It’s time for another SB Nation Reacts poll. Which Nationals’ prospect will be the next one up to make their MLB debut this season?
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Trey Lipscomb made a strong case for his inclusion on the Opening Day roster this spring, but in the end, the Nationals decided against including their 23-year-old, 2022 3rd Round pick on their 26-man roster for the start of the regular season. Then, circumstances.
Nick Senzel, who was expected to play every day at third base, suffered a fractured thumb fielding grounders before the season opener so Lipscomb got the call to come back up to join the team in Cincinnati and make his MLB debut.
“I was going to play baseball in Rochester,” he said of accepting the fact he didn’t make the club out of Spring Training, “… and I was going to play nine innings, so the fact that I get to come up here, and it’ll be my first game of the season, is definitely special to me. My family is going to enjoy it just as much as I am.”
He said it didn’t take long to get past any disappointment about making the club.
“I feel like I was going to go to Rochester, I was going to get to play baseball, and when the time is right I was going to come up here.”
The time was right a day later, though it happened earlier than the Nationals planned.
“We had a plan going into Spring Training of having all of our young players be up with us to kind of teach them the ropes of what we’re trying to do here, and get them a little bit of experience of how we’re trying to do things,” manager Davey Martinez explained.
“It was great to have these guys, and to watch Trey do what he did all of Spring Training definitely helped. Having him here now, and I always revert back to like Keibert Ruiz, CJ [Abrams], and it took them a while to understand what we’re trying to do, and then once they realized, ‘Hey I can do this,’ they took off. The second-half of the season they played really well
“To get him here now, early part of this season and watch him and talk to him and have him learn and teach him different things, I’m hoping that it comes a lot sooner for him because we have time. So, he’s done really well.”
How will Lipscomb adjust once the league gets a book on him? That’s part of the fun of now watching all these prospects develop.
This week’s poll is not really a scientific one. We’re just asking you to go with your gut, and see which prospect will be next up for the Nationals? Lipscomb got an opportunity. Which prospect do you think will be next?
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