Washington Nationals Preparing To Sell... What Players Might Interest The Brewers?

[Brock Beauchamp]

In the latest trade roundup from The Athletic, Ken Rosenthal, Katie Woo, and Patrick Mooney wrote that the Nationals are preparing to sell. While Washington is playing decently this season (42-49), they're a whopping 16.5 games behind the Philadelphia Phillies and 5.5 games out of a contentious National League Wild Card spot. They didn't expect to compete this year and feel as if they're a year ahead of schedule and PoBO Mike Rizzo feels selling is the right decision at this trade deadline.

The Nationals have several interesting right-handed relievers that could interest the Brewers. On expiring contracts, they have Dylan Floro (179 ERA+) while they have two relievers who become free agents after the 2025 season: Hunter Harvey (183 ERA+) and Kyle Finnegan (184 ERA+). Starting pitcher Trevor Williams is expected to return from injury soon. He will also become a free agent at season's end and over 11 starts has a 2.22 ERA.

Of course, the Nationals also have a Brewers fan favorite rostered and available in trade, Jesse Winker.

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[Brewcrew82]

If Winker played 1B, he would actually make some sense as an upgrade over Bauer and Black. 

[Lloyd330]

24 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

If Winker played 1B, he would actually make some sense as an upgrade over Bauer and Black. 

Winker is never an upgrade

[Brewcrew82]

18 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

Winker is never an upgrade

If you haven't watched baseball since last October, then sure....

[brewmann04]

stay away from any Trade Deadline Relievers.

[jay87shot]

MacKenzie Gore and Jake Irvins are the only guys I would give anything meaningful for (not counting Abrams/Wood). I doubt either are available. If Trevor Williams gets a good start or 2 in maybe but I wouldnt give up much for him.

[Lloyd330]

19 hours ago, Brewcrew82 said:

If you haven't watched baseball since last October, then sure....

Where exactly do you see him playing? He is a below average hitter that will take away AB's from the Young guys that need them. 

If we want to take away AB's from the young guys, i'm fine with it for a longer term piece. 

Example - You trade Frelick for Jazz Chisholm

[wallus]

Not a whole lot of interest in Nationals guys. The only one that I would be interested in is Lane Thomas as he murders LHP.

[Brewcrew82]

52 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

Where exactly do you see him playing? He is a below average hitter that will take away AB's from the Young guys that need them. 

If we want to take away AB's from the young guys, i'm fine with it for a longer term piece. 

Example - You trade Frelick for Jazz Chisholm

If you recall I said “IF Winker played 1B he’d be a fit”. Which clearly means I don’t think he’s a fit on the current roster. 

And not quite sure where you’re getting it from that Winker is a “below average hitter”.  He’s got a 134 wRC+ this season and a 122 wRC + for his career. That’s the literal opposite of below average. Unless you haven’t watched baseball at all since last October…

[Lloyd330]

12 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

If you recall I said “IF Winker played 1B he’d be a fit”. Which clearly means I don’t think he’s a fit on the current roster. 

And not quite sure where you’re getting it from that Winker is a “below average hitter”.  He’s got a 134 wRC+ this season and a 122 wRC + for his career. That’s the literal opposite of below average. Unless you haven’t watched baseball at all since last October…

[Brewcrew82]

34 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

Lol. 70th percentile xwOBA is "below average" now? 

[sveumrules]

3 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

Lmao. 70th percentile xwOBA is "below average"? 

96th percentile BB rate versus 42nd percentile K rate seems pretty good to, wonder why that wasn’t circled?

[Brewcrew82]

23 minutes ago, sveumrules said:

96th percentile BB rate versus 42nd percentile K rate seems pretty good to, wonder why that wasn’t circled?

People talk about Hiura getting irrational hate from the fanbase, but it seems Winker really did a number on folks, too. Like, yeah, he sucked last year but he also had a pretty solid excuse coming off major neck surgery. Glad that he's rediscovered his form. 

[Lloyd330]

34 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

Lol. 70th percentile xwOBA is "below average" now? 

You picked the one stat that is above avg...Not the seven that are below...Good job. 

[Lloyd330]

31 minutes ago, sveumrules said:

96th percentile BB rate versus 42nd percentile K rate seems pretty good to, wonder why that wasn’t circled?

The guy walks and doesn't chase. Good for him. has always been that guy

[Brewcrew82]

21 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

You picked the one stat that is above avg...Not the seven that are below...Good job. 

No, I just picked the one stat that's all-encompassing and actually representative as to whether a guy is a good hitter relative to average. And that's just purely predictive....

According to the stats measuring actual production, such as wRC+ and OPS+, Winker is a well above average hitter. Both for this season and his career. 

If anyone's "picking stats" here it's you....Because hitters can have a below average bat speed or EV, for example, and still be good. 

[Lloyd330]

1 hour ago, Brewcrew82 said:

No, I just picked the one stat that's all-encompassing and actually representative as to whether a guy is a good hitter relative to average. And that's just purely predictive....

According to the stats measuring actual production, such as wRC+ and OPS+, Winker is a well above average hitter. Both for this season and his career. 

If anyone's "picking stats" here it's you....Because hitters can have a below average bat speed or EV, for example, and still be good. 

This guy looks pretty good to with .340 xwOBA too, but you want to replace him, 

 

[StearnsFTW]

Winker has been a good-to-excellent hitter every year of his career except 2.

We had him in a bad year when he was clearly injured.

[Lloyd330]

I guess if i trade for someone, id rather not a Winker. 

[Brewcrew82]

42 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

This guy looks pretty good to with .340 xwOBA too, but you want to replace him, 

 

Looks like you're willing to die on this hill. I'll continue to indulge for now. 

First of all, I never said replace Bauers with Winker because I acknowledged that Winker doesn't play 1B which makes Bauers a better fit for this roster. 

Second of all, despite their identical xwOBA, Winker has clearly proven himself to be a better hitter and player, both for this season and career-wise. Winker (2024): 134 wRC+, 1.5 fWAR, Winker (career): 122 wRC+, 8.8 fWAR vs. Bauers (2024): 101 wRC+, 0.3 fWAR, Bauers (career): 86 wRC+, -1.0 fWAR. 

Statcast is awesome and quite the useful tool, but there's more to the game than living and dying by red and blue dots. 

[Lloyd330]

16 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

Looks like you're willing to die on this hill. I'll continue to indulge for now. 

First of all, I never said replace Bauers with Winker because I acknowledged that Winker doesn't play 1B which makes Bauers a better fit for this roster. 

Second of all, despite their identical xwOBA, Winker has clearly proven himself to be a better hitter and player, both for this season and career-wise. Winker (2024): 134 wRC+, 1.5 fWAR, Winker (career): 122 wRC+, 8.8 fWAR vs. Bauers (2024): 101 wRC+, 0.3 fWAR, Bauers (career): 86 wRC+, -1.0 fWAR. 

Statcast is awesome and quite the useful tool, but there's more to the game than living and dying by red and blue dots. 

So your whole thing is hypothetical. 

i could care less about career stats when someone is 30 yrs old. i look at the last 2-3 years.  He left one of the best hitter ballparks. I just think he is very lucky this year. His last 6 weeks raised all of his numbers which is inflated by a .392 BAbip

[Brewcrew82]

18 minutes ago, Lloyd330 said:

So your whole thing is hypothetical. 

i could care less about career stats when someone is 30 yrs old. i look at the last 2-3 years.  He left one of the best hitter ballparks. I just think he is very lucky this year. His last 6 weeks raised all of his numbers which is inflated by a .392 BAbip

Lol. It's just as hypothetical as it was in my initial post where I said "If Winker played 1B, he would actually make some sense." You then responded as if it wasn't a hypothetical.

Even if you think he's lucky with his 20 point overperformance in wOBA he's still sporting a 70th percentile xwOBA. Which is well above average last time I checked. And, unlike Bauers, he has a history of well above average production. 

[BrewerFan]

1 hour ago, Brewcrew82 said:

Lol. It's just as hypothetical as it was in my initial post where I said "If Winker played 1B, he would actually make some sense." You then responded as if it wasn't a hypothetical.

Even if you think he's lucky with his 20 point overperformance in wOBA he's still sporting a 70th percentile xwOBA. Which is well above average last time I checked. And, unlike Bauers, he has a history of well above average production. 

I'd happily take Winker in a hypothetical as another good LHed bat off the bench. It's not a great fit as Hoskins isn't a great defensive 1B so you need Bauers vs RHers, but he's back to hitting well and...he's a valuable player. 2.2 WAR as a DH?

I kept thinking he was too good of a hitter to keep struggling last year...I was wrong. But, he was coming off the neck surgery. A guy who can give you good ABs and get on base, is patient. Not the worst guy to have on your bench. Not a great fit(hence the IF he could play 1B well). 

If it wasn't for the awful version of him we saw last year, I doubt there'd be much resistance. 

 

Really hope Wilken can tap into his power enough as he seems like the ideal candidate to fill 1B in the future if he doesn't stick at 3rd. Or even if he can stick at 3B, it appears we may have others coming up not too long after him who may be able to be better 3B and push him to 1B. 

 

[TURBO]

5 hours ago, Brewcrew82 said:

People talk about Hiura getting irrational hate from the fanbase, but it seems Winker really did a number on folks, too. Like, yeah, he sucked last year but he also had a pretty solid excuse coming off major neck surgery. Glad that he's rediscovered his form. 

Of course, he played with us for one season, was absolutely horrid in every imaginable way.

What, do you expect Brewers fans to give a rip about what he did before last season, or this season for that matter?

Dude was just plain bad for us, no one likes him, it's normal fan behavior.  He was our big off season signing and he couldn't have been much worse.

[sveumrules]

1 minute ago, TURBO said:

He was our big off season signing

He was acquired via trade for Kolten Wong, not signed as a free agent.