Washington Nationals: Team preview and prediction for 2020 season

Washington Nationals: 2020 Preview and Prediction

To me, I would say if this Washington Nationals team is going to keep itself in the hunt, it’ll have to begin the process of turning to its youth movement to start leading the pack. Luckily for the Nats, they’re rather well-equipped in terms of their young players with players everybody knows like Juan Soto and Trea Turner, as well as the guys not everybody is acquainted with in Joe Ross, Carter Kieboom, and Victor Robles as the designated future leaders of this franchise.

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We know how high of a ceiling Juan Soto has as the run-producing machine that he is and how multi-faceted a player like Trea Turner has become with a triple threat at the plate, in the field, and on the base path. But what is going to be interesting to see this year is the development of Ross, Kieboom, and Robles.

As far as fielding is concerned, Victor Robles led the majors last season in outs above average with 23. Meaning, he saved the most runs in baseball last year with his wide range patrolling the outfield. Robles isn’t quite the best player on this team as a hitter, but he’s quickly becoming one of the elite defenders in the league and will once again prove to be one of the leaders of this Nationals ball club in the future.

Kieboom was supposed to be the future shortstop of this team until Trea Turner established himself a few years ago at the position, but even so, he’s an extra-base-hit machine who’s had nothing but success at the lower levels. Now, he’s going to have the opportunity to play third base every day and cement his spot in this Nationals lineup for years to come alongside Soto and Turner.

As for Joe Ross, I’m very excited to see what he does this year. We’ve sort of been waiting around for him to pop these last couple of years with the stuff he has, but he dealt with injuries two years ago and last year he wasn’t quite ready to take over a starting gig.

This year, however, is his time. Ross is a rising star in the baseball world who has two knockout pitches of a sinker and slider and high velocity on both. Ross had a brief moment to shine last year in the World Series when Scherzer went down, but he couldn’t quite get the job done. This time around, we’re going to see him cemented into the Nats rotation and he’ll very shortly get himself established as a guy to watch.

So, how do the Nats finish in 2020?

The biggest things for me are that this team is still a bit old, I’m not sure if their two top dogs in the rotation can stay up, and the loss of another MVP candidate (I think snub) in Anthony Rendon is never going to go unnoticed and without consequence. Sure they won last year despite losing Bryce Harper who actually won the MVP, but are they going to keep the train moving two-straight years when they have dropped two of the game’s best in consecutive offseasons?

They have solid veterans around the diamond with Yan Gomes, Asdrubal Cabrera, Adam Eaton, and Ryan Zimmerman with Eric Thames and Starlin Castro added in the offseason. They have the young core I already talked about.

They have some other prospects coming up to keep an eye on like Yadiel Hernandez (who hit 30+ jacks last year in Triple-A), Jacob Wilson, and Luis Garcia. And they improved their bullpen a bit from last season by holding on to Daniel Hudson and Sean Doolittle while also adding Will Harris. But to me, something has to happen this year. There has to be some kind of pullback.

I have the Nats finishing this season in third place in the NL East (87-75 before the delayed opening) and just missing the playoffs. But don’t get me wrong, this team may have its doubts, but it’s still very formidable. Let’s see what they can do post-championship.