The Washington Nationals are set to kick off a 3-game set against their NL East rival New York Mets in just about 20 minutes or so, but before then, the team announced yet another roster move. Since the insertion of interim General Manager Mike DeBartolo about a month ago, the team has made a ton of moves, but this latest one should be a helpful one.
Infielder Andres Chaparro, who was acquired from the Arizona Diamondbacks at the conclusion of the 2024 MLB Trade Deadline, is set to return to the Nationals for the second time in the 2025 season, and this time he should be given more of an opportunity to prove themselves.
He will be replacing infielder Jose Tena, who had been playing only sparingly over the last couple weeks. Tena had been serving as a backup infielder along with Paul DeJong, but with the team having a large abundance of lefty hitters, the team made the switch to swap him out for Chaparro.
So where will Chaparro fit in? He should have a great opportunity to soak up a lot of the vacated playing time after Nathaniel Lowe was DFA'd last week, and will likely work himself into some sort of platoon with Josh Bell. At the very least, Chaparro should get a decent amount of playing time against lefties, where he has thrived throughout his professional career. Bell is much better hitting from the left side against righties, so the two of them could form a positive platoon match.
Chaparro has been thought of as the ultimate 4A player, as a guy who absolutely demolishes AAA pitching, but has yet to really establish himself at the big league level. To be fair to him, he has not been given much of an opportunity, as he only has just 144 plate appearances in parts of 2 seasons, including just 12 this season.
He is only still just 26-years-old and has a ton of pop in his bat, and hopefully interim manager Miguel Cairo will be able to find enough opportunities for him to get some actual playing time in his second stint of the season. Between trying to find playing time for Chaparro and the 5 outfielders on the big league roster, Cairo certainly has his hands full, and it will be interesting to see how he juggles the playing time for everyone on the big league roster.
What do you think of the move to recall Andres Chaparro? As always, please let me know on X, @DCBerk.