Rainey non-tendered as Nationals close the book on 2019 World Series team

A small peek into the window of a team's offseason plans begins on a random Friday night in November, during the non-tender deadline. Every member of the roster eligible for arbitration has to be tendered a contract, sign a contract, or the team announces they will be non-tendering them a contract, allowing them to become a free agent.

Eight players on the 40-man roster were eligible for arbitration, with Mason Thompson already agreeing to a contract, and Luis Garcia Jr, MacKenzie Gore, Josiah Gray, Derek Law, and Riley Adams were tendered contracts. The remaining two were not so lucky. Kyle Finnegan, in a semi-suprising move was non-tendered, and the last member of the 2019 World Series team still on the roster, Tanner Rainey, was let go. Rainey had an up-and-down career in DC, and after a tough 2024 season, many people saw this coming.

I have always been a fan of Tanner Rainey. The reliever was fearless, never fully providing us with consistent results, but he gave us plenty of good innings throughout his career.

Rainey began his career with the Reds, being drafted in the second round of the 2015 draft. He made his debut and struggled in 2018, before being traded for Nationals legend Tanner Roark heading into the 2019 season.

Rainey was called up in May of the 2019 season and quickly became a late-inning reliever. In 52 games in 2019, Rainey pitched to a 3.91 ERA, strikeout out 74 batters in 48 1/3 innings. As a rookie, Rainey was a relied-upon reliever in the playoffs, struggling for the most part but making 9 total appearances, including 4 in the World Series. Walks were a huge issue, but his elite strikeout rate gave us high hopes for the future. His 2020 season validated that.

Rainey became our best reliever in the shortened season and one of the best relievers in baseball. He cut his walks in half, increased his strikeout rate, and pitched to a 2.66 ERA, and 0.738 WHIP in 20 games.

As a result of his immense workload, Rainey got hurt in September, and his 2021 season ended up being a train wreck working back from injury. Rainey had a 7.39 ERA and 25 walks in only 31 2/3 innings. The strikeouts were still there with 42, but his once-promising career seemed to be getting murky.

He entered 2022 as the main closer, more of by circumstance than results. Rainey responded by putting together good results, with a 3.30 ERA and 12 saves in 30 innings with 36 strikeouts. The walks were down once again, and although the strikeouts were down, Rainey had some big-time saves on a miserable Nationals team. After a very good start, Rainey sprained his UCL, leading to Tommy John Surgery and only made one appearance late in 2023.

Rainey entered 2024 as a make-or-break year coming off of the major surgery and gave the Nationals and Mike Rizzo not many reasons to keep him. Rainey's velo was down, the strikeouts were down, and his walk rate was higher than the 2020 and 2022 seasons. A lot of fans called for Rainey to be DFA'd after a horrendous start to the season before he went on a 20-appearance run in the late summer of 1.80 ERA ball.

To finish the season Rainey had a 4.76 ERA, 5.42 FIP, 1.490 WHIP, with only 44 strikeouts and 29 walks in 51 innings. His best pitch, his slider, continued to become more hittable since his best seasons in 2020 and 2022, and his fastball ranked toward the bottom of the league in efficiency. Rainey's once blazing fastball that could reach over 100 mph diminished, going from an average of 97.7 in 2019 to 94 mph in 2024.

Rainey will be remembered in Washington for his big-time potential, and flashes that proved how good he could be. Rainey ended his Nationals career pitching 182 1/3 innings over 6 seasons, with a 4.49 ERA, 236 strikeouts, 113 walks, and 15 saves. Although it is probably unlikely that Rainey will score a major league contract, I hope to see him in the majors again. Hopefully, he has a little juice left.