Category: Sports News

DRaysBay works best as a place for community and conversation. Accordingly, in the lead up to the new season, we are posting “Daily Questions” in the month of February. I look forward to seeing you in the comment section!

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What moment in this franchise history haunts you, keeps you up at night, barges into your brain at inconvenient moments when you’re just trying to enjoy a game…

The Nationals figure to have an exciting lineup in 2026, with a combination of proven talent such as James Wood and CJ Abrams, youngsters who have flashed upside such as Daylen Lile and Dylan Crews, and still relatively unknown commodities such as Harry Ford and Brady House. While the lineup will certainly be worth watching this season, it’s hard to say the same about the Nationals’ pitching staff.

According to Fangraphs, the Nationals’ starting rotation and bullpen both rank 30th out of 30 in projected fWAR in 2026, respectively. While the starting rotation is only the worst by a little, the bullpen is far and away the worst in the sport according to Fangraphs, with its projected combined fWAR of 0.4 being 0.7 behind the 2nd worst unit, the San Francisco Giants.

I’ve discussed starting pitching options the Nats should be looking to bring in before pitchers and catchers report soon, now let’s take a look at some options on the bullpen side of things, to take the unit from awful to at least bearable in 2026.

LHP Justin Wilson

After a tough 2024 season in which the 36-year-old Wilson posted a 5.59 ERA and 4.73 FIP in 46.2 IP, it appeared Wilson’s career was nearing its end. After an effective 2025 in which he posted a 3.35 ERA and 2.95 FIP in 48.1 IP, it looks like the now 38 year old Wilson still has some juice left in the tank after all.

One of the things Wilson does most effectively is generate swing and miss, something Paul Toboni is looking to add to a bullpen unit that sorely lacks it currently. In 2025, Wilson posted a 74th percentile chase rate and 91st percentile whiff rate, good for a 27.5% strikeout rate, ranking in the 82nd percentile among all relievers. His fastball and slider are his go-to swing and miss pitches, both having a whiff rate over 30%, but he’ll also mix in the occasional cutter and splitter to keep hitters guessing.

While Wilson was exactly 50th percentile in average exit velocity in 2025, it doesn’t affect him as much as others because he excels at keeping the ball on the ground, with a 72nd percentile groundball rate in 2025, resulting in a strong 72nd percentile barrel rate (which accounts for both the exit velocity and launch angle of a batted ball).

The 38-year-old Wilson seems like a pitcher that a contender would have taken a chance on by now, but if his market just isn’t where he expected it to be by now, the Nationals should jump into negotiations and get a deal done. Whether he ends up closing games or being a setup man, Wilson would be a big boost for a currently very shaky bullpen.

LHP Danny Coulombe

Coulombe was dominating in the first half of 2025 with the Twins, posting a 1.16 ERA and 2.01 FIP in 31 IP with them, before seeing the results disappear in the second half after being traded to the Rangers, as well as dealing with a shoulder injury, resulting in a 5.25 ERA and 6.64 FIP in 12 IP for them. The 36-year-olds market has been quiet this offseason, offering the Nats a chance to swoop in and offer him a situation where he’ll have nearly unlimited attempts at finding what he had going on early in 2025.

Coulombe has been nothing but consistent throughout his entire big league career, posting an ERA under 3 every year since 2022 and an ERA over 4 only once since 2017, resulting in a career ERA of 3.35. One of the key reasons for his success is his ability to limit barrels, whether it be by keeping hard contact to a minimum or keeping the ball on the ground.

Coulombe does not throw hard, ranking 6th percentile in fastball velocity in 2025, but it doesn’t matter because his primary pitch is actually his cutter, which he throws 40% of the time to great success, posting a 36.4% whiff rate and .291 xwOBA with the pitch in 2025. Outside of the cutter, he relies on a multitude of pitches to rack up outs, with sinkers against lefties and sweepers against righties being his other go-to pitches.

RHP Scott Barlow

While the results lagged behind the peripherals in 2025 for Barlow, posting a 4.21 ERA and 4.70 FIP in 68.1 IP, there are reasons to believe he can be more effective and potentially even break out in 2026, the type of pitchers the Nationals should be all over right now in free agency.

One thing Barlow did extremely well in 2025 was limit hard contact, posting a 96th percentile average exit velocity and 99th percentile hard hit rate. He also did a strong job of keeping the ball on the ground, with a 60th percentile groundball rate, resulting in a 66th percentile barrel rate. He also generated plenty of swing-and-misses in 2025, with an 87th percentile whiff rate and 67th percentile strikeout rate overall.

So if Barlow was both limiting hard contact and getting swing-and-misses in 2025, why weren’t his results better? The issue that plagued Barlow was walks, and he gave up a lot of them, with his 14.9% walk rate ranking in the bottom 1st percentile among relievers in 2025. Hitters had a hard time doing damage off Barlow’s stuff, but as long as they worked the count enough, odds were, Barlow was going to beat himself for them.

While the walk issue might be enough to scare contenders away from the 33-year-old Barlow, the reason the Nats should be taking a shot on him is that it was an outlier year for him in terms of that issue, as it was a 2% jump in walk rate from 2024 to 2025. With proper coaching, there is the potential of Barlow getting the walks back under control, which could make him an extremely effective piece out of the pen for Butera to use.

We finally have solid details of how the St. Louis Cardinals plan to make their games available for streaming for the upcoming season. The team says that Major League Baseball will produce and distribute all in-market St. Louis Cardinals games and they promise to do it with no regional blackout restrictions.

Here are the exact words shared by the St. Louis Cardinals in a press release shared today:

“Fans can purchase a Cardinals.TV streaming subscription when packages go on sale on February 10. Cardinals.TV can be purchased for $99.99 for the full season or $19.99 per month. Information on cable and satellite providers, including specific channel locations, will be announced at a later date.“

The St. Louis Cardinals are the 8th team to turn over their broadcast to MLB joining the Diamondbacks, Guardians, Padres, Rockies, Twins, Mariners and Nationals. There’s no mention who the broadcasters will be for the games, but they say those details will be provided in the coming weeks. I noticed the no blackout promise comes with an asterisk specifying “in Cardinals territory”. That seems to refer to the national exclusive broadcasts and not some odd state restrictions or so I hope.

“Our top priority is making sure that Cardinals fans can watch their team as easily as possible,” said Anuk Karunaratne, Cardinals Senior Vice President of Business Operations. “Whether you prefer cable, satellite, or streaming, you’ll have uninterrupted access to every in-market game through this new model. MLB brings world-class production capabilities, and we’re excited about what this means for the future of Cardinals broadcasts.”

Moises Chace may have lost some time to injury this year, but maybe it will hasten the time to putting him in his best spot: relief pitching

Moises Chace – 53
Matthew Fisher – 32
Jean Cabrera – 12
Cade Obermueller – 9
Carson DeMartini – 8
Keaton Anthony – 8
Alex McFarlane – 5
Griffin Burkholder – 4
Mavis Graves – 1

There are whispers that the team is still going to try and make Chace a starter this season as he returns from Tommy John surgery. Based on a lot of the scouting reports available, I’m not sure why. The stuff he possesses seems to lend itself towards being a reliever, so why not try and expedite the process? Plus, with the possibility that the team will need different arms throughout the summer to reinforce the bullpen in case of injury, Chace seems like the perfect candidate to figure into that mix.

However, if they want to continue his developmental path down towards being a starter, let’s hope it works out.

2025 stats (w/ Reading)

6 G (6 GS), 16 2/3 IP, 25.3 K%, 16.0 BB%, 1.62 HR/9, 31.8 GB%, 3.24 ERA (5.51 FIP)

Fangraphs scouting report

It seemed plausible that Chace, who was put on the 40-man after the 2024 season, could play a very important role in Philly in 2025, even if that was as the team’s setup man or closer. Instead, Chace’s velocity tanked into the low 90s, his walk rate regressed to his problematic, early-career levels, and after six starts, he was shut down and needed Tommy John toward the end of May. The injury not only casts doubt on how Chace’s stuff might look when he returns, but also robs him of valuable reps needed to develop the durability, control, and secondary pitches of a starting pitcher.

Chace’s slider flashes late, hitter-freezing, two-plane bend, but it doesn’t do so consistently. At times, his changeup has ridiculous tailing action and can steal strikes running back over the glove-side corner of the plate, but again, this is rare.

With each new post, we’ll reveal who won the voting for that particular slot, then post new players for you to vote on, adding another one to the list each time until we get to our final tally of 20. Once we get to 20 top prospects, we’ll do an honorable mention post at the end. If a player gets traded to another team, we’ll just chuck him right on outta here and all the players will move up a spot. If a prospect gets acquired, we’ll ask where he should go on the list.

Probably the most important thing about this whole process – please vote. Give us a few minutes of your time, just click a button and then we can discuss other players and things in the comment section, but don’t forget – VOTE!

It’s officially February now, which means that we don’t have too much longer to wait until we start hearing the crack of the bat and baseballs hitting mitts under the Florida sun.

Before that can happen and before even pitchers and catchers can report, all of the equipment needs to get down to the spring training facilities first. That process got underway here on Monday, as the Braves had their annual Truck Day at Truist Park. Again, it’s not quite as exciting as seeing the players report to camp but it’s still exciting enough since it’s the clearest sign yet that baseball is coming very, very soon.

The Braves (via a press release) laid out the details of just how much stuff they’ll be taking with them from the Atlanta Metro area down to North Port, Florida.

Stood end to end, the number of baseballs (9,000) being sent to Spring Training would stand over 2,175 ft. in height – or more than five times as tall as the TK Elevator test tower, located in The Battery Atlanta, which is the tallest elevator test tower in North America.

If stacked end to end, the number of bats (432) would extend more than 1,100 feet – or the equivalent of approximately 160 Bloopers.

574 hats laid brim-to-brim would span nearly 300 feet – almost completing a full lap around the bases at Truist Park.

65,000 fluid ounces of water and Powerade — more than 500 gallons — is enough liquid to fill over 50 standard MLB dugout drink coolers, enough to line the entire dugout rail with coolers, end to end, with some to spare.

More than 2,000 pieces of gum is enough for one individual to chew a piece every day for nearly five and a half years.

I was able to go down into the depths of Truist Park in order to get a look at one of the trucks that was being loaded up to head down to North Port.

Blooper even got in on lending a helping hand, though it’s tough to say if he was working hard or hardly working down there.

The trucks officially departed for Florida at Noon E.T. on Monday, so I suppose you could say that the countdown to spring training can officially begin in earnest after that particular milestone. Pitchers and catchers are set to report on February 10, with the full squad being required to report by February 15. Considering how the past couple of seasons have gone for the Braves, I’d imagine that everybody involved with the squad is probably champing at the bit to get down there and get to work on what should hopefully be a bounce-back season for this ballclub.

The Braves also unveiled some of the giveaways that they’ll be handing out to fans over the course of this 81-game season. DJourn posted a link to the 2026 Giveaway Schedule over in The Feed Of course there’s the expected selection of bobbleheads but the Braves have also decided to reach out to fans of different sports across Braves Country with some wearable giveaways as well.

There will be a football jersey giveaway with a design inspired by what the Georgia Bulldogs wear on the field, there will be an Atlanta Hawks-inspired basketball giveaway, a hockey jersey giveaway that’ll likely coincide with the Nashville Predators visiting Truist Park during June (in response to the Predators having a Braves Night this March) and then there will be a soccer jersey giveaway with the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup in mind.

Atlanta Braves Director of Marketing and Advertising Jori Palmer was on hand for a press scrum explained the thinking behind the crossover jerseys. “[Crossover jerseys] are getting a lot of traction in the sports world,” said Palmer. “A lot of people have a Braves jersey, so [we] put a little spin on it and remixed it. We’ve got a football jersey featuring Michael Harris [II] because he’s a great football fan, a hockey jersey featuring Drake Baldwin because they guy’s good at everything (including hockey), a basketball jersey with Ronald Acuña Jr. on it because he’s good at everything (including basketball) and then a soccer jersey…with the number 26 on the back, which represents 2026 and the fact that Atlanta is hosting some FIFA World Cup games.“

The coolest giveaway on display (in my opinion) was the Chris Sale “Bobblecard.” This is a new idea that, as the name suggests, merges together the worlds of bobbleheads and trading cards. There’s a bobblehead and torso model of Chris Sale in the front and it’s contained within a box that has Sale’s stats on the back. I’d imagine that this is going to be a hot commodity once it drops on April 29 and Palmer made sure to mention that this won’t be the only “Bobblecard” given away during this season.

“It’s supposed to look like the front of a baseball card,” said Palmer. “And then on the back, you’ve got all the history, the stats, All-Star appearances…so it’s kind of like a 3D baseball card.”

So, with the trucks officially heading down to Floriday ahead of spring training and the giveaways for 2026 being laid out, are y’all excited yet for baseball? Between this and the club’s solid offseason (which Jim Bowden of The Athletic graded out at a B+, for what it’s worth), the smell of baseball is starting to float into the air once again. Ervin Santana isn’t with the team to see or smell it but you can still start getting excited for Braves baseball, nonetheless.

Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic Detroit had the scoop on Monday morning. The arbitration hearing between Detroit Tigers’ ace, Tarik Skubal, and the club will take place on Wednesday, February 4. The arbitration panel will have 24 hours to rule in favor on one party or the other.

The Tigers filed for a one-year contract of $19 million, while Skubal and agent Scott Boras filed at $32 million. The midpoint is $25.5 million, which is where the the three person panel will essentially make an over/under decision and award Skubal either $19 million or $32 million. The two parties could still work out an agreement beforehand but that seems out of the question by this point.

The difference of $13 million is the largest in the history of arbitration. Should the Tigers win, that decision may set a pretty firm cap on arbitration awards for now. Should Skubal win, he’ll set a record for the highest salary ever for an arbitration eligible player, surpassing Juan Soto’s $31 million a few years back. Soto’s deal was agreed without a hearing, so the Skubal decision, should it go his way, will also set a new standard for arbitration awards for the top players in the game. His would also be the biggest one-year increase in the sport’s history.

The Tigers initially offered $19.80 million, which was rejected. That amount would just break David Price’s 2015 record for a one-year salary for an arbitration eligible pitcher by $50,000, though again, that deal was negotiated to agreement by then GM Dave Dombrowski and Price’s representatives. It didn’t go to an arbitration panel. It’s fairly telling that 11 years later, the Tigers offered Skubal the same amount, and that is why many expect Skubal to come out on top in the hearing. That certainly isn’t guaranteed, however, as the size of the raise year over year would also be unprecedented should Skubal win through and receive the $32 million.

A minor war of words in the media has followed, as the two parties filed their initial numbers, each rejecting the others’ demands. At that point negotiations ceased, the two parties filed their numbers, and there have been no reported talks since. The Tigers came off looking rather poorly based on their offer just on the Price comparison alone. They did fire back a little through the media, suggesting that they were willing to negotiate from that point, but that Boras and Skubal cut off negotiations. Boras responded that he and Skubal were still willing to negotiate. And so it goes…

As big of a story as this is for Major League Baseball, particularly with the next CBA negotiations looming, we’ll have to see if this is actually that impactful for the 2026 Tigers or not. The $13 million may be the difference in terms of adding another depth starter or not, and the starting pitching market has ground to a halt over the last week or two, perhaps in anticipation of arb hearings around the league finalizing payroll numbers for numerous teams. But unless the Tigers are getting into the Framber Valdez sweepstakes, or waiting on the final number before actively engaging on talks to trade Skubal, which seems highly unlikely at this point, then they’re probably hunting for a cheaper, one-year starter either way.

You can read Stavenhagen’s piece on the arbitration standoff right here, but it is paywalled.

Still, knowing Skubal’s number one way or the other at very least gives them that clarity. Another looming factor is that pitchers and catchers will report to spring training on Wednesday, February 11. At that point, the Tigers could move an injured player like Jackson Jobe to the 60-day injured list, allowing them to sign a player without designating anyone for assignment.

So the next two Wednesdays will be big for freeing up the Tigers as they look to finalize their roster for 2026. The question is whether they’re waiting on these two dates or not. If they’re actually planning to keep adding signficant talent to the roster once they have Skubal’s final number and can open a 40-man roster spot, we should find out over the next two weeks.

The Twins kicked off the week with a surprising trade of former top prospect Edouard Julien and reliever Pierson Ohl for minor leaguer Jace Kaminski, who had missed all of 2025 with Tommy John surgery. They ended the week with a bombshell announcement that POB&BO Derek Falvey and the team were parting ways. While the move in a vacuum may not have been surprising, the timing of the move, considering pitchers and catchers report in a couple of weeks to spring training, was quite suspect. Now, the relentless pursuit of new heads of baseball and business operations begins.

The Past Week on Twinkie Town:

• Check out The Feed, where you can add your discussions about the Twins!
• We’re starting a new segment called Daily Questions! Provide your opinion on the Twins and debate with the community!
• Zach Koenig looks at the 2026 MLB HOF class.
• Matt Monitto provides his thoughts on Tom Pohlad’s comments on current events in the Twin Cities.
• We’re onto Round 14 of Zach Koenig’s Greatest Twins Moments and Performances list.
• James Fillmore recaps the most recent Twinkie Town movie night, Benched. We’ve got the Rookie coming up on Friday.

Elsewhere in Twins Territory:

• Aaron Gleeman at The Athletic reads between the lines of Derek Falvey’s exit interview with local media.
• Bobby Nightengale at the Star Tribune profiles the new (interim) head man of the Twins, Jeremy Zoll.
• Chris Schad at Zone Coverage looks at the impact of the shortened 2020 season on Derek Falvey’s legacy.
• Betsy Helfand at the Pioneer Press evaluates Derek Falvey’s track record as the Twins’ POBO.

In the World of Baseball:

• Eugenio Suárez, who hit 49 homers last season in Arizona and Seattle, is returning to Cincinnati on a one-year, $15 million contract.
• If you’re looking for some light reading, Shohei Ohtani is releasing a new children’s book about his dog. Seriously, what can’t this man do?
• Thomas Harrigan at MLB.com identifies seven players with more prominent roles this year due to roster changes.