Washington Nationals Starting Rotation Bolstered by Incredible Depth
Spring training has started up for the Washington Nationals and the franchise will be anxious to see what their young core of talent looks like in 2025.
For the last several years, there has been a lot of losing for the Nationals. However, the light finally appears to be at the end of the tunnel for the franchise and their rebuild.
In 2024, despite winning just 71 games, a lot of the young talent for the franchise was starting to get showcased in the Majors. Now, as the start of the new campaign approaches, the team will be hoping to take a nice step forward and win some more games.
While the lineup for Washington is the most exciting part of the team with their plethora of young talent, the starting rotation on the other hand will be what likely makes or breaks the team.
This winter, the Nationals did make some additions to the unit to help provide a veteran presence to what is a young group overall. In free agency, they signed Shinnosuke Ogasawara and Michael Soroka, and re-signed Trevor Williams.
Even though they added some new arms, there is still a lot of uncertainty surrounding what the rotation will look like. However, even though they might not have a true ace just yet, they do have a lot of depth.
As the team gets prepared for the season, there is a good chance that they will look to utilize a six-man rotation either to start the season or at some point during the campaign.
Currently, the rotation has MacKenzie Gore, Jake Irvin, Soroka, Mitchell Parker, Williams, DJ Herz, and Ogasawara. With seven pitchers fighting for either five or six spots, there will be someone left out come Opening Day.
However, there is never such thing as too much pitching and that is true for Washington.
While the franchise has seen some of their young position players flash excellence, they will be hoping to see someone from the starting rotation do so as well.
Gore, Irvin, or Parker seem like the most likely choices from the young starters to take that step forward toward possibly becoming an All-Star caliber pitcher.
From the veterans, Williams is a really interesting player to watch. Despite missing a good chunk of 2024 due to injury, he was amazing when he was on the mound. If the veteran found something out to change his career around, he could be an X-factor.
Overall, the unit currently lacks top-end talent, but they have plenty of depth heading into the campaign. If some of the young pitchers step up, this could turn into a decent rotation.
