Once the 2023 trade deadline passes on August 1st of this year (6 p.m. ET), it’s time to get back to work for Davey Martinez and his club.
“At 6:01 p.m. some players came up and asked, ‘Are you still here?'” Martinez told reporters.
“I say, ‘Yes, you guys are good.’ You got traded to the Washington Nationals, congratulations. Keep playing.'”
The morning after the 23rd deadline, GM Mike Rizzo spoke with 106.7 The Fan on Sports Junkies in D.C. In his opinion, he spoke about the club’s goals for the 2024 season after the club made great strides this season in terms of developing a young core in the majors and minors.
What are Rizzo’s goals for his 24 years with the club?
“Win as many games as possible,” the GM said. group. “
“We have a lot of good young players,” the Nats captain said, noting that C.J. Abrams, Lane Thomas, Keibert Lewis and Riley Adams have improved this year, and Martinez is the next player in the Nats’ system. He said the waves were for him. I’m also excited.
“Some of the guys that are coming up are really, really excited,” Martinez said.
“Some of the key players we got in Double-A are doing well,” Martinez said of prospects such as Brady House, Trey Lipscomb, Dylan Cruz, Robert Hassell III and James Wood. I’m excited.” .
“So, it looks like the plans are moving pretty quickly. I don’t think we’re that far off. We’re playing and competing every day here, and our players are going out there for the rest of their lives.” They’re playing hard. That’s what I love about them. So we’ve got to keep moving forward and keep getting better.”
6th year manager (People who signed new multi-year extension contracts this summer), said he wasn’t too surprised by how quickly the plans they started at the 2021 deadline were coming together, and he expects he and Rizzo to be competitive again as early as next season (’24). said.
“Look, there’s no one around me. We hate losing,” Martinez said. “Really not. We want this to happen pretty quickly. This organization is known for winning championships and making the playoffs. So we want to get back to that as soon as possible. So, like I said, we started this, and we had a plan. The plan wasn’t to wait five or six years. The plan was It was about trying to get it done. And now we’re really happy with where we are.”
The Nationals won 16 games overall in 2022, but Rizzo told Junkees he doesn’t want to set a clear goal for the 2024 season in terms of wins.
“I never put expectations or win-loss numbers out there,” he explained. “I’m here to play good baseball and win every baseball game we play. “That’s what I tell the players today is the most important game of the season. Davie says, “Let’s go 1-0.” That’s his contract and that’s how we work. That can’t be done — 162 [games] And 67 months into the season, you can’t see the big picture like that, we have to focus on not just today’s game, not just this inning, not just this inning. [at-bat]But like Clayton Kershaw said when he was in Los Angeles, to me he’s like, “This, I’m going from pitch to pitch.” It’s not inning to inning or batter to batter, it’s pitch to pitch. That’s the concentration you have to have as a major leaguer, and that’s what makes this game so difficult. You play every day, there’s 200 pitches in a game, you have to be confined to 200 pitches in a game, and if you lose concentration on that one or two pitches or the batter’s one or two pitches, you can’t hit the ball. I feel like I’ll be found out and lose. The game is what it is. ”
And how do we teach and instill the necessary focus as players grow?
“That’s what young players have to learn to go from rookie to good to great,” Rizzo said.
“It’s like an escalation of their mental abilities in baseball, and it’s exhausting sometimes.”
There is definitely room for improvement at every level of the organization, and changes to the front office, minors, and major league staff already this offseason indicate what the club believes changes/improvements need to be made. This seems to suggest, but in the end, it is important to develop players and change direction. When asked about his next steps after signing a multi-year extension in September, Rizzo explained:
He said the simplest way to describe the goal was to “enable talented young players to take the next step in their development.” And they’re just continuing the success rate they’ve had with these elite prospects in the minor league system.
“We moved from a minor league system where we had a lot of minor league players at the major league level, but in terms of prospects and depth at the minor league level— [it] It was short because we were competitive with the major leagues for about 10 years. So we used a lot of our prospect capital to continue winning at the big league level.
“We’ve refilled it. We think we have something better, deeper, more impactful. [minor league] We plan to use the in-game system at the Major League level in the near future to help return to championship level clubs. ”
