One thing that has shown up in the Nationals last two losses is their weak defense. In particular, the defense in the middle infield has cost them. That has been a running theme for the past few seasons. Both Luis Garcia Jr. and CJ Abrams are weak defenders at second base and shortstop. Whoever the next Nationals GM is will have to determine if those two can play together.
You can afford to have a weak defender at an up the middle position. We are seeing that this season with the Toronto Blue Jays,
who are the best defensive team in baseball. Despite being an elite defense, Bo Bichette is a poor defender at shortstop for the Jays.
However, they have enough good defenders around Bichette to make up for it. Guys like Andres Gimenez, Ernie Clement and the recently acquired Isiah Kiner-Falefa can insulate a poor defender. They also have phenomenal defense in the outfield and behind the plate.
However, the Nationals have not done a good job protecting their defensively limited shortstop. CJ Abrams has -9 outs above average and -7 fielding run value. This is very poor but actually better than Bichette. Abrams’ defensive shortcomings get exposed much more because there is not a lot of help around him. Overall, Abrams is having a very good season but the defensive issues stick out.
These issues stick out because the Nationals overall infield defense is a disaster. The team has the worst fielding run value in all of baseball at -41. The infield and catching have been the problem areas. We have talked about the Nats catchers defensive problems at length though.
In the infield, things are ugly. The infield’s fielding run value sits at -24, which is the worst in baseball. It is not close either as the next worst infield has a -17 fielding run value.
That brings us to Luis Garcia Jr., who the Nationals next GM will have to think long and hard about. Garcia actually has a solid bat, but is the juice worth the squeeze? Last season, Garcia had a good year defensively. However, he has regressed this year, posting -7 OAA and -5 FRV. His range is noticeably poor and he makes some bone headed plays at times.
The controversial play the other night when he tried to tag the runner going to second base is a good example. It would have been an easy out if Garcia flipped the ball to Abrams but he decided to go for the tag instead. That cost the Nats in a game that they lost control of.
The Nationals should try to trade Garcia this offseason and target a more defensively capable second baseman. It is hard to win games when your second baseman and shortstop are both poor defenders. Those are two of the most important defensive positions on the diamond.
While the Nats would not get a ton, I believe there would be a taker for Garcia. His underlying offensive metrics are actually quite strong. A team could also talk themselves into Garcia returning to 2024 form as a defender. The 2024 version of Luis Garcia Jr. is actually a valuable player, but he has not been that guy this season.
Moving Garcia could also open the door for CJ Abrams to move to second base. The position seems like a more natural fit for him. Abrams really struggles with those long throws shortstops have to make. Those are not as big of an issue at second. However, the only issue with that is there is not a natural replacement for Abrams at shortstop and high end players at that position cost a premium.
The Nationals need to decide between CJ Abrams and Luis Garcia. At the end of the day, this is an easy choice. Even with his defensive struggles, Abrams brings so much value at the plate and on the bases. We even saw that in these last couple games where his defense has been all over the place.
The Nationals new GM is going to have to make defense a priority and these last couple games have shown us that. You can have some poor defenders, but the Nationals have too many in key positions right now.
Making defense a priority in the infield will be a key this offseason. While we might miss his bat, I think it is time to move off of Luis Garcia Jr. as the team’s second baseman. You can only have so many defensive liabilities out there. While Garcia’s bat is solid, it is not good enough to justify having another poor defender on the field.
