The Washington Nationals Pitching Crossroads

During the 2021 season, no team in baseball will spend more on starting pitching than the Washington Nationals. As a matter of fact, the franchise's "big three" of Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin will earn a combined salary of just under $94 million this season. That figure is higher than the salary of any other team's rotation as of January 19th and more than six MLB franchises spent on their entire roster during the 2019 season. The Nationals could add free agent Trevor Bauer to this mix as well, but it seems highly unlikely with the recent signing of veteran lefty Jon Lester.

Pitching has defined this era of Washington Nationals baseball and has taken up much of the team's payroll over the last decade. However, this could potentially change after the upcoming season with Scherzer's contract due to expire.The Nationals could undoubtedly resign what is likely the franchise's first Hall of Famer in Scherzer, but it won't be at an average annual value of $30 million, and this is where the change may begin.

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Outside of Lucas Giolito and going back further to Stephen Strasburg, the Nationals' farm system has traditionally produced top positional talent and therefore, the Nats have saved money during the teahttps://thenatsreport.com/06/08/2020/special-reports/special-report-v-10-years-of-strasmas/m control and arbitration periods for players like Trea Turner, Juan Soto, Bryce Harper, and Anthony Rendon.

Savings actually might be an understatement. In 2018, when all of these players were on the team, Harper, Rendon, Turner, and Soto's combined luxury tax hit was $31,047,000. This means that in 2018, Washington got 18.1 WAR out of 4 position players that only cost a total of $1,047,000 more than Max Scherzer toward the luxury tax.

Two of those players, Turner and Soto, didn't even earn a million dollars. For years, the Nats could go out and spend big money on starting pitching, while knowing that they had cheap, impact bats waiting on the farm.  With four NL East Division titles and a World Series since 2012, this plan has worked more often than not.

2021 and Beyond...

In 2021, things look to be a little bit different. Infielders Carter Kieboom and Luis Garcia have graduated from prospect status, and now the farm system is top heavy with pitching talent. According to MLB Pipeline, 10 of the top 15 Nationals prospects are pitchers, and a quartet of them are projected to be impact starters. These four are Jackson Rutledge, Cade Cavalli, Cole Henry, and Andry Lara. After this group, there are talented starters like Tim Cate, Seth Romero, and Mason Denaburg, that could be called upon as early as this season to fill in the back end of a rotation.

That's a lot of unmined pitching gold in the system right now, and with all of this talent on the verge of making an impact, the Nats may finally be able to shift their spending habits. If only one of the top four pitching prospects hits on their projections over the next two years, this will free up $25 million in payroll that would be needed to get a reliable third starter behind Strasburg and Corbin. If two of them hit, that would save the franchise over $35 million, and these savings would continue to grow if more of them reach their projected potential. These savings could go directly into a big bat to supplement the lineup, just like Corbin supplemented the rotation in 2019.

Historically, Mike Rizzo had always picked pitching when the budget forced him to make a choice.

In the 2018 offseason, he went with Corbin over Harper, and in 2019 he went with Strasburg over Rendon. Now Rizzo has those two aces locked up for a while and a farm system stocked with potential third starter options to take Scherzer's spot at a fraction of the cost. As a result, the Nats will have a good amount of money available and this could be the time to shift spending toward offense with a 2022 free-agent class filled with impact bats like Conforto, Story, Baez, Seager, Correa, and Bryant.

During the next two offseasons, the free-agent classes are also scheduled to include pitchers like Berrios, Syndergaard, McCullers, and Taillon, so time will tell if Rizzo is willing to use the money on offense, or back up the Brinks truck for another ace. A lot of this team's future depends on the progress of four young arm.