The Nationals are juggling various possibilities as the deadline approaches. Washington is one game above .500 and enters a difficult series in Atlanta two games back in a crowded NL Wild Card field. They\u2019re ahead of schedule in the rebuild and have arguably MLB\u2019s best offense, but the pitching staff is the worst of any postseason hopeful.<\/p>\n
Washington is weighing whether to part with any players who would\u2019ve been obvious trade candidates if they weren\u2019t surprisingly competitive. Foster Griffin<\/a> might be the most in-demand rental starter not named\u00a0Tarik Skubal<\/a>, as he\u2019s having a fantastic season and playing on a modest $5.5MM salary. Extension talks haven\u2019t gotten far, so it wouldn\u2019t be a surprise if tomorrow night\u2019s start in his final in a Nats uniform. Griffin is their only big impending free agent, so they could opt for a quiet deadline beyond capitalizing on his breakout year.<\/p>\n The big question is whether to listen on\u00a0CJ Abrams<\/a>, who is under arbitration control through 2028. Abrams leads all shortstops with 27 home runs and took a .292\/.365\/.561 slash line into tonight\u2019s game. Even as he gives back some of that value with the glove, it\u2019s rare offensive ability for an up-the-middle player. It\u2019d require a monster haul for the Nats to think about moving their franchise shortstop. Jeff Passan of ESPN<\/a> writes that some clubs are considering making that kind of offer.<\/p>\n Abrams has gotten attention<\/a> from the Yankees. The Red Sox are known to be in the shortstop market. The Rays have a deep farm system and could put together a compelling package for any star player available. Washington could justifiably demand that any Boston deal is built around rookie southpaw Payton Tolle<\/a> or top shortstop prospect\u00a0Franklin Arias<\/a>. The Sox and Nationals lined up on one key swap<\/a> of young players last week.<\/p>\n The Nats could push for Tampa Bay to build a return around their top prospect, outfielder Theo Gillen<\/a>. Passan suggests that while the Rays aren\u2019t likely to part with Gillen for any rental (even Skubal), they may not be completely opposed to doing so for a player with a longer window of contractual control.<\/p>\n If Washington decides to take Abrams off the market, they could mostly stand pat beyond a Griffin trade. First baseman\u00a0Luis Garc\u00eda Jr.<\/a>, eligible for arbitration through \u201927, would surely get interest but isn\u2019t going to command a franchise-altering return. He\u2019s also having a huge year offensively, including hitting his 23rd homer while threatening to hit for the cycle tonight. However, he has limited defensive value as a league average first baseman and an aggressive approach that keeps his on-base percentage down.<\/p>\n The Nationals probably aren\u2019t going to be super aggressive buyers for rentals. Last week\u2019s trade of Curtis Mead<\/a> for\u00a0Connelly Early<\/a> suggests they\u2019re not afraid of bold moves, but that didn\u2019t deviate from the long-term plan. They could add around the margins of the roster, though, with one of MLB\u2019s worst bullpens standing as the obvious point of emphasis.<\/p>\n Spencer Nusbaum of The Athletic<\/a> wrote this week that the Nats are open to trading lower-end prospects to deepen the roster for the stretch run, perhaps by adding a rental reliever. It seems safe to assume they\u2019re not going to beat the field for a marquee name like\u00a0Adrian Morejon<\/a>, but there are plenty of veteran bullpen arms who\u2019d be available for a minimal return and still upgrade Washington\u2019s late-inning mix. It\u2019s highly unlikely that any prospect they surrender for someone like Kirby Yates<\/a>,\u00a0John Schreiber<\/a> or\u00a0Caleb Ferguson<\/a> (to name a few examples) will burn them in the long run.<\/p>\n In one other bit of Nats news, the team announced that left-hander\u00a0Mitchell Parker<\/a> underwent UCL surgery with an internal brace on Wednesday (relayed by Mark Zuckerman of Nats Journal<\/a>). That has been the expectation since Parker was diagnosed with a Grade 3 sprain of the ligament last month. He\u2019s already on the 60-day injured list but will need to be reinstated onto the 40-man roster after the World Series. Parker will miss most or all of the \u201927 season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Nationals are juggling various possibilities as the deadline approaches. Washington is one game above .500 and enters…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":837300,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,29742,20930,462,82],"class_list":["post-837299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cj-abrams","tag-mitchell-parker","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837299","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=837299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/837300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=837299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=837299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=837299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}