Storylines to follow in the second half

The All-Star break is over. The Nationals – along with 29 other major league teams – return to action tonight, and the second half of the 2025 season gets underway.

It’s a second half that doesn’t hold anything close to the same promise it did a few months ago, when it looked like the Nats might at least threaten the .500 mark, maybe even make a surprise cameo appearance in the National League wild card race. Alas, that’s not going to happen now. To finish 81-81, they need to go a ridiculous 43-23 the rest of the way. (That would be the equivalent of a 105-win pace over an entire season. So, yeah, it’s not happening.)

But that doesn’t mean the rest of the season is going to be meaningless. There are storylines worth following over the next 2 1/2 months. Such as these …

THE TRADE DEADLINE
For the fifth straight season, the Nationals figure to be sellers on July 31. That’s not a position anyone wanted to be in this year, but it’s reality now. Interim general manager Mike DeBartolo has no choice but to see what he can get for players who don’t look like part of the long-term plan around here. Anybody on an expiring contract (Kyle Finnegan, Michael Soroka, Josh Bell, Paul DeJong, Amed Rosario, Andrew Chafin) is going to be shopped and likely moved if any kind of substantive offer is made. The bigger question is whether DeBartolo looks to move anybody still under club control in 2026 (or beyond). Nathaniel Lowe would be a potential candidate. And what about (gulp) MacKenzie Gore, who is the same distance away from free agency right as Juan Soto was in July 2022. It would take a gargantuan offer from someone, but would DeBartolo consider doing it?

WOOD’S PERSONAL PURSUITS
He’s not going to be able to do anything on his own to help the Nationals become a winning team this year, but James Wood has plenty to shoot for on a personal level. He’s shooting for 40-plus homers, a number previously reached only by Bryce Harper (42) and Alfonso Soriano (46) in club history. If he gets within shouting distance of Soriano, September could actually be a lot of fun. He could also join Anthony Rendon as the only players in club history to drive in more than 110 runs, though it would take a mammoth surge to threaten Rendon’s team record of 126 RBIs.

CAN CREWS FINISH STRONG?
Dylan Crews should be close to returning from his oblique strain at last, perhaps sometime within the next week. Once he’s back on the active roster, the rookie outfielder has some catching up to do. He can’t do anything about his sluggish April and early May, but he can put together a strong late July, August and September and look more like the all-around star the Nationals believe he can be. He was showing signs of breaking out before suffering the injury. It’s time to see if he can sustain that over a longer stretch.

ARE WE FINALLY GOING TO SEE CAVALLI?
It’s been a long, frustrating wait for everyone who has yearned to see Cade Cavalli pitch in the major leagues beyond his disappointing August 2022 debut. We should finally be getting to the point where the Nationals feel compelled to promote him from Triple-A. There are no more service time considerations. He’s pitched well enough in Rochester to merit a call-up, certainly better than Shinnosuke Ogasawara or anyone else who could reasonably be considered in the mix. Maybe the 2020 first round pick is going to struggle. Maybe he’s going to be great. Either way, it’s time for the Nats to find out once and for all what he is at the major league level.

DO ANY MORE ROOKIES GET A SHOT DOWN THE STRETCH?
Brady House is here to stay, and there’s been enough to like so far from the 2021 first round pick, who finally hit his first two big league homers just before the All-Star break. What about the other young outfielders? Is Daylen Lile going to get to stay once Crews returns and play regularly? Will Robert Hassell III be recalled at some point? If Lowe and/or Bell are traded, could 2023 second round pick Yoyo Morales get a shot at first base or DH? Is there any other pitcher in the organization who can get guys out on a semi-consistent basis?

CAN GRAY PUT HIMSELF BACK IN THE PICTURE FOR THE FUTURE?
Remember Josiah Gray? It’s been a while. He was an All-Star in 2023. He started Opening Day in 2024, then made one more start before landing on the IL. And he hasn’t pitched since. But we might just see him again before season’s end. Now on the cusp of the 1-year anniversary of his Tommy John surgery, Gray is about ready to face live hitters again. If all goes well, he’ll go on a minor league rehab assignment sometime in August. And if that goes well, the Nationals would love to give him at least a few big league starts come September. That could go a long way toward determining if Gray can actually be counted on as a member of the rotation come 2026 and beyond.