Good Morning Washington Nationals Fans,

Here are the latest headlines and analyses around the Washington Nationals and Major League Baseball for Tuesday, January 11, 2022. Thank you for starting your day with us.

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Leading today's Morning Briefing:  Another Soto in a Curly W? Earlier this month/late last year there was rumblings of Elian Soto the younger brother of Juan, who was close to joining the New York Mets organization according to the New York Post.  Fast forward to yesterday afternoon, when Byron Kerr reported that " Elian Soto, the younger brother of Nats superstar Juan Soto, is close to joining his brother in the Nats organization. Elian, 16, is a 3B/OF." [Tweet Link].  No matter what, the younger Soto will not be able to sign with the Nationals until 2023, which is right before Juan Soto's current contract expires.

MLB Insider and Sports Journalist, Hector Gómez has a video of the younger Soto hitting some impressive shots in Washington Nationals gear. [Tweet Link]

Our friends at TalkNats have a MUST READ article about the news. Read the full article here.

Why does this matter? Or does it? That is the million-dollar question, or billion if you want to say.  Does the possible signing of the younger Soto mean that Juan wants to stay in D.C? According to Britt Ghiroli of the TheAthletic, "Juan Soto was a factor" in this change. [Tweet Link] Hmm...

Meet the Washington Nationals’ 2021 Organizational All-Stars via MiLB.com; Cade Cavalli leading the way. We've been waiting for this list for a bit, so it was great to finally see Minor League Baseball.com put out the 2021 Organizational All-stars for the Washington Nationals. Obviously, right-handed pitcher Cade Cavalli was on the list, however, there were a few surprises. We have the full list here.

Thankfully, the Nationals Finally Figured out the Catchers Position. With the recent acquisitions of Riley Adams and Keibert Ruiz and with Tres Barrera already being in the Nationals minor league system the Nationals are for the first time in a long time are set at players to catch the next new wave of Nationals pitching rotation and it’s nice after years of Matt Wieters underperformance and the steady-but-uninspiring upgrade to Yan Gomes and Kurt Suzuki, the Nationals have their most exciting catchers’ room, perhaps, in franchise history. Read the full article here.

Washington Nationals Front Office News: According to Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post, there is a new member of the Nationals research and development team.  According to Dougherty, "Michael Schatz has come over from the Red to joining the Nationals research and development team as a lead analyst."[Tweet Link].

Schatz has spent six years with the Reds and four years with the A's before that.

Around the "Nationals Water Cooler":  Revisiting the 2022 priorities for the Washington Nationals. Whenever this lockout ends, the Nationals have a lot to do and are most likely going to have little time to do it. TalkNats has a must-read article about all the 2022 priorities for the Washington Nationals.  "We set a list of priorities for the Washington Nationals baseball team at the end of September for the offseason. Few have been accomplished, so far, as December was basically canceled in terms of baseball moves." Read the full article here.

We are a couple of weeks away from the start of when teams can start to sign International players. In early 2021 we took a look at Cristian Vaquero who might be one of the players that the Nationals might sign during the signing period. Cristian Vaquero is a top-five international prospect. Get to know him here.

Apple TV & Major League Baseball? According to the New York Post, Apple has had substantial talks about carrying Major League Baseball games next season. This is extremely interesting as a potential MLB-Apple deal would not be anywhere close to the magnitude of the NFL and Amazon — which is for more than a billion dollars per year — but MLB and Apple would be the entree of the technology behemoth into the coverage of top live sports. Read the full article here.

MLB Expected To Make Proposal To MLBPA Within Two Weeks. Last week, both Jeff Passan of ESPN and Evan Drellich of the Athletic reported that Major League Baseball had been preparing core economics proposals to present to the MLB Players Association. Both suggested that this proposal could ignite collective bargaining negotiations by the end of the month. Bob Nightengale of USA Today adds a bit more specificity to that timeline, writing yesterday morning that the league is planning to make its proposal “within the next two weeks.” Maybe the proposal by the league is the beginning of the end of this lockout. One note, if we look at the calendar it looks like Spring Training is in fact going to be delayed either way.

Now Trending on the Nats Report. Max Scherzer breaks down what players are seeking in the new collective bargaining agreement with MLB owners. From our article "During the interview, there was a discussion about the additional new sources of revenue that owners are receiving through media deals and gambling and how the players aren’t necessarily interested in getting a piece of the new revenue streams." Read the full article here.

ICYMI: We asked the question: Should the Nationals draft right-handed pitcher Kumar Rocker? From the article: "After not being able to agree with the New York Mets, Right-Handed Pitcher Kumar Rocker could be an interesting draft choice for the Nationals in 2022. As of now, MLB.com is projecting that the Nationals will draft OF Elijah Green from IMG Academy (Bradenton, Fla.), however, with pitching now being a need for the Nationals things could change and it might be a good idea to draft another stud pitcher that could help the team in the long term, is Kumar Rocker a good fit?" Click here to read the full article. We have also written about another interesting prospect that the Nationals should take a look at shortstop: Jacob Berry.

You are all ready for the day!

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