Washington Nationals

The Washington Nationals are dealing with COVID-19 concerns before their 2021 campaign even starts.

General manager Mike Rizzo told reporters the Nationals had two more players test positive for the virus Thursday with another who is "likely positive" in quarantine. That would make four Nationals players positive for COVID-19 before they play their first game.

Washington announced Thursday's opener against the New York Mets was postponed, and Rizzo said "we're not sure" if there will be any games between the two National League East teams this weekend.

Tim Healey of Newsday reported the Mets are not dealing with any COVID-19 concerns.

Jessica Camerato of MLB.com reported the Nationals received one positive test for a player Wednesday and placed four players and a staff member in quarantine because of contact tracing.

"[I thought] just kind of: 'Oh, crap'" scheduled Opening Day starter Max Scherzer said. "Everybody across the game, we had seen so few positive cases across spring training as a whole. It just shows you how quickly that can turn—it can turn on a dime. We have to face it, and we have to overcome it."

According to MLB's health and safety protocols for the 2021 season, anyone who tests positive must isolate for at least 10 days while being monitored by medical staff. Players must also undergo a cardiac evaluation before being cleared to return.

Following the scheduled series with the Mets, the Nationals are slated to host the Atlanta Braves from Monday through Wednesday.

Thursday's game between the New York Mets and Washington Nationals is the first postponement of the 2021 Major League Baseball season because of COVID-19 concerns. 

Washington confirmed the postponement after ESPN's Buster Olney first reported the game between the two National League East rivals would not be played.

Per Joel Sherman of the New York Post, the Mets and Nationals won't use their scheduled off day Friday to make up for today's game because MLB wants to be "cautious" with the situation since it's easier to make up a game between division opponents at a later date. 

Per MLB.com's Jessica Camerato, the Nationals had one positive COVID-19 test Wednesday, while five other people, including four players, are in quarantine because of contact tracing. 

ESPN's Jeff Passan reported Thursday there are "concerns about at least one more positive" test with the Nationals. 

Sherman noted the Nationals are continuing to undergo contact tracing to determine the number of close contacts. 

Newsday's Tim Healey added there aren't any COVID-19 issues with the Mets. 

Camerato noted the first positive that returned was from a test taken Monday before the Nationals played their final spring training game against the Houston Astros. 

“We tested, we played that game that night, we got on the bus and then the charter plane that took us back to D.C.,” general manager Mike Rizzo told reporters Wednesday. “That's the only interaction that we've had with each other that's different than any other spring training day.”

Per MLB's official health and safety protocols for this season, individuals who test positive are required to isolate for a minimum of 10 days and must be cleared by the league's joint committee and individual team doctors "following a mandatory cardiac evaluation and a determination that the individual no longer presents a risk of infection to others."

The Mets and Nationals are scheduled to play a three-game series at Nationals Park through Sunday. Washington is also scheduled to host the Atlanta Braves for three games starting Monday. 

New York's second series of the season will be at Citizens Bank Park against the Philadelphia Phillies starting Monday. 

Washington Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo announced Wednesday that one player has tested positive for COVID-19, per Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post.

Five people were required to quarantine as a result of being close contacts with the person who tested positive.

Washington is scheduled to begin its season Thursday against the New York Mets at Nationals Park, but four players will be unavailable.

Rizzo said he will "certainly" have to make roster moves ahead of Opening Day.

MLB announced last Friday that there were 17 positive tests out of 72,751 among players and staff during spring training, including two major league players and two staff members during the week prior to the announcement.

The league had to reschedule several series because of COVID-19 outbreaks last season, notably involving the St. Louis Cardinals and Miami Marlins.

In 2021, MLB has "strongly encouraged" players and staff to get vaccinated and created more relaxed protocols for those who have received the vaccine, according to Alden Gonzalez of ESPN.           

The Washington Nationals would be smart to lock up young superstar Juan Soto with a long-term contract extension, though whether Soto is interested in such a scenario remains to be seen.

"We would love to lock up Juan to a long-term deal, but he and his agent have to be ready to do that. We've reached out to them and we'll see what happens," Nationals principal owner Mark Lerner told Scott Abraham of ABC7 on Tuesday. "We'll try our best. The fans know us well enough that we're gonna try our best to keep a special player like Juan."

WATCH - "We would love to lock Juan up to a long term deal, but he and his agent have to be ready to do that"

I just had a one on one interview with @Nationals principal owner Mark Lerner.

We discussed Juan Soto's future here in Washington.

More here - https://t.co/PiL3cT8IG8 pic.twitter.com/xqa9WxCv8W

— Scott Abraham (@Scott7news) March 30, 2021

Soto, 22, has been brilliant in his three MLB seasons:

• 2018: .292 with 22 homers, 70 RBI and 77 runs (116 games).
• 2019: .282 with 34 homers, 110 RBI and 110 runs (150 games).
• 2020: .351 with 13 homers, 37 RBI and 39 runs (47 games). 

He finished ninth in the National League MVP voting in 2019 and fifth in 2020. He won the batting title in 2020 as well. 

"He's a special kid," manager Dave Martinez told Keith Abernethy of WJLA.com. "He sees the game differently, he's able to slow the game down, which is amazing for a guy so young."

It wouldn't be shocking if Soto ended up the NL MVP in 2021. 

"He's such a perfectionist," general manager Mike Rizzo told Abernethy. "He has set the bar extremely high for himself. He makes it a point to take his game to another level."

Soto is under club control through the 2024 season. He could go one of two routes with his future financial situation: Bypass three more arbitration years to sign a lucrative long-term extension now, much like Fernando Tatis Jr. did with the San Diego Padres (14 years, $340 million).

Or he could wait to become a free agent in 2025, hoping his market value increases beyond what he could sign in an extension now. That was the route former Nationals like Bryce Harper and Anthony Rendon each took, cashing out in free agency.

It's the dilemma of prioritizing financial security now versus the possibility of an even bigger payday down the line. It would be hard to blame Rendon for going either route, though Washington obviously will be rooting for the former. 

The Washington Nationals would be wise to keep Trea Turner and Juan Soto around for the long term. They reportedly want to do just that this offseason. 

According to Jon Heyman of the MLB Network, the Nats are "trying to extend both Turner and Soto again after making offers to both last spring as well. There seems to be a bit of optimism at least on Turner, who has two years to go before free agency."

Turner, 27, was excellent for the Nationals in 2020, hitting .335 with 12 homers, 41 RBI, 46 runs and 12 stolen bases. Projected out to a 162-game season, Turner would have blasted 33 homers with 113 RBI, 126 runs and 33 stolen bases. That elite production is further proof that the shortstop's offense has developed him into far more than just a speedster on the basepaths.

Soto, 22, is one of the game's ascending superstars. The outfielder won the batting title in 2020, hitting .351, to go along with 13 homers, 37 RBI and 39 runs. In a full season, those numbers project to 45 homers, 128 RBI and 134 runs. 

It was no surprise that Soto was fifth in the MVP voting, the second straight year he's been a top-10 finisher.  

Likewise, it's no surprise that the Nats would want to lock up Turner and Soto as soon as possible. The team has already seen other homegrown talents like Bryce Harper and Anthony Rendon depart via free agency in recent years. 

Washington general manager Mike Rizzo said the organization would eventually like to get deals done with both players when asked about the possibility of extensions earlier in March, telling reporters: 

"We've discussed internally with ownership about it. We're in the midst of making decisions on what a timeframe would look like. And again, it goes back to my early press conference where we talked about it as we certainly would love to. We certainly have made and will make a long-term extension offer to both players sometime in the near future."

For Turner and Soto, their decisions come down to securing long-term security sooner at the expense of maximizing their market potential as free agents down the line. Harper and Rendon went the latter route. A player like the San Diego Padres' Fernando Tatis Jr.—who signed a 14-year, $340 million extension with the Padres after just two MLB seasons—preferred the former. 

If the Washington Nationals want to extend Juan Soto—and they do—they might have to make him an offer unlike any other in the history of Major League Baseball.

One worth $400 million.

Yes, the Los Angeles Angels locked up Mike Trout for $426.5 million over 12 years in 2019. But because that agreement called for "only" $354.5 million in new money, he didn't really sign a deal worth $400 million. A contract of that sort would be the first of its kind.

As for Soto, Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo told reporters the club is planning to offer its wunderkind slugger an extension "sometime in the near future."

At the least, the price to beat is Fernando Tatis Jr.'s $340 million, 14-year extension with the San Diego Padres. But if Soto and agent Scott Boras demand a lot more, they'll be standing on solid ground.

   

Juan Soto's Resume

• 22 years old
• Signed out of the Dominican Republic in July 2015
• MLB debut May 20, 2018
• National League Rookie of the Year runner-up in 2018
• World Series champion in 2019
• Silver Slugger in 2020
• Career .295/.415/.557 slash line with 69 HR, 23 SB and 9.7 rWAR

   

A Bat Like Soto's Doesn't Come Around Often...or Ever

It's not hyperbole to say Soto is one of the greatest younger hitters in the history of baseball. For that matter, he might even be the greatest young hitter in baseball history.

This is where OPS+ (a park- and league-adjusted version of OPS for which 100 denotes an average hitter) comes in handy. Soto boasts a 151 OPS+ and 1,349 plate appearances, marks reached by only four other hitters through their age-21 seasons.

You might have heard of them:

• Mike Trout (2011-13): 166 OPS+
• Ted Williams (1939-40): 161 OPS+
• Ty Cobb (1905-08): 153 OPS+
• Jimmie Foxx (1925-29): 157 OPS+

That's three inner-circle Hall of Famers and one active superstar who's on track to become maybe the greatest player ever. Pretty good company, as they say.

While Soto doesn't have the best OPS+ of the bunch, he does have the edge on that quartet with his 69 home runs. Likewise, he's the only hitter in MLB history to do better than a 140 OPS+ in his age-19, -20 and -21 seasons.

And he's still getting better.

Even though he played only 47 out of 60 games in last year's coronavirus pandemic-shortened season, Soto was hands down the best hitter in the game by way of his MLB-best marks in on-base (.490) and slugging (.695) percentages.

Lest anyone doubt those efforts, Soto walked 13 more times than he struck out and ranked in at least the 90th percentile for exit velocity, hard-hit rate and barrel percentage. So even in terms of expected production, he was still the majors' top hitter.

Perhaps it's easiest to compare Soto to Miguel Cabrera, who was likewise a hitting prodigy at a young age. If Soto follows a trajectory similar to that of Cabrera, then the path before him leads to more than a decade of MVP-caliber hitting.

   

But Is Soto Really Worth More Than Tatis?

It's not a coincidence that Rizzo had to address the possibility of an extension for Soto mere weeks after Tatis signed his deal.

After all, the two players occupy the same niche. They're cornerstone stars on contending teams, and Soto is only 69 days older than Tatis.

To be fair, it's not hard to argue that Tatis is the superior player. His 143 games in the majors have yielded a stellar 154 OPS+ with 39 homers, 27 steals and 7.0 rWAR. He was also better in Year 2 than in Year 1, specifically with regard to his contact quality and defense at shortstop.

Strictly on a performance basis, Tatis might resemble the second coming of Alex Rodriguez over the next 14 years. That is, a shortstop who uses his bat, legs and glove to annually contend for MVP Awards. On balance, the next Rodriguez would thus be better than the next Cabrera.

But between Soto and Tatis, Soto's advantage is that he's more of a known quantity.

Soto has an additional season and 170 games on Tatis. And that's just in the regular season. Soto proved in 2019 that he can also be a standout hitter under the bright lights of the postseason, as he aided Washington's World Series run with a .927 OPS and five homers in 17 games.

If nothing else, Soto's similarity to Tatis in the age, past performance and future projection columns gives him and Boras grounds to demand a 14-year contract from the Nationals. Since they can argue that Soto is the safer bet over the long term, they could also push for a higher average annual value.

To that end, it would take only $28.6 million per year to get a 14-year guarantee in the $400 million range. That's not an outrageous ask when the going rate for superstars is more than $30 million per year.

   

But Would the Nationals Do It? And Would Boras?

Because front offices generally try to pay players less than they're worth (and succeed), it's fair to assume the Nationals don't want to cut Soto a $400 million check.

But if that's what it would take to extend him, there are at least two reasons to believe they'd do it.

For one, they don't want to risk losing a generational hitter via free agency or—a la the Boston Red Sox with Mookie Betts—trade once his date with the open market is imminent.

For two, they can afford it. The Nats have traditionally been more willing than most to do big-money deals, and they're due for some payroll flexibility. Max Scherzer's contract will be up after 2021, and only Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin are signed beyond 2022.

If anything, the bigger question might be whether Boras will stand in the way. As evidenced by the reality that only four of his clients have signed nine-figure extensions, Boras prefers to take his stars to free agency.

It might, however, bode well that Strasburg was one of those four exceptions. Likewise, Scherzer, Jayson Werth, Rafael Soriano and Matt Wieters were still more Boras clients who've scored multiyear deals from Rizzo and the Nationals. There's clearly a good working relationship there.

Which is to say there may be a chance Soto lands the richest contract in baseball history sometime soon. And if not, well, such a deal might still await him after his time with the Nationals is up in 2024.

   

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.

Washington Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg left Sunday's exhibition against the Houston Astros because of a calf injury, but the right-hander is "definitely" not concerned about the issue.

"Everything was feeling good, and then the calf grabbed me a little bit," Strasburg told reporters. "Luckily, the reports and stuff from the doctors [show] nothing major. It was just kind of more of a precautionary thing, take it day to day and see how it feels tomorrow."

He added: "Luckily, I feel like I'm a fast healer, so I don't think it would be something that could be a prolonged absence."

Nationals manager Dave Martinez noted the team was taking the cautious approach, given it's only spring training.

"There was really not much of a discussion," Martinez said. "Just wanted to pinpoint exactly what he was feeling. Other than that, he was coming out of the game. We're in spring training. There's no sense in pushing it."

Strasburg allowed just one hit while striking out four and issuing one walk in 2.1 innings before exiting.

The three-time All-Star had a tough 2020 campaign: He was 0-1 in two starts with a 10.80 ERA and 1.80 WHIP, and he had just two strikeouts in five innings. His season came to an end in August when he underwent surgery to address carpal tunnel syndrome in his pitching hand.

The 2019 season was a far better representation of the 32-year-old's hold on the league. He finished fifth in voting for the National League Cy Young Award after going 18-6 with a 3.32 ERA, 1.04 WHIP and 251 strikeouts in 209 innings.

In the postseason, Strasburg went 5-0 with a 1.98 ERA across six outings. He was named the World Series MVP after the Nationals defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers in seven games that year.

Max Scherzer and Patrick Corbin will continue to lead the rotation, but it will be up to Jon Lester, Austin Voth and Erick Fedde to fill out the back end should Strasburg be sidelined for the start of the regular season.

The Washington Nationals are looking to offer contract extensions to Trea Turner and Juan Soto "in the near future." 

General manager Mike Rizzo told reporters Monday the front office has spoken with ownership about potentially handing multiyear deals to both players. Turner is eligible for one more year of arbitration before hitting free agency in 2023. Soto, meanwhile, won't hit the open market until 2025.

Because of the timing, Turner might be the bigger priority right now. The 27-year-old shortstop said in February he'd like to remain with the Nationals beyond his window of team control:

Trea Turner: "I would love to play my entire career here." Says extension talks "have happened in the past, hopefully will happen in the future."

— Mark Zuckerman (@MarkZuckerman) February 23, 2021

Between 2019 and 2020, Turner ranked fifth at his position in WAR (6.3), per FanGraphs. He slugged .525 with a .374 weighted on-base average. FanGraphs listed him fifth among all position players in base running runs above average (9.0) as well.

While Washington was unable to retain Anthony Rendon, you'd expect the front office to make a strong push to keep Turner.

On the heels of Fernando Tatis Jr. signing a 14-year, $340 million deal with the San Diego Padres, it wouldn't be surprising if the Nationals locked up Soto well before there's any threat of him leaving.

The 22-year-old probably isn't as good as his 2020 numbers (13 home runs, 47 RBI and a .351/490/.695 slash line in 47 games) would indicate, but he has torn the cover off the ball from the moment he arrived in MLB in 2018. Among players with at least 1,000 plate appearances through their first three seasons, Soto is 16th all time in OPS (.972), per Stathead.

The Dominican Republic native appears poised to dominate National League pitching for seasons to come. 

Because of his contract situation, fans don't have to begin panicking just yet about Soto. But his price tag probably won't get any lower down the line, so the longer he goes without an extension, the odds of the Nationals losing him might climb.

Washington Nationals starter Jon Lester is set for surgery to remove a thyroid gland.

According to the Associated Press (h/t ESPN), Nationals manager Dave Martinez said Wednesday that Lester will go to New York for the procedure and return to spring training in five to seven days.

The left-hander, who signed a one-year deal with the Nats in January, spent the past six seasons with the Chicago Cubs, winning a title with the team in 2016. 

The bulk of his career was spent with the Red Sox, where he won two World Series championships before he was dealt to the Oakland Athletics in 2014.

In the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, the five-time All-Star amassed a 5.16 ERA.

The longest stretch of time he missed came in the 2006-07 seasons, when he was diagnosed with lymphoma. He underwent chemotherapy in the offseason and returned to the team in July, eventually leading the team to a 2007 World Series Championship. 

In Washington, the 37-year-old is expected to assume a role in the back end of a rotation topped by Max Scherzer, Patrick Corbin and Stephen Strasburg, with Erick Fedde and Joe Ross waiting in the wings.

The three-time World Series winner could prove to be a big signing for the Nationals, as they landed a 15-year veteran who owns a 193-111 record and 3.60 ERA in 424 career regular-season games.

Lester also boasts an impressive playoff resume with a 9-7 record, 2.51 ERA and 1.02 WHIP in 26 career postseason outings.

Assuming Lester returns during the timetable provided by Martinez and is ready for the start of the regular season, he will provide necessary depth to Washington's rotation and play a role in helping the Nats get back to the form they displayed in 2019 when they won the World Series.

Washington Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo would like Juan Soto to be a key piece of the team for years to come, but contract discussions have not taken off to this point.

Rizzo said such talks last spring "didn't go very far" and have not been revisited since given the uncertainty the entire league dealt with in 2020, per Mark Zuckerman of MASN.

"But our plans are to make an effort like we’ve made efforts in the past to our really great young players, to keep them in a Nationals uniform for a long, long time," Rizzo said.

Zuckerman noted questions about Soto's future with the team arose after Fernando Tatis Jr. signed a 14-year, $340 million extension with the San Diego Padres.

"For me, I was really happy for (Tatis)," Soto said. "I just congrats him and everything. For me right now, I just try to come here and play baseball. I don't think about any of that. Anytime I come to spring, my mind is on baseball. I try to get my body in shape, get ready and try to win another championship."

This isn't an immediately pressing issue for either side.

After all, Soto is not scheduled for unrestricted free agency until after the 2024 campaign. Still, locking up the 22-year-old would give Washington a franchise cornerstone to build around and serve as a contrast to Bryce Harper and Anthony Rendon eventually signing elsewhere after becoming stars with the Nationals.

Soto has played for the Nationals during the last three seasons and already has a World Series title, Silver Slugger and batting title on his resume. He slashed .351/.490/.695 with 13 home runs and 37 RBI in 47 games during the shortened 2020 season.

The slugger figures to be among the league's best players for the foreseeable future, and contract talks will surely pick up with the Nationals at some point. They just haven't advanced much of late.