How the Washington Nationals can get back on track

The Washington Nationals have struggled mightily the last six weeks, here is how they can stabilize the ship

Since June 1st, the Washington Nationals have been the worst team in baseball. Their 10-28 record since June began is even worse than the Colorado Rockies. It has been a miserable run that has gotten the coach and GM fired. While the 2025 Washington Nationals are not a good baseball team, they have too much talent to be this bad. Here is what they need to do to right the ship.

Pitching Needs to be Better:

The pitching staff has been a massive disappointment this year. Outside of MacKenzie Gore, Brad Lord and Kyle Finnegan, things have been ugly. The Nats have a team ERA of 5.21, the second worst in all of baseball.

Early on in the season, the bullpen was historically bad but the rotation was a bright spot. Well now the rotation is very bad as well. The bullpen ERA is the worst in all of baseball at 5.88 and outside of MacKenzie Gore, the rotation has been bad as well.

Guys like Jake Irvin and Mitchell Parker were expected to build off of solid 2024 seasons. However, both have regressed. Irvin has not been a disaster, but he is an innings eating number 5 starter being asked to be the number 2 in the rotation. He has a 4.58 ERA and his drop in velocity has seen his strikeout numbers regress.

After a red hot start to the season, Parker has been really bad. His ERA sits at 5.12 and in his last 15 starts that number is over six. Right now Parker is not performing like a guy who belongs in a big league rotation.

While Michael Soroka has shown some interesting flashes, his ERA is over 5 as well. He looks better suited to a bullpen role, as he tends to run out of stamina after the fifth inning. Trevor Williams was also very bad before going down with injury.

The starting rotation was supposed to be solid for the Washington Nationals. However, it has been a problem and a big reason why the team is losing games. Too often, the starting pitchers are just not giving the team any chance to win.

Clean Up the Fundamentals:

The other biggest issue I have with this team is the lack of fundamentals. This team just does not play a good brand of baseball. There are too many mental mistakes and errors. The Nationals are top 10 in errors and top five in being caught stealing.

That is an ugly combination that shows a level of sloppiness. When watching the team, it is clear to see the lack of fundamentals in their game. It is easy to see why this team got their manager fired.

On the fielding side of things, the advanced numbers are just as bad as the more traditional metrics. The Nats are bottom five in defensive runs saved at -28. The infield is particularly ugly, with guys like Nathaniel Lowe, Luis Garcia Jr. and CJ Abrams grading out quite negatively.

Find Ways to Win:

This is not a great baseball team, but they are doing things to underperform their talent level. Instead of finding ways to win, the Washington Nationals are finding ways to lose. We saw that in Milwaukee and really we have been seeing it throughout this miserable 10-28 run.

The team is on pace to go 64-98 and has a real chance to lose 100 games. That would be an utter embarrassment. While the playoffs were always a pipe dream, the Nationals were expected to improve this year and potentially flirt with a .500 record.

I predicted 75 wins before the season. That is looking way too high at he moment. It will be a battle to even get to the 71-91 mark they have sat at the last two seasons. While this season is all but over and the Nats are 20 games under .500, the players need to show some pride here.

The pitchers need to perform and the team needs to play fundamentally sound baseball. Nationals fans have been through a lot these last five years and are desperate for a good team. It is on the players to give fans a reason to be excited heading into 2026. So far, 2025 has been one of the more disappointing seasons in Nats history and expectations were not even that high.