The Washington Nationals and Baltimore Orioles are in nearly identical spots – the Nats at 55-58, 4.5 games out of the final NL wild-card spot, the O’s at 54-58, 2.5 game out of the final AL wild-card spot.
Their front office activities on trade deadline day seem to have them heading in identical directions – waving the white flag headed into the final two months of the 2026 season.
A good number of eyes across MLB headed into the deadline were on first-year Washington president of baseball operations Paul Toboni, who was widely expected to deal star shortstop CJ Abrams, to get pieces for a rebuild that, for Toboni, is still in Year 1.
Naturally, then, the big news for our local teams came out of Charm City, where Mike Elias, apparently gearing up for a second rebuild, flipped former #1 overall draft pick Adley Rutschman to the Boston Red Sox for three of the Sox’ top prospects, got another decent prospect from Tampa Bay for reliever Tyler Wells, and unloaded disappointing offseason pickup Taylor Ward to Seattle for a relief pitcher with a 5.79 ERA and two non-Top 30 Mariners prospects.
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Just down I-95 from Baltimore on Deadline Day, the Nats only made one move on deadline day – trading 30-year-old rookie Foster Griffin (12-3, 3.06 ERA/1.08 WHIP) for pitchers Will Dion, Josh Hartle and Kendeglys Virguez and outfielder Nick Mitchell.
Griffin was named to the NL All-Star team last month, but as a 30-year-old rookie, you can’t fault Toboni for wanting to flip him for whatever he could get, even if it wasn’t much, in the final analysis – only Hartle, among the Cleveland prospects, was ranked in the organization’s Top 30.
This was on top of moves made by the franchise ahead of deadline day in which Toboni got a solid rotation guy, UVA Baseball alum Connelly Early, for infielder Curtis Mead, and the trade on Sunday of infielder Luis Garcia Jr. to the New York Yankees for two big-league relievers and two pitching prospects.
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For whatever stretch run there is left in the Nats, Early (7-5, 3.44 ERA/1.26 WHIP in 2026) adds depth to the rotation for the final two months of this season, and then there’s the addition-by-not-subtracting Abrams (.287/.363/.554, .917 OPS/151 OPS+, 28 HRs, 85 RBIs in 2026).
The focus, though, is clearly on the future, in terms of building depth in the staff, with Early, the pickups from the Yankees in the Garcia trade, Ben Grable (2.79 ERA/0.90 WHIP in Double-A in 2026) and Yovanny Cruz (13.1 Ks/9 in Triple-A in 2026), and the haul of arms from Cleveland.
Baltimore also clearly treated the deadline as a chance to put the focus on the future.
Elias had already committed long term to Rutschman’s backup at catcher, 21-year-old Samuel Basallo, who has 16 homers and a 111 OPS+ in 86 games in what is officially his rookie season.
Ward, coming off a 36-homer season with the Los Angeles Angels a year ago, has transmogrified from being a power hitter to being a walks guy (seven homers, career-high .383 OBP, career-low .346 OBP in Baltimore in 2026).
Wells (2.67 ERA/0.96 WHIP in 54 innings in 2026) was being used as the closer of late, but first-year manager Craig Albernaz can go with a committee approach down the stretch, with Yennier Cano (2.15 ERA/0.93 WHIP) and Rico Garcia (3.04 ERA/0.87 WHIP) being the obvious candidates there.
The return for the O’s from today’s trades includes pitchers Anthony Eyanson, now slotted as the organization’s top prospect, and Kyson Witherspoon (#6), outfielder Enddy Azocar (#7), and pitcher Michael Forret (still, at this writing, listed as Tampa Bay’s #8 prospect).
Eyanson, 21, a Top 50 overall prospect, would seem to be on track to compete for a spot in the O’s rotation next year.
Witherspoon and Azocar have 2028 ETAs.
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Chris Graham
