Saturdays in October are about the change of seasons in so many parts of the country where the foliage is turning to a new color palette revealing underlying yellow and orange carotenoids and new red and purple anthocyanins. In the Arizona desert and the tropical climate of West Palm Beach in Florida, the cactus and palm trees are still green.

Today is traditionally part of some big college football matchups and drinking pumpkin spiced selections at Starbucks. But baseball is on today’s schedule with the opening of the MLB Division Series in the postseason as well as Opening Day for the Arizona Fall League where all six teams are in action.

Next Saturday opens “Strength Camp” at West Palm Beach for selected lower minor league top prospects, and that lasts for six weeks. The beginning of camp, per our source, will focus on proper workouts and strength training. The final two weeks of camp will conclude with some training on the field.

This is a first for the Nats at a time when they would be traditionally bringing in prospects for Fall Instructs. This new camp is more specialized and will run for six weeks and finish up right before Thanksgiving.

The camp will give these players a head-start on their offseason routines and working on their individualized Powerpoints.

Speaking of top prospects, MLB Pipeline posted their final Top-100 prospect list of the year. The Nats have four players on that list.

Not on their list is Devin Fitz-Gerald and Ronny Cruz. That is surprising, and especially with the hot finish that Fitz-Gerald had to his Double-A season as a younger 21 year old (August birthday). Fitz-Gerald started his season at High-A Wilmington where he put up a .903 OPS. Coming out of the All-Star break, DFG found another gear and hit .296 with an .859 OPS. It was a tale of two halves for Fitz-Gerald in Double-A as he only hit .159 with .436 OPS before that in his first 27 games in Double-A.

For Cruz, he dominated Single-A Fredericksburg (1.088 OPS) and the Nats rewarded him with a promotion to High-A where many right-handed hitters struggle and Cruz did. He finished on a high note with a 1.034 OPS in his final nine games for Wilmington. Cruz was just inconsistent in Wilmington, and we have seen it before from right-handed batters there. Cruz was 19 years old most of his season and just turned 20 at the end of August.

Here’s the thing, Fitz-Gerald is 3.6 years younger than the average Double-A player, and Cruz is 3.0 years younger than the average High-A player. In fact, until Eli Willits arrived in Harrisburg at the end of their season, Fitz-Gerald was the youngest player on the roster by two years.

Nats affiliates play most of their games in low altitude cities compared to many of the prospects who play out west in higher altitude cities. Yes, Harrisburg looked more hitterish this year because of the quality of players.

Getting back to the Arizona Fall League (AFL), here is your full schedule. There are six teams in the AFL and each of those teams represent five MLB teams. This year some teams didn’t send enough players so there will be a little crossover.

The Nationals this year are part of the Salt River Rafters along with the Diamondbacks, Rockies, Twins and Yankees. They are managed by Ted Tom who happens to be the High-A manager of the Nats’ Wilmington Blue Rocks. Here is the full roster on this link.

The Nationals are only sending one Top-30 prospect and that is pitcher Jarlin Susana. He will be joined by LHP Noah Dean, LHP Nolan Hughes, RHP Owen Puk, RHP R.J. Sales, outfielders Teo Banks and Jorgelys Mota, and catcher Kevin Bazzell. It appears from the original list that two more Nats were added.

With the Nats not in the postseason this year, we will have prospects to follow into November. Play ball!

Photo by Steve Mears; Graphic by MLB Pipeline