The Nationals’ ownership is in flux, but it looks like the on-field brain trust is staying, as The Athletic reports that the team has agreed to a two-year extension with manager Davey Martinez, and finalizing a similar deal with GM Mike Rizzo.
Both men, who are in the final year of their current contracts, will also get club options for a third year, per Ken Rosenthal – and per Grant & Danny, that’s further proof that current ownership sees the rebuilding process is working.
“This fits and here’s why: the build is materializing in front of our eyes, so it makes sense to keep the architects of the rebuild in charge to see it through,” Danny said. “Davey Martinez – we’re big fans of his as a person, and he was the perfect guy for that 2019 group, but the thing we’d asked is what will happen this year after seeing some young guys not develop in previous years. Well, the key to this year is development, from the guys who came over for Juan Soto and some guys who have never done this before. This is happening under Davey’s watch, and that was the feather in his cap.”
“Look at where this entire organization was two years ago at this time,” Grant replied. “They are having their best season since 2019, and they’re closer to the playoffs than the Yankees are, at the major-league level…but that’s not even the important part. The important part was rebuilding a barren system back up. When they started to sell off with Scherzer and Turner, they had arguably the worst system in baseball, a knock Rizzo has to answer to – but since that time, they have out all of their assets into building this thing bac up from the ground floor, just like Rizzo did a decade ago.”
Indeed, as Grant noted, after drafting guys like Strasburg, Harper, and Rendon and signing Soto, the Nats went out and spent on guys like Scherzer and Corbin, and it coalesced into a 2019 title.
The Marlins may be a nice blueprint of win a title, fail, sell off, and be back in contention a few years later, and while a World Series six years after the first (which would be 2025) may still be a little presumptuous, WHAT.
“You have seen what is a basically a clinical rebuild, a textbook operation, to this point,” Grant said. “I don’t know if Davey is as good of a manager as Rizzo is a GM, but Davey is that positive guy, and it works for players in the clubhouse – and this is his best managerial job since 2019, and may be even better. He has earned this; you can pick nits in-game, but the bottom line is the young players that matter most have their arrows pointing way up.”
Check out Grant & Danny’s entire live reaction to the extension news above!
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