PLAYER REVIEW: JAKE IRVIN

Age on Opening Day 2026: 29

How acquired: Fourth round pick, 2018 MLB Draft

MLB service time: 2 years, 152 days

2025 salary: $774,600

PLAYER REVIEW: MACKENZIE GORE

Age on Opening Day 2026: 27

How acquired: Traded with CJ Abrams, James Wood, Robert Hassell III, Jarlin Susana and Luke Voit from Padres for Juan Soto and Josh Bell, August 2022

MLB service time: 4 years

2025 salary: $2.89 million

PLAYER REVIEW: DREW MILLAS

Age on Opening Day 2026: 28

How acquired: Traded with Richard Guasch and Seth Shuman from Athletics for Yan Gomes and Josh Harrison, July 2021

MLB service time: 178 days

2025 salary: $760,000

PLAYER REVIEW: PAUL DeJONG

Age on Opening Day 2026: 32

How acquired: Signed as free agent, February 2025

MLB service time: 8 years, 57 days

2025 salary: $1 million

PLAYER REVIEW: NASIM NUNEZ

Age on Opening Day 2026: 25

How acquired: Selected in 2023 Rule 5 Draft

MLB service time: 1 year, 89 days

2025 salary: $760,000

PLAYER REVIEW: BRADY HOUSE

Age on Opening Day 2026: 22

How acquired: First round pick, 2021 Draft

MLB service time: 107 days

2025 salary: $760,000

Jacob Young gets a second crack at becoming only the third Gold Glove Award winner in Nationals history.

Young was named a finalist for the award this morning, one of three competing to be honored as the best defensive center fielder in the National League. He’s joined by the Cubs’ Pete Crow-Armstrong and the Cardinals’ Victor Scott II.

The winner will be announced Nov. 3.

It’s the second straight year Young has been named a Gold Glove finalist. Though he seemed to have a stronger statistical case for the award in 2024, he ultimately lost out to the Rockies’ Brenton Doyle.

Young’s case this season isn’t quite as concrete. He was one of only three regular major league position players with a 1.000 fielding percentage. But he ranked second to Crow-Armstrong in FanGraphs’ overall Defensive Rating (17.7 to 12.3) and Defensive Runs Saved (15 to 13). And he ranked third to both Crow-Armstrong and Scott in Statcast’s Outs Above Average (24 to 16 to 14) and Runs Prevented (22 to 14 to 13).

PLAYER REVIEW: CJ ABRAMS

Age on Opening Day 2026: 25

How acquired: Traded with James Wood, MacKenzie Gore, Robert Hassell III, Jarlin Susana and Luke Voit from Padres for Juan Soto and Josh Bell, August 2022

MLB service time: 3 years, 130 days

2025 salary: $780,600

PLAYER REVIEW: LUIS GARCIA JR.

Age on Opening Day 2026: 25

How acquired: Signed as international free agent, July 2016

MLB service time: 4 years, 142 days

2025 salary: $4.5 million

PLAYER REVIEW: JOSH BELL

Age on Opening Day 2026: 33

How acquired: Signed as free agent, January 2025

MLB service time: 9 years, 53 days

2025 salary: $6 million

PLAYER REVIEW: KEIBERT RUIZ

Age on Opening Day 2026: 27

How acquired: Traded with Josiah Gray, Donovan Casey and Gerardo Carrillo from Dodgers for Max Scherzer and Trea Turner, July 2021

MLB service time: 4 years, 64 days

2025 salary: $6 million

PLAYER REVIEW: RILEY ADAMS

Age on Opening Day 2026: 29

How acquired: Acquired from Blue Jays for Brad Hand, July 2021

MLB service time: 3 years, 171 days

2025 salary: $850,000

PLAYER REVIEW: ROBERT HASSELL III

Age on Opening Day 2026: 24

How acquired: Traded with James Wood, CJ Abrams, MacKenzie Gore, Jarlin Susana and Luke from Padres for Juan Soto and Josh Bell, August 2022

MLB service time: 85 days

2025 salary: $760,000

PLAYER REVIEW: JACOB YOUNG

Age on Opening Day 2026: 26

How acquired: Seventh round pick, 2021 Draft

MLB service time: 2 years, 37 days

2025 salary: $768,700

PLAYER REVIEW: DAYLEN LILE

Age on Opening Day 2026: 23

How acquired: Second round pick, 2021 Draft

MLB service time: 119 days

2025 salary: $760,000

PLAYER REVIEW: DYLAN CREWS

Age on Opening Day 2026: 24

How acquired: First round pick, 2023 Draft

MLB service time: 1 year, 35 days

2025 salary: $761,800

PLAYER REVIEW: JAMES WOOD

Age on Opening Day 2026: 23

How acquired: Traded with CJ Abrams, MacKenzie Gore, Robert Hassell III, Jarlin Susana and Luke Voit from Padres for Juan Soto and Josh Bell, August 2022

MLB service time: 1 year, 91 days

2025 salary: $764,600

OK, it’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for. No, not the naming of the Nationals’ new president of baseball operations. Not the hiring of a new manager. And certainly not the signing of any core young player to a long-term extension. It’s the revisiting of our annual Opening Day predictions!

For 16 years now, my colleagues on the Nats beat have been gracious enough to join me in making all sorts of predictions about the upcoming season. And for 16 years now, we’ve all mostly been embarrassed to look back at all the predictions we got wrong, with an occasional celebration over something one of us actually got right.

The 2025 season did not play out how anyone expected, I think that’s safe to say. But within the big picture, we did come close to getting a few smaller items correct. Right or wrong, it’s not only tradition to publish these traditions on Opening Day. It’s also tradition to republish them at the end of the season, which we now present behind covered eyes and ears …

WHICH NATIONALS WILL BE SELECTED FOR THE ALL-STAR GAME?
Bobby Blanco (MASNsports.com) – MacKenzie Gore, James Wood
Jessica Camerato (MLB.com) – Luis García Jr., James Wood
Al Galdi (Nats Chat Podcast) – MacKenzie Gore, James Wood
Andrew Golden (Washington Post) – Michael Soroka, James Wood
Craig Heist (106.7 The Fan) – CJ Abrams, James Wood
Chelsea Janes (Washington Post) – Luis García Jr., MacKenzie Gore
Bill Ladson (MLB.com honorary) – MacKenzie Gore, James Wood
Tim Shovers (Nats Chat Podcast) – MacKenzie Gore
Spencer Nusbaum (Washington Post) – Luis García Jr., James Wood
Mark Zuckerman (MASNsports.com) – CJ Abrams, James Wood

Correct answer: MacKenzie Gore and James Wood each earned the first All-Star selections of their careers thanks to dominant first halves … which they could not sustain over the second half.

Welcome to the offseason, everybody. Though if you were expecting a quiet October, you're probably going to be disappointed. The Nationals should be very active during this opening month, and that began with Wednesday's introductory press conference for new president of baseball operations Paul Toboni.

There's a lot still on Toboni's plate. Will he hire a general manager to work underneath him? Will he retain the Nationals' current front office or bring in new people from outside the organization? What will the managerial search look like, and when will it be resolved? Who will be on the eventual manager's coaching staff? Oh yeah, and then: What about the roster?

We'll be here to chronicle it every step of the way. But before we hit the ground running, let's take this opportunity today to answer your questions about the state of the Nats and what's still to come. As always, enter your submissions in the comments section below, then check back for my responses over the course of the morning ...

Paul Toboni liked his situation in Boston. He was a rising star within the Red Sox organization, a strong candidate to be named general manager and work directly underneath chief baseball officer Craig Breslow for a storied franchise currently in the postseason that already owns four World Series trophies secured over the last two decades.

When the Nationals came calling, Toboni was intrigued enough to take the interview. But he was still unsure if he wanted to uproot his young family and take over a Washington franchise that just completed its sixth straight losing season since winning its one and only World Series title.

It was during his repeated conversations with members of the Lerner family that Toboni made up his mind. He knew plenty about the Nationals. He knew very little about their owners. Once he did, the 35-year-old executive came away firmly believing they were ready to commit to his vision, which convinced him he was ready to commit to theirs.

“We were going to hold a pretty high bar if we were going to leave the Boston Red Sox organization,” he said. “And this cleared it because of that: Ownership’s love of baseball, and how competitive they are. And really, how great of people they are. That’s what I really bought into, which made my wife and I think this was the jump we were going to make.”

Thus did Toboni find himself sitting at a dais in the Nationals Park press conference room this morning, surrounded by three of the club’s principal owners (Mark Lerner, Edward Cohen and Robert Tanenbaum), his wife Danielle and their four very young boys (ages 1-6) seated in the front row watching the Nats’ new president of baseball operations introduce himself to the world.