The Washington Nationals have come under the microscope from talking heads around the sport of baseball after everything they have been through this offseason. For a team that began their rebuild a handful of years ago, the organization is now having to rebuild the rebuild, and with that, some tough decisions have to be made.
After new President of Baseball Operations Paul Toboni was hired, he had a large list of tough decisions he had to make, and one of them was regarding the team's former ace, lefty and 2025 All-Star MacKenzie Gore. While the new front office had nothing but great things to say about him and his long-term potential, they ultimately were presented with an offer they could not refuse from the Texas Rangers, and shipped him away in January.
That return for the Nationals was a handful of prospects including the Rangers' most recent 1st round pick in 2025 in Gavin Fien, and the Nationals officially made it clear that they are further away from competing than fans would have liked. It remains to be seen if this was the right decision in the long run, but it does seem like the Nationals did not have much of a choice.
After we wrote an article yesterday talking about how Gore had gotten off to a solid start over his first few appearances with the Rangers, he suffered a bit of a brutal outing yesterday afternoon for the Rangers. It was tough timing, but the outing itself might have been even tougher for Gore, and has led to some Rangers fans questioning what they got out of the deal.
Gore exited yesterday's outing without retiring a single batter from the Kansas City Royals, giving up 5 hits and 6 earned runs as he was quickly forced out of the game. Through 3 appearances, he now has a 12.79 ERA and 2.37 WHIP, and has more concerningly only struck out 3 batters compared to 3 walks issued. He has faced 33 batters so far, so the fact he has only struck out 3 is cause for concern.
Obviously, it is very early in spring training, so it is prime time for overreaction season, but the early returns on the MacKenzie Gore trade for the Rangers, one that included them giving up 5 of their Top 30 prospects including multiple highly-ranked ones, are not great. For the Nationals, they continue to look smart for selling off when they did.
What do you think of MacKenzie Gore's recent disaster outing for the Texas Rangers? As always, please let me know on X, @DCBerk.