said after he's posted a 2.47 ERA and 0.849 WHIP over his first 73 innings and 17 starts at A-ball with 111 strikeouts to 22 walks.