Nationals Arm Race

The AFL rosters were announced today. The Nats are not well known for sending their best talent to Arizona, and this year seems no different. We’ve announced six (6) names as of this writing, which seems a little light, so I wouldn’t be surprised to hear a few more names added in (we sent 8 last year and most teams send 8-9).

Here’s who we’ve announced so far:

• RHP Starter Jarlin Susana, AA
• OF Teo Banks, High-A
• LHP Reliever Noah Dean, AA
• LHP Starter Nolan Hughes, Low-A
• OF/3B Jorgelys Mota, High-A
• RHP Starter RJ Sales, High-A

Post Publishing update 10/5/26: a look at the Salt River rosters shows a couple more players were added post initial announcement. The following guys are also on the AFL roster but are not discussed below:

• RHP Reliever AJ Puk, Low-A
• C Kevin Bazzell, AA

This is an … interesting group, to say the least. It includes two top 30 prospects at best (Susana and Mota), a couple of fringe at best arms (Sales and Hughes), an 18th round OF prospect who’s never been on anyone’s radar (Banks), and a frigging MLFA they signed in March who’s thrown a grand total of 14 innings for us (Dean).

Usually AFL players fall into one of several distinct categories:

• Pitchers who were injured for most of the season and who need innings
• Pending Rule-5 guys who they want one last look at.
• Show-me pop up guys who the team wants to challenge in a less-meaningful environment
• Top Prospects to show we’re actually playing by AFL roster rules.

So, how do these six classify w/r/t these rules?

• Susana is clearly a top prospect, but also most nearly the entire season so he’s the classic “needs innings” case
• Banks is … a pop-up guy? This is a 2024 18th rounder who had a .700 OPS figure this season.
• Dean is another weird guy; he was a 2026 MLFA of all things, and then barely pitched. So, are we assuming the team signed him for multiple years? He was a 2022 draftee, so he’s technically Rule-5 eligible, but this is a weird one.
• Hughes? Clearly the “needs more innings” guy, in that he’s got just 7 IP this season and is on the 60-day dl as we speak.
• Mota could be considered a “show me” prospect, but he also only earned a promotion to High-A later in the season and he struggled badly up there; he’ll get destroyed by AA -level pitching in AFL.
• Sales is classical “missed most of the season and needs innings” guy.

I wonder if the lack of star power in our AFL roster is mostly a function of the nature of our prospect depth right now, which is for the most part either nearly in the majors, injured, or is still a teen ager. To wit, here’s how the top 20 or so guys in the system would classify:

• Already hit the Majors: Simpson, Kent, Perales, Ortiz
• Already done AFL: King, Peterson, Petry, Wallace
• Still hurt: Sykora, Rosario
• Too young or too new: Willits, Fitz-Gerald, Hacopian, Cruz, Fein, Sime, Harmon, Brunson, James, Serrano

Also, thanks to aggressive promotions this season, we have almost no real Rule-5 candidates to consider. A quick guide down the Roster Resource lists a scant few R5 candidates to even talk about (burying the lead on the annual Rule 5 analysis, but here goes). I’m leaving out any 2026 MLFAs and/or 60-day DL guys.

• in AAA right now: Romero, Wallace, Lawson, Powell
• in AA right now: Young, Boissiere, Made, White, Luckham, Gaston, Huff
• in High-A right now: Polanco, Stuart, Hill

Not a lot needing protecting this coming December, and certainly not a lot in the AA range that deserves a trip to Arizona. Boissiere? White? I dunno.

Possible candidates to consider adding if they need a few more bodies:

• AAA starters like Cebert or Lyon: both over 100 IP this season though, and no real need to give them more.
• AA starters like Clemmey, Tejeda, Randall, or Hartle: all have 120+ ip this year.
• Catchers (they always need catchers): Romero, Bazzell, Lomavita; Bazzell in particular could use time behind the plate, and Romero is R5.

Players who I don’t know why they’re not in the AFL:

• Swan: he’s the classical arm who needs more work, is AA talent.
• Maybe Elijah Greene, just for humor purposes to see if he can strikeout 75% of the time?

So, that’s the AFL this year. I’ll be super curious when Susana throws, probably couldn’t care less about anyone else’s performance out there this year.

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Post publishing data dump: I ran through the last few AFL rosters for comparison purposes. These names are in rough order of their “value” as prospects at the time:

• 2026: Susana, Bazzell, Mota, Sales, Hughes, Dean, Banks, Puk
• 2025: King, Bennett, Petry, Linan, Peterson, Aldonis, Amaral, Simpson
• 2024: Wallace, Hassell, Cronin, Saenz, Cuevas, Romero, Young, Solesky
• 2023: Hassell, Lipscomb, Herz, Pineda, Ward, Powell, Sinclair, Ribalta
• 2022: Hassell, Millas, Cate, Antuna, Knowles, Willingham, Baker, Ribalta, Frizzell, Lindsly
• 2021: Henry, Rutledge, Lee, Pineda, Millas, Peterson, Casey, Cluff
• 2020: cancelled
• 2019: Garcia, Sharp, Reetz, Raquet, Banks, Freeman, Lee, Condra-Bogan
• 2018: Kieboom, Guilbeau, Braymer, Barrera, Noll, Mills, Johnson, Reyes
• 2017: Robles, Williams, McGowin, Bacus, Cordero, Gushu, Gutierrez
• 2016: Stevenson, Voth, Ward, Johansen, Brinley, Lee, Abreu