Washington Nationals 2025 Season

THE LEAD

This has been a frustrating rebuild on oh so many levels, as I am sure you know well from reading this space. But it must be said that Friday night’s 5-4 walk-off win against the Mets has to be considered the franchise’s biggest win since the Before Times of 2019. The biggest performances came from the following players: a couple of the Nats’ biggest later-round development success stories of the past decade-plus (Jake Irvin and Jacob Young); two of the principal return pieces from a franchise-defining trade - against that very player’s new team, no less (CJ Abrams and James Wood); a number two overall pick heating up as a rookie (Dylan Crews); and a trade throw-in from last summer (José Tena). And the win came against a division rival that has owned them of late (especially last year, when the Nats went 2-11 against the Mets).

As Sarah Langs says, baseball is the best. Irvin, a fourth-round selection out of Minnesota by way of the University of Oklahoma seven years ago, had his left (glove) elbow hyperextended by the combination of a bad toss from Nathaniel Lowe and Juan Soto’s thigh in the top of the first, and there was a palpable fear throughout the park that the combustible Nats’ bullpen would perhaps have to cover twenty-six outs - two starts after Irvin took an Oneil Cruz tracer missile off of his right leg on the first at-bat of the game. Irvin stayed in the game again, however, and submitted probably his best start since July 4 of last year, when he tossed eight shutout innings against these Mets. Irvin eventually departed after seven and a third scoreless innings with a man on base, having scattered five singles while striking out four and walking one, although his inherited runner scored in the eighth to leave a blemish on his box score line.

Crews, whose ugly first week this season had many leaving him for dead or at least wondering aloud if he should go back to Rochester, worked a hustle double in the bottom of the second and then scored on a Tena single, then scored again in the bottom of the seventh before tripling off of Juan Soto’s glove to lead off the ninth, where Tena drove him in as the tying run. Since that rough first week (1-for-25, 12 K) Crews has been stinging the ball regularly, and he has such a high baseball IQ that he has had other opportunities to impact games with his legs or his glove, and has consistently taken advantage of those.

Abrams tripled home the Nats’ second run on Friday, just missing an oppo taco to the Red Porch seats, and found himself on first base with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. I don’t think that Abrams has a great first step (both his base-stealing rates and his defensive range stats would back me up on that), but he is very fast when underway, and his dash from first all the way home for the winning run (and the slide!) was a thing of beauty.

Finally, Wood had his first career walk-off hit on a full count, hitting a dotted cutter on the outside corner off of second baseman Jeff McNeil’s glove into shallow center field. Tyrone Taylor, playing a no-doubles defense, charged in and threw home, but Abrams got in just around and ahead of the tag for a run that was upheld upon review.

 Washington Nationals 2025 Season

Game Recap

For the first six innings yesterday, the Nationals looked dead in the water for the second consecutive game, managing a second-inning solo homer by Crews and a walk by Alex Call against Mets starter Tylor Megill, but nothing else, while conversely Mitchell Parker struggled for the first time this season - especially with his command - and allowed the Mets to hang five runs in the first and insurance runs in the second and fifth frames. The offense finally woke up after the seventh-inning stretch, staring at a six-run deficit with nine outs to go. Luis García Jr. doubled followed by a Nathaniel Lowe strikeout and a Josh Bell single that scored García and chased Megill to the showers. José Buttó came in and struck out Crews before allowing singles to Tena and Call, and then Riley Adams - who plays so rarely that he might have forgotten how to hit live pitching - clobbered a pitch over the out-of-town scoreboard in right field, and all of a sudden it was a one-run game.

The Nats threatened again in the eighth but left the bases loaded, and thus entered the ninth - with Jorgé López having worked out of a jam to keep it a one-run game - trailing 7-6. Call led off the inning with an opposite-field double, correctly challenging Soto’s arm even though the latter had cut the ball off in front of the wall. Keibert Ruiz, pinch-hitting for Adams against a righty, moved pinch runner Jacob Young to third with an infield grounder before Abrams ripped a grounder past the diving Pete Alonso to score Young and tie the game. Wood walked to push the winning run into scoring position, and then García hit a grounder that forced a bad throw from Alonso to the covering pitcher, Ryne Stanek, or rather over Stanek’s head to the Nats’ on-deck circle. Catcher Luis Torrens had absolutely no chance to both back up the bad throw and recover to the plate to get Abrams, who scampered home with the winning run.

The Mets and Nats conclude their series this afternoon at 4:05, with Trevor Williams taking the mound against Griffin Canning.

 STORY TYPE

Reaching Crewsing Altitude

Since that 1-for-25 start to the season, Crews has gone 20-for-66 and looked increasingly comfortable at the plate (only striking out ten times in that span). His barrel and squared-up rates are both in the 80th percentile across baseball, and he has hit into a lot of bad luck this season. While he has not looked as elite in the outfield yet as he did in his 2024 cameo, he has displayed 97th percentile sprint speed and a strong arm. He also just turned 23, and since leaving A-ball in his draft year has shown a tendency to start slow at new levels and then adjust fairly quickly. It looks like that may be happening now for Crews, who absolutely has to be at minimum an above-average regular in order for this rebuild to succeed.

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Speed Reads

📌 Harper On the Cubs (The Athletic)

📌 The Simpsons Spoofs Mizuhara Gambling Scandal (The Athletic)

📌 Early 2025-26 Free Agency Primer (Yahoo!)