Photo by Andrew Lang for TalkNats
They say it is easier to make large improvements from a deficient system than from a successful one. Blue chip companies are always in continual improvement mode. In the old days of advertising, the gimmick was “new and improved” for a product. The Washington Nationals need new and improved. Their deficiencies were highlighted in bold ink in the pages of BaseballReference.com. You don’t have to be a baseball savant to see the issues. We have talked about them incessantly. Paul Toboni, the President of Baseball Operations for the Washington Nationals, is now tasked to fix it.
In his introductory press conference yesterday, Toboni spoke about the importance of scouting, player development, and coaching. The first two areas, he has direct experience in. Coaching is player development and decision-making. Toboni talked extensively about all of this, and about approaching a player to talk about his deficiencies — and how you get players to improve. He also talked about a player development alignment where the coaching is consistent at each level.
“I’m a huge believer in analytics. I’m also a strong, strong advocate and believe in the power of area scouting. And I believe in the power of great coaching. So what we want to do is have folks that have mutual respect for both, but also, they understand how their responsibilities contribute to the greater goals of the department. And then we can clearly outline what’s expected of everyone in their roles. And then it’s up to them to really get after it and do a great job. I think that’s the main thing.”
— Toboni said yesterday
“I’ve been around a lot of coaches that are very technically sound, but don’t quite understand the art of coaching and they’re not as effective influencing players. And I’ve been around coaches that really get the art of coaching, but are behind technically and they’re not as good as they can be impacting players. So ideally, we are outfitted in our group with scouts, coaches, whoever it might be with both of those traits. They really get how to connect with players and build trust and those types of things. But also, they’re really well versed technically on how to get players better. And once players start to see that, ‘Wow, this coach is really getting me better and I’m getting the feedback and I’m getting better,’ it just creates this cascading buy-in where they’re realizing that they are becoming the best versions of themselves.”
Most people want to talk about spending money. How has that worked for the New York Mets? Okay, they were the extreme outlier. Spending wisely is needed. That’s been a problem for years in Washington. Toboni was clear that you have to get all of the other parts of your system working well.
Truth be told, the Nats won’t be spending big money this offseason. But as we said before, if they can just get to the league middle, they will give themselves $60 to $70 million to spend this offseason. Even if they just match last year’s $50 million, let Toboni cook and see what he can do. Just go quality over quantity.
Again, we know the weak links. The deficiencies are clear from a macro level with the second worst pitching staff in baseball (5.35 ERA), the second worst team defense (-45.4), and the third worst hitter walk-to-strikeout rate in baseball (0.33).
You can then drill down to the micro level to see who the problems were. The good news, some of those players are already gone. The bad news, some of those players are still here. Obviously this team needs change. The triangle up the middle formed from the catchers to the shortstop to the second baseman was the worst defense in baseball for the primary players. This is not the root cause of the pitching issues, however, this is a major contributing factor. Bad defense leads to high pitch counts and runs scored by both earned and unearned runs.
On offense, sure, hitting more home runs would help, and the Nats were only 25 homers from the league middle. We all know this team needs a legit middle-of-the-order bat. Here’s the thing, the Nats were only 21 RBIs from being top half of baseball. They weren’t awful on offense at times. Just think of where those numbers would have been if James Wood was able to replicate his first half to the second half. Wood had 22 homers and 63 RBIs in the team’s first 81-games. If he ended up with 44 home runs and 126 RBIs, that would have been 13 more homers and 32 more RBIs than his final production. The Nats would have been in the top-half of RBIs and just 12 homers from the top-half if Wood kept that consistency.
“I think more than anything, we have some young, exciting players,” Toboni said. “I’ve been in touch with a number of them to date, and they’re fun to watch. And I’ve told many of them, while I haven’t had the chance to reach out to everyone, I’ve told many of them, and I really believe it, I think there’s another gear to tap into with many of them. So it’s not just that they’re already really talented players. It’s that it’s easy for me to see a world a year or two down the line where we’re seeing a different caliber player in a good way.”
— Toboni said yesterday
“I probably see a lot of the same players that you see. And you’ve honestly watched a lot more Nats games than I have, probably. So yeah, I think about James, I think about Daylen, I think about Dylan, MacKenzie, and CJ. So many of these guys have such great skill sets.”
“And now it’s up to me to hopefully place the support around the [players] where we can tap into another gear for them. But at the same time, it’s up to them to hold themselves accountable — and hold each other accountable to reach each of their own potentials. So that’s how I think through it. And when I text them that or when I tell them that, I really mean it. I think there’s another gear in all those players’ games, and we’re excited to bring it out.”
The same could be said for CJ Abrams and his lack of consistency in the second half. These are real problems for Toboni to fix. He potentially has two superstar players who fell off. Then he has some, who never were. This 2025 Nats team was actually looking promising on the morning of June 1 before their collapse. Just 2.0 games under .500 at that point. Then that June losing streak happened, and fingers were getting pointed. As we said before, it was the blow-out games that killed the Nats, not the close games. The Nats had a 16-45 record in blow-out games. That makes sense when the pitching staff was second to the worst in all of baseball. But they let games get out of hand quickly. This team was not good playing from behind.
Again, it is easy to point to the problems. Fixing those deficiencies takes the right balance. It is easy to say, that you can find a defensive catcher. They’re out there, but then you might give up offense. You could move Nasim Nunez to shortstop as we discussed before and shift Abrams to shortstop, and Luis Garcia Jr. to first base — but again, what does that do to your offense?
Baseball is all about balance. The easiest solution is to add better pitchers. But that takes lots of money. Our solution before was to follow what the Royals did two years ago by adding less expensive middle tier pitchers and improve the defense. If Wood and Daylen Lile are alternating between left field and DH, Dylan Crews in left field, Garcia is at first base, Abrams at second base, Nunez at shortstop, and Brady House at third base, where do you add that thump? Internal improvement might help some, but you need more.
My solution is to think outside of the box. Trade Garcia. Move Wood to DH and first base (yes I know that is not an easy transition), and let Lile be the left fielder. And in free agency, get a DH with some first base experience. On the low end, that is Paul Goldschmidt, and on the high end, that is Pete Alonso. One will cost $10 million and the other is $30 million. Yes, top quality costs top money.
My take is that Toboni is more comfortable in the success he found in Boston, and will be focused on following what Boston did, even in offseason moves. They only signed 4 notable free agents this year: Alex Bregman, Aroldis Chapman, Walker Buehler (DFA) and Patrick Sandoval (injured). Of course their most impactful move was the trade for Garrett Crochet. Quality over quantity. Boston was also able to shed payroll to where their actual payroll only increased by a net of $17.2 million from 2024 to 2025. Per USA Today, they went from an Opening Day payroll of $176,458,748 in 2024 to $193,629,093 to start 2025. Mid-season they traded their best player in Rafael Devers and his $31 million salary, and payroll dropped significantly.
Boston was able to do all of that because of their strength of the farm system that ranked No. 1 coming into the 2025 season. Toboni talked about how it stung when they traded Kyle Teel in the package for Crochet. They were able to do that trade because of the depth of their farm that they built through the draft and player development. Even after the Crochet trade, receiving back prospects in the Devers’ trade, this year’s draft, and promoting all of those prospects, Baseball America still has Boston as the No. 5 farm system.
The Nats farm took huge hits from injuries, and of course promoting top prospects. The Nats Top-2 pitching prospects are Travis Sykora (elbow) and Jarlin Susana (lat) were injured. Sykora is out for the 2026 season. Susana will be down for a couple more months at least after his surgery on his latissimus dorsi muscle. Overall, Baseball America has the Nats’ farm ranked 21st in baseball, and trading top prospects might not be wise. Jake Bennett looks like the next top prospect starting pitcher to be available for the 2026 season. I will say it again, is it time to move Susana to a role as a bullpen arm like the Reds did with Chapman?
“We’re going create a scouting and player development monster that hopefully leads to a winning culture — and one that lands us as a perennial contender.”
— Toboni said
Building a good roster might have some of the future star players in-house — and some just need to show improvement. Some will come from the outside. Other teams have been in this position before. There are good players here. You need lots of great players to win championships. The Nats did that less than six years ago.
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