After what had become a matter of time to anyone paying attention, the Washington Nationals demoted former top prospect Dylan Crews to AAA yesterday. After struggling mightily at the plate and in the field during spring training, the team made the decision to have their 2023 first round pick start the season in the minor leagues.Â
In 29 at bats this spring, Crews hit just .103 and has a .632 OPS. In these 29 at bats, he failed to log an extra base hits and also tallied 11 strikeouts. This was not the kind of production the Nationals expected from the outfielder, and this demotion definitely hurts. After improving his OPS from .602 to .730 from 2024 to 2025, the Nationals hoped that Crews would be in strong form entering this season, but that has just not been the case thus far.
Hopefully, Crews will be able to continue to develop at AAA and try to reach the potential that the Nationals hoped he would reach when they selected him ahead of guys like Wyatt Langford back in the draft that year. Last season, Crews actually showed some signs that he would be a valuable player, as his bat speed was 73.3 miles per hour, good enough to be in the upper percentiles of Major League players, while also having elite sprint speed and fielding statistics.
He is clearly a talented player with the raw tools needed to succeed in the highest level of baseball. Unfortunately, he still strikes out at a high rate, does not walk frequently, and fails to consistently make hard contact. Crews will need to take a serious step forward in AAA if he wants to show this new leadership group that he is a part of the Nationals future.
With Crews’ demotion to the minor leagues, outfielder Joey Wiemer seems primed to take his spot on the roster. The Nationals claimed the outfielder off waivers from the Marlins earlier in the offseason, but he has been uninspiring. While Wiemer has struggled in the Major Leagues similarly to Crews, he has a history of making consistently hard contact in the Major Leagues. Similar to Crews, he is an elite baserunner and defender. As a more mature bat, the Nationals could potentially unlock another level in Wiemer, and he could be a part of the team’s plans moving forward.
Crews is also a part of a trend of the team demoting former top prospects who need seasoning in AAA. The team recently demoted Josiah Gray and Harry Ford to the Minor Leagues. The Nationals front office is showing that they all players need to earn their spot on the roster and that prospects from the Mike Rizzo regime hold less status than they used to in the organization.
This is a stark change from the previous regime led by Mike Rizzo, who rushed Crews to the big leagues in an effort to save his job despite the fact that his numbers both at AA Harrisburg and AAA Rochester were only slightly above-average and not what you would expect from a prospect of his hype and status. The door is not shut at all on Crews, but this new front office is proving right the narrative that the best players will play, and everything else does not matter as it relates to playing the best players on the team.