Back from the six-game road trip, the Nationals and Mike Rizzo returned to Washington with four wins in their pocket after swinging the bat well, pounding out 40 runs in two series wins at Seattle and Arizona.
"It was pretty successful," general manager Mike Rizzo told The Sports Junkies during his weekly appearence on Wednesday, before adding the offensive success was down to a "momentum thing" as they kept the line moving by guys "getting good pitches to hit" and doign damage.
"We stayed in the zone much better, our chase rate was way down," Rizzo said. "And we got some good pitches to hit and hit 'em hard, and when you start doing that and you get some momentum offensively, it's like all the hard balls go through, all the bloopers drop in, and it's a fun series.
"Hitting is contagious and it's cyclical. And when you're hot, you have to score some runs, and when you're not, you have to scratch for runs."
One person who has been swinging the bat well is Robert Hassell III, who knocked his first big-league homer during the trip and went 9-for-24 with a .917 OPS in the final five games of the series. Not bad for his first road trip in the big leagues after his call-up when Dylan Crews landed on the IL.
"He's a great player," Rizzo told The Junkies. "He was an important part of the [Juan] Soto trade, and we really coveted him and we like him a lot. We think he's a five-tool kinda player. He's a good defender, he runs really well, he throws well, he's got bat-to-ball skills, he's gonna come into his power and he showed it at the Triple-A level right before we brought him up... He can really play defense in center field, really run the bases, and he's a good hitter."
And Rizzo noted that the only reason the 23-year-old is just now getting his shot after several injuries stole his time to be on the field the last couple of years. But that hasn't changed his trajectory, as the GM said Hassell is "going to be a big part of our future."
Of course, the Nats will face a positional crunch when Crews gets healthy. "What we're gonna do with [Hassell] when all of these outfielders come back [from the IL], we're gonna figure it out, because it usually figures itself out," Rizzo said. "If our greatest worry is that we have so many great players that we don't have enough spots for them, I can live with that."
Crews injury update
"The oblique thing," Rizzo said, "That's a painstaking, difficult rehab to get through."
The GM put the recovery timeline as typically 4-to-6 weeks (Crews last played two weeks before on May 20) and the Nationals "don't see anything out of the ordinary with Dylan's injury."
"We kinda know how to treat it, and it just takes time to heal. And that's the issue with that," he said. "If you rush it too quickly, you re-injure it, and you could tear stuff, and you make it worse. He's on pace to be ready when he's ready. And when he's prepared, he's gonna be in the big leagues. And we're gonna figure out what we're gonna do with the outfield."
Brady House timeline accellerating?
The No. 3 prospect in the Nationals' system and No. 94 in baseball, per MLB Pipeline, has gotten off to a smoking start at Triple-A: 11 home runs, 14 doubles in 55 games with a .290/.347/.516 slash line for an .863 OPS. Could a call-up be in the future for the infielder, who is celebrating his 22nd birthday on Wednesday?
"Well I'm looking forward to seeing him, for sure," Rizzo said when asekd about if fans would see House later this year in D.C. "He's in the right spot for his development for where we want him to be, he's improved his walk rate has come up a little bit, which was a point of emphasis. His strikeout rate has come down a tick, which is kinda what we've wanted him to do.
"And he's getting more experience at third base... but he's doing everything he needs to do to get to the big leagues and barring injury he's gonna get to the big leagues and be a great player for us and a big part of what we're trying to achieve here."
Catch the full conversation with the Nationals' GM on the audio player above!