The voices of Nats baseball on 106.7 The Fan joins G&D live at Lost Rhino to preview the 2025 season ahead.
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00:00We are just one day away from Nats game number one at Nationals Park of 2025 against the Philadelphia
00:06Phillies. And with opening day looming, thanks to our friends out here at Los Rinos, we wanted
00:11to celebrate the start of a new Nats season and them dropping the Hittin' Dingers IPA by having
00:16the voices of Nats baseball, Charlie Slows and Dave Jagler, alongside to kick off the season.
00:22Gentlemen, the silence is ending. It's time to turn up the volume a little bit.
00:29Yeah, we've been working on ending it for about a month, six weeks.
00:32I was joking with Treswaya, so the commander's punter was out here with me earlier,
00:36and we were both marveling, his brother-in-law is Bryce Teranga of the Milwaukee Brewers,
00:40about just how much baseball is played. Spring training as an endeavor, I understand Jags how
00:45important it is to get everybody ramped up. The amount of hours those guys put in and work on the
00:50backfields and games, it does seem like they could do a little bit less and probably still get ready.
00:56It's all about the pitchers. That's why spring training is so long, because they ramp up from
01:01one inning now. It used to be you'd throw two or three innings in your first game. Now it's
01:04one inning and you build up to about 90 pitches. Back in the day, we always like to tell the story
01:08of Don Sutton, rest in peace, who used to be one of the Nationals analysts who worked with Bob
01:13Carpenter. He made the Hall of Fame 300-game winner. He'd say, you know how I knew I was
01:18ready for the season? When I threw a complete game in spring training. If anyone threw a
01:23complete game in spring training now, they would fire the manager on the spot. These guys build up
01:27to 90 pitches and they go down to 70 and they'll throw four innings opening day, but it's all about
01:31the starting pitchers. For us, the broadcasters, we did 14 games in Florida. I was ready after two.
01:37Just give me one rundown play, one double in the gap, let's go. Those games are hard,
01:43because the fifth inning comes and then it's the second unit. They don't tell you the eight
01:47different guys. When it was Dusty or Matt Williams, if you were the shortstop and you
01:54went in for C.J. Abrams, you bat in C.J. Abrams' spot. Now the batting order, you throw a dart
02:00for the coin. You don't know who's going to bat in what spot until they actually come up, so you
02:03can't write them in the book. Depending if the seven hitter made the last out, he could put
02:09someone in the eighth spot who's the left fielder and he's going to bat in the catcher's spot.
02:14So after two of those games, I'm like, let's get this started for real.
02:19Charlie, you're mid-season form, two games in. How many do you need?
02:24A game and a half.
02:26It's funny you guys say that, because we complain all the time. I want more televised spring
02:31training games. We only get a couple. It's ridiculous.
02:33Actually, this year they had nine. It was like a record. Or it would have been nine,
02:37but we got ranked out.
02:38They're calling them from Towson. But that's a whole other story.
02:43I want to watch the team, and I want to listen to the team. So while you guys, I get it,
02:46you're like, these are tough and a grind. I want every game available.
02:50I get it. The thing for us, though, the last two years really helped us see all of the talent
02:55coming in the organization. Last year, the guys who would be the call-ups for minor league camp
03:01to fill out a game and get into the seventh, eighth, and ninth, these are the guys that are
03:06in major league camp from the beginning. And some of them, of course, came up and made the club
03:10last year. James Wood and Dylan Cruz. A guy like DJ Herz, we'd never seen. We didn't even
03:15see him in spring training. Or Mitchell Parker. They weren't in big league camp.
03:19So it helps us learn the organization and helps us get to know these young players.
03:25And they were kind of all coming as a group. And they're dead serious about what they saw
03:32as a group to be that next wave of national players.
03:34So let's talk about that. Because as we're on the precipice now of a brand new campaign,
03:38it does feel like when you talk to certainly Davey or Mike Rizzo, and even now players,
03:44the narrative is, it's time to stop playing around. It's time to push this thing forward.
03:50They are essentially saying, the rebuild is over.
03:53Yeah, I heard you talking about this when I was driving in that you thought, well,
03:56maybe this is a little like a year premature.
03:59To me, that would have been my messaging next year. Only because if you're telling me this
04:03week, we're now here, we've arrived, then you're telling me, okay, it's over 500 and we're
04:09competing. I think this is the 77 win season if things go well. Next year is the 85 win season.
04:15But I like that the players are going, if you're Dylan Cruz, I'm a winner. I'm here to win. James
04:20Wood's going, I'm a star. And so they're confident. I want them to be. But I don't know that
04:25the reinforcements that were necessary to kind of put them over the top were added. But I do like
04:29the feel of this ball club. They seem to be very much confident that the rebuild has ended.
04:35Yeah, I think Davey wants them to feel like they could go out and beat anybody.
04:38If you pitch well, play good defense, I think their offense is going to be better.
04:43So don't sell yourself short.
04:46You got to play better baseball too. I mean, like last year's team on paper, or at least
04:50watching them on the field, I thought was better than the year before. Yet they ended up with the
04:53same record. But why was that? I mean, they made way too many outs on the bases, had defensive
04:58miscues. If they play good, solid baseball, I think there's talent up there to make that run
05:03to be 500. And if you're 500 with now the six postseason teams in each league, you're in the
05:10discussion. You're not going to make it at 81, but if you're at 83, 84 wins, you're in the discussion
05:16later in the season. And I think that that improvement can be made just by playing better
05:20baseball. And for a lot of this, that's what they all focus on in spring training. 27 outs
05:25defensively. Don't give anybody extra outs. We want to be aggressive. I mean, this team's DNA
05:29is to be aggressive on the bases, but there's a fine line between aggressive and reckless.
05:33And too often they went to the wrong side of that line last year. This spring, for the most part,
05:38I think that's been better. For two weeks, it felt like they didn't make any errors. Then they
05:41had this kind of stretch where they made about six errors in two games and had a bunch of outs
05:46on the bases. It's like, oh, that's the team we saw last year. Then they cleaned it up again as
05:50it got toward the last week to 10 days of spring training. So I think if they play better baseball,
05:55they're going to be, just by definition, better than last year. Because last year was a step
05:58sideways. I mean, they went from 109, 107 losses and they win 71. Well, last year you hoped to get
06:06to 77. They took that big step sideways. So now you'd like to make that jump. It's easy to get
06:13the first 15 win jump. This next 10 to 12 win jump, this is the hard jump to get across that 500
06:20level. Yeah. And you've got to look at a whole season. I mean, they were much better in the first
06:23half in every phase, defensively and pitching wise. I mean, their ERA, that was over five.
06:30How much of that is that they sold off some veterans?
06:32Good part of it. They got rid of their two and three hitters in the lineup.
06:35And the two of their top three relievers.
06:37Right. But even before that, they had started to slide in July. From the way they played in the
06:42first half of the year, the ERA in mid-June was in the 3.7, 3.8. And then you took a half of run
06:53up as far as their ERA was concerned, even before they were trading away people. And your defense
06:59slipped in the second half of the year. I mean, when you talk about like key players, C.J. Abrams
07:03was an all-star. He had a great first half and he had a miserable second half. He wasn't as good
07:08defensively in the second half of the year. I mean, this is a guy and he's still only 24.
07:13Right. So, but this is the time at that position, that kind of player is the type of player who's
07:20maybe your most talented player on the field needs to have a full season. And that's the
07:24hardest thing about being a major league player. Dusty Baker used to talk about, you can have
07:30two great months or three really good streaks during the year. And the rest of the time,
07:35you're just average. And if that's okay, then you've had a good year. But you need a bunch of
07:40guys to have those streaks and average times. And if you have a lot of guys, especially key spots
07:48that fall off, your leadoff batter and Abrams, I handed him that job last year. And so, I think
07:54the second half of the year for him was, first half was a step up, second half was a step,
07:59I'll use your phrase, Dave, sideways. Charlie Slows, Dave Jagler, you'll be hearing them all
08:04season long on Nationals radio right here on 106.7, the fan opening day slated for 4.05.
08:10Tomorrow, there's no rain in the forecast, which I thought was against the rules for opening day
08:15around here. But it sounds like it's gonna be a little chilly and otherwise beautiful and we are
08:19ready for baseball. I just want to tell people who just saw me take a drink on YouTube. Liquid
08:24death that looks like beer. Liquid death is mountain water that looks like a beer can.
08:29Well, two things. One, I think those waters in the beer cans are the coolest thing in the world.
08:33I love those. Two, you are over 21, so you are allowed to be drinking. You don't have to explain
08:38to anyone what you're doing. But I'm doing it on the radio. Our great friend was the late
08:45Bob Euchre, and he passed away in the offseason, sadly. And he occasionally might tilt back a
08:51Miller Lite, but generally that thing is frowned upon. So liquid death, we give two thumbs up.
08:58Speaking of Bob Euchre, you were mentioning the base pads and the mistakes last year.
09:03So the Nats and the Brewers were the only two teams in the sport that stole 210 bases.
09:07And the Nationals stole 223, the most in the major leagues. But they ran into 73 outs.
09:13So the 223 steals, unfathomably impressive record. Obviously, the rules were changed.
09:19It helped them. But they ran into 73 outs. And if you can clean that up and you can cut down
09:25on the errors, that's how you're going to kind of around the edges. Sometimes two on one play.
09:30Yes, they had some of those, unfortunately. But how about the offseason? What did we think?
09:36What were your expectations going in? And how do you feel like they were able to accomplish
09:41some of the goals? Yeah, I think they've they plug some holes. I mean, I think everyone kind
09:45of assumed that this might be the year that they went out and signed that Jason Worth contract.
09:49There was no Jason Worth contract. But I think from working at the margins, undoubtedly, this
09:55team is better. I mean, they were kind of gaping holes last year in the corner infield. First base
10:00was a hole. Third base was a hole. They filled those. DH was not good. You're supposed to
10:05designate a hitter. They didn't have very good designated hitters. So now you're hoping that
10:09Josh Bell can be that guy. And, you know, right now, you know, the kind of the wild card for this
10:15team and this team is going to need starting pitching. We talked about the fall off last year.
10:19I mean, a lot of these guys, be it Parker, Herz, Irvin, were pitching their first full big league
10:24seasons. You know, obviously, tough news on on DJ, but they have a veteran pitcher in Michael
10:30Soroka. Soroka, when he was healthy, was a dominant pitcher. That was some time ago. He's
10:34got a lot of injuries. Changed his repertoire. It's not the same guy. When he was an all-star
10:39with the Braves, he was a sinker slider guy. Now he's more of a four seam guy up in the zone,
10:44mixes in a curveball down, and really felt that that repertoire changed his career last season as
10:51a reliever for the White Sox. His numbers were dominant. A lot of teams wanted to sign him as
10:55a reliever. He wanted to be a starter. The Nationals signed him. He came out gangbusters
10:59here in the spring, maintaining his velocity mid-90s later into his outings.
11:05Starting pitchers were going for $15 million. Charlie Morton got $15 million. Scherzer got $15
11:09million. Verlander got $15 million. They got Soroka for $9 million, and they got Trevor back for $7
11:15million. So basically, for those two guys, you've spent what one pitcher would cost. You got two
11:21guys. We know what Trevor did last year. Soroka, if he can be a big win, that could be the signing
11:26of the year for this team, if he can stay healthy. He was that impressive early in the spring.
11:30He was one of the marquee additions. I would throw into that group. Nathaniel Lowe,
11:35they're going to start at first base every day. He's going to hit in the heart of the order.
11:38They acquired him for a non-closing reliever in lefty Robert Garcia. Josh Bell is back,
11:43who's going to DH every day, and maybe air it out to try to hit for some more power,
11:46because they need home runs after only hitting 135 second fewest in baseball last year.
11:51Then if you want to throw in Paul DeYoung, who's going to start at third, or they have three
11:54relievers, they sign in free agency. Of those additions, though, who do you think is going to
11:59make the biggest impact in terms of the offseason? Splashes, if we want to call them that.
12:03I think you'd want it to be Nathaniel Lowe at first base, because that's a position where the
12:07Nationals have just had a revolving door for several years, not produced a lot of offense
12:12from first base. You can say the same thing even at third base. They've gone through several people
12:17the last few years and have not gotten a lot of production out of that. They did with Candelario
12:23came on and eventually netted you a trade that got you a couple of players, including D.J. Herz,
12:29but outside of Candelario, that's been a dormant position offensively. DeYoung can hit for power.
12:36He will strike out. He doesn't normally hit for a terrifically high average. Right now,
12:40we're still waiting to see. He can play third, though. We haven't seen him play third before,
12:44because he was a shortstop at Sulcury. He can play third. I get the sense after just getting
12:49back from West Palm, you guys tell me if you disagree, I think he's going to play way more
12:52than people think. We're not even sure if Jose Tena makes the team. If they option Tena,
12:58then DeYoung is your everyday third baseman. I think even if Tena makes the team, I left West
13:03Palm, I should say this, I got there thinking maybe it's a platoon situation. I think he's
13:08going to play 18 of the first 19 games. Look at the last two or three lineups in the exhibition
13:13season. DeYoung was in it. One of them was at shortstop. One of the games he started at shortstop
13:19and he's played good defensive shortstop in his career. You mentioned Soroka. One guy we haven't
13:25covered then, because we've talked Lowe and DeYoung, is Josh Bell. I had a good conversation
13:29with him at camp, where he basically said, when I was here before, I didn't have to necessarily
13:35hit a ton of home runs, because we had guys on the team that could drive the ball. Remember,
13:38even though it didn't work out that well, like Nelson Cruz or Soto. His point is, they brought
13:42me in here and basically told me that we need some power. Do you think he tries to maybe air it out
13:47a little bit? He doesn't have to worry about playing first base unless it's once every week
13:53or two, where they give Lowe a day off to play some first base. That's what he's talked about.
13:59Not so much concentrating on hitting for a higher average, but trying to come up in situations with
14:04men on base. The thing the Nationals lack the most is the extra base hit with a couple of men on base,
14:09not even the home run. As you said, the White Sox were the only team to hit fewer home runs
14:14in the Nationals. The White Sox are the only team below you in any category. It's like your last,
14:19because they were not a big league team last year. But how about just the ball in the gap with a
14:23couple of men on base, where you score a couple of runs? Not even necessarily hit it out of the
14:26park. You need some extra base hits with men on base to score runs. Well, you made a good point.
14:32The corner infield and the corner outfield, the last few years, no wonder where you're so low
14:37and slug. That's where those guys come from, Jackson. They haven't had the first baseman,
14:41the third baseman, and they've been trying to develop. They haven't really had the corner
14:44outfielders that were boppers either. Yeah, you were down there and you saw the game that
14:49James Wood had and how he was swinging. He had a slow start to the spring for folks who weren't
14:55listening to all our early broadcasts. He wasn't on the field the first week to 10 days of the
14:59spring. He had a lingering left leg issue, some quad tendonitis. He had an MRI in the offseason.
15:04You were like, oh man, this could be a problem. The first day, he just starts hitting line drives.
15:11I don't know that I've ever been as fooled calling a home run as one he hit in Jupiter.
15:15It was against the Marlins. It was a line drive that I thought was going to be caught by the
15:19left fielder. It just kept going and it never sank. The left fielder thought he was going to
15:26catch the ball. Then he turned to play the carom. Then the ball went over the fence,
15:30hit the back wall of the bullpen, and bounced. It's a clear fence. It looked like he was on the
15:35warning track. He was rounding first, ready to jog into second for a double. He didn't know he
15:39hit a home run. It looked like it went through the wire fence. That's how hard it was. It was
15:43a 16-degree launch angle. There were something like three home runs hit with a 16-degree launch
15:48angle all last season. Stick aside. The view of that home run, it looked like it could have soared
15:54the entire way in this building. It would not have hit the roof of Los Reinos. It was crazy.
16:01We'll get to him when we break down the lineup. I'd say that was my biggest takeaway from my time
16:05in West Palm. As excited as I am and have been for James Wood, the conversations you have with
16:11Nats people about him, it's hard not to just get chills at the possibilities. We're talking,
16:17if he reaches his ceiling, they think it's a perennial MVP candidate, like a judge
16:23standing in his prime. Soto is a different beast with the approach and the average and the walks.
16:29He's got a good approach. From day one last year, play discipline was there.
16:34I guess I mean more strikeouts, swing and miss, whatever. He's just big. There's going to be a
16:39little bit of that. He's got it, to your point, a great batter's eye. One of the other problems,
16:43I guess the elephant in the room for the Nats trying to turn a bit of a corner here,
16:47is that the division is ridiculous. Right. You almost can't even worry about
16:54the division. You just worry about how you play right now and then see where you are as you get
17:00into the season. You already know what those teams are. Who do you guys think will be the
17:04best team? I want to talk about that first. That's a fair point. The difference between
17:09when the Nationals climbed that hill the first time, from the 08-09, losing 100 games,
17:13the division was terrible back then. It was much easier to go from the bottom to the top,
17:17as they basically did in a two-year period. Now you've got to go a rung at a time almost,
17:21because you have three legitimate heavyweights in your division. Again, it's a little different
17:27schedule. You only play them 13 instead of 19 times. You have the third wild card. In theory,
17:32if you play good enough baseball against everybody else and hold your own against them,
17:37you can have all the postseason. You can have four teams out of five go from the postseason.
17:42You do have to worry about yourself. Even with their record last year being the same,
17:46their record against teams in the division was better last year than it was atrocious before
17:51that. What do you mean? Their record against the Nationals. Last year, they dominated the
17:58Marlins. The Marlins had just eaten their lunch for two years in a row, and the Nationals actually
18:03won the season series from the Braves, which was the first time since I believe 2017 or 2018 that
18:08they had won the season series from the Braves. But then the Phillies and the Mets dominated them,
18:12so it was almost like a wash. They were just slightly under 500 in the division.
18:16If you could somehow play close to 500 against the top three and still dominate the Marlins,
18:21then you're over 500 in the division. If you do well against everybody else, you're in the mix.
18:25Let's take the Nats out of the equation because you guys are calling their games. Of the other
18:30three and the likely frontrunners, who do you think ends up winning the East?
18:34The Phillies, to me, are still the favorite with the pitching they have at the top of their row,
18:38really through their starting rotation. Their bullpen is a little bit different at the back
18:43end this year. They traded pitchers with Toronto to get their closer, but if they're healthy,
18:50offensively, position by position, they're the same team coming back that's just a year older.
18:56It'll be interesting. On paper, position by position, to me, they're the best team in the
19:01division. They have the fewest question marks. On there too, they added the Marlins' best pitcher.
19:05He's starting game two against the Nationals, and Mr. Lizardo, one-time Nationals draft choice,
19:10traded for Sean Doolittle. Lizardo's starting game two. They're deep, but their window
19:15is starting to... They got a lot of expiring contracts this year.
19:20The Braves are probably in a better position long-term because they have everybody signed.
19:24The Mets have a player signed for a long period of time too. I think for this year,
19:29the Phillies are probably the biggest threat to the Dodgers in the National League.
19:33The Braves are my sneaky play, although I do think there's a real chance for some regression
19:38in the rotation. You got to keep sale healthy. Is Lopez going to do that again? No way.
19:42I'm not thinking that. I think Spencer Schwellenbach is going to be a monster.
19:45Losing Freed? It's big, no doubt, but I think they get Strider back. Hopefully,
19:50I don't know when he comes back. Well, soon. He's been pumping gas in spring.
19:54Absolutely. They've got some coming, some going, but the lineup's going to be way better. Acuna
19:58will be back six weeks or so from now. Albies got hurt last year. Harris got hurt. Riley was down.
20:04I think they're being slept on a little bit. Murphy's down now.
20:07Let's get to the lineup and some questions on the offense. We'll go through
20:11Abrams needing to bounce back, the outfield structure with the kids in left and in right.
20:16Charlie Slows, Dave Jagler. We are previewing opening day tomorrow in Washington, D.C.
20:22We're at the Lost Rhino Brew Pub on your home for Nationals Baseball.
20:27This is Grant and Danny on the fan.