Washington Nationals: Five potential waiver trade candidates

Although we’re now into August, the Washington Nationals could still look to improve their roster with waiver trades. Here are five names to keep an eye on.

The MLB Trade Deadline has come and passed, and the Washington Nationals decided to largely stay as they were. Even though the big day has now passed, it doesn’t prevent them from adding to their roster.

Teams around baseball are still permitted to trade players who have passed through revocable waivers. This is allowed throughout the season, however, to be eligible for the post-season, a player must be on that team’s books before September 1st. This gives an unofficial deadline for these types of trades.

With revocable waivers, all MLB teams have a chance to claim a player. If multiple teams try to claim them, priority goes to the team with the worst record in the same league, then the worst record in the opposite league. If a player is claimed, then one of the following can happen:

• A trade can be negotiated between the two teams.
• The player can simply be sent to the claiming team, and they would take on the entire contract
• Or the player can be withdrawn from waivers, and can’t be placed on them again

However, if the player passes through unclaimed, then he’s free to be traded to anyone.

This is usually the best way to conduct a trade after the deadline, given the flexibility to include multiple players who have cleared waivers. Plus the team can negotiate with anyone, they aren’t locked into just talking with the team that would’ve claimed them.

The Nationals have only really made two noteworthy waiver additions in August since 2012. The first was Kurt Suzuki, who did an admirable job as Wilson Ramos‘ backup. Then in 2014, they acquired Matt Thornton via waivers from the New York Yankees.

So we’ve taken a look to see if there are any potential fits for the Nationals, should they make a trade to bolster their roster heading towards the stretch run.