The Washington Nationals have signed second baseman Starlin Castro to a two year deal to shore up their infield.
Starlin Castro, an infielder who can play both the middle infield positions, has signed a two year, $12 million deal to play second base for the defending World Series champs. He will be playing second base as the Nationals are already set at short with Trea Turner.
Let’s be honest, the Washington Nationals needed to shore up their infield, an infield who lost arguably it’s best player in Anthony Rendon to the Los Angeles Angels.
While there is no way Castro will replicate Rendon-like numbers, he is an upgrade over Howie Kendrick and Carter Kieboom. Kendrick, the postseason hero in the series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, is just not an everyday player anymore, and Kieboom only has 39 career MLB at-bats.
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Castro has a career slash line of .280/.319/.414 with 133 home runs and 636 RBI’s. He’s also coming off a season where he led all of baseball in games played at 162. This is a guy who can literally play every day.
According to FanGraphs, he ranked as the 8th best second baseman in the league last season ranking right behind former Nationals second baseman Brian Dozier. They will be getting the same quality defense this season with Castro.
When it comes to Dozier, Castro is an upgrade at the dish. Dozier only slashed .238/.340/.430 compared to Castro’s .270/.300/.436.
Castro will surely be a good replacement for Dozier, but we still have to wonder, who the Nationals are going to get to replace Rendon at third? Free agent Josh Donaldson still has yet to make his decision, but do the Nats have a backup plan in case he goes somewhere else?
Currently, on their depth chart, the two options at the hot corner have a combined 51 MLB plate appearances in their careers. They may have to platoon Castro and recently resigned Asdrubal Cabrera.
Either way, the Washington Nationals made a good signing by inking Starlin Castro and it should provide dividends, especially with him not being very injury prone.