As the World Series wages on after a surprising extra innings victory from the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday night, the offseason will have to wait another night. While the Milwaukee Brewers could easily end the series on Wednesday night, there are other things happening around the league involving our Washington Nationals, or at least people who used to be involved with them.
Astros interviewing Mike Rizzo for GM vacancy
The Houston Astros are interviewing former Nationals manager Mike Rizzo for their vacant general manager position, reported Bob Nightengale of USA TODAY on Monday morning.
The revelation comes after the team parted ways with previous general manager Dana Brown in August. It's been a turbulent time for the Astros GM role since the start of the decade; Jeff Luhnow was fired on the heels of the sign-stealing scandal in early 2020, James Click was allowed to walk immediately after winning the World Series, and the exit of Brown indicates deteriorating relationships between Astros owner Jim Crane and a man who was thought to be hired effectively as a yes man to him.
I'm a Nationals fan, but I'm also an Astros fan. I was born in Houston and have lived here my entire life. Whether or not I would like to leave is neither here nor there. The fact of the matter is that the writing has been on the wall in Houston since 2024; increasingly, the team has become "Yordan Álvarez and Friends," and Houston farting its way to a Postseason spot despite having the worst 162-game record to do so in MLB history while having the likely American League MVP on their team only further cements that.
So now the Astros, who have gone the last two months effectively without anyone at the helm of the ship and Jeff Bagwell sitting on Jim Crane's shoulder like a tiny cartoon devil, interview Mike Rizzo. Look, I've been writing for District on Deck for over two years. At no point was I ever a fan of Mike Rizzo, and I made that clear even before he was fired over his unwillingness to let previous manager Davey Martinez go. From the time the team won the World Series in 2019 to his departure from the team in mid-2025, Rizzo effectively held the Nationals in the technological Stone Age, and had no clear plan to ever get them out if he remained in a position of authority with the team.
Fast forward nearly a year and a half, a new regime led by Paul Toboni has spent significantly behind the scenes to get the team up to speed, and the fruits of that labor have already manifested significantly on and off the field. Players have bought into the new organizational philosophy at levels vastly outweighing any kind of mass adoption the Rizzo-led Nationals ever did. The Astros, who at one time were on the forefront of technological advancement in the sport, have regressed massively this decade. Independent of the penalties the organization faced following the sign-stealing scandal, the farm system has been depleted for years, the team's top stars either have left, are on the verge of leaving, or fallen off a cliff, and they've failed to find anyone to replace them suitably.
Hiring Mike Rizzo would be the death knell for a team that's had one foot in the grave for three years running now. If it happens, once the laughter settles down, Nationals fans will be saying one thing: Houston, he's your problem now.
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