{"id":396919,"date":"2026-01-08T21:23:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T21:23:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/396919\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T21:23:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T21:23:08","slug":"nationals-sign-all-star-to-4-2-million-contract-for-2026-mlb-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/396919\/","title":{"rendered":"Nationals sign All Star to $4.2 million contract for 2026 MLB season"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/ca\/mlb\/washington-nationals\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Washington Nationals<\/a> entered last season hoping to put things together toward a big step forward.<\/p>\n<p>The step never came, though, and now they&#8217;ll be trying to do the same in 2026.<\/p>\n<p>At least they know they&#8217;ll have C.J. Abrams on an affordable contract.<\/p>\n<p>Thursday was the last day for MLB teams to reach agreements with players to avoid salary arbitration, and that&#8217;s what the Nats did with Abrams.<\/p>\n<p>According to <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/andrewcgolden\/status\/2009329522508959953?s=20\" rel=\"nofollow\">Andrew Golden of The Washington Post<\/a>, Abrams will earn a salary of $4.2 million for the 2026 campaign.<\/p>\n<p>Abrams was an All-Star shortstop in 2024. He was one of the key pieces the Nats got when they traded Juan Soto to the Padres.<\/p>\n<p>MORE:\u00a0<a target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/ca\/mlb\/cleveland-guardians\/news\/guardians-steven-kwan-gets-7725-million-contract-update-trade-rumors\/3d53cbf46fdbe4405b75d092\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Guardians take a step forward with Steven Kwan<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In 2025, Abrams hit .257 with 35 doubles, five triples, 19 home runs, 60 RBI, 92 runs scored and 31 stolen bases (in 34 attempts).<\/p>\n<p>Abrams put up a .748 OPS in 2025 after a .747 OPS in 2024, so he&#8217;s certainly got an expectation in that category.<\/p>\n<p>He&#8217;s not necessarily a perfect defender at shortstop, and there was speculation about potentially moving him to the outfield.<\/p>\n<p>Whatever the long-term move, Abrams is still just 25 years old. His potent lefty swing and impressive speed will be of use wherever the Nationals want to play him.<\/p>\n<p>And for the Nats to put together a special 2026 season, Abrams will need to be at his best.<\/p>\n<p>More MLB news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Washington Nationals entered last season hoping to put things together toward a big step forward. The step&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396920,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-396919","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}