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Davey Martinez talked over the weekend about the final decisions he had to make before he and the Washington Nationals’ brass settled on a final 30-Man roster for Opening Day 2020.
Following three weeks of Spring Training 2.0, Martinez said, he had a pretty good idea of his final roster for the 60-game MLB campaign.
“I got about 28 guys right now out of the 30,” the manager said.
“I think there’s a couple that are still on the bubble that we need to figure out. But for the most part I’ve got a pretty good idea of what I want to do, what we want to do.
“I’m going to sit down with [GM Mike Rizzo] probably in the next day or so and sort these things out.”
The rules of the 2020 season, which include a DH in the NL, a runner on second in extras, and more, Martinez said, would impact the final decisions he needed to make.
“We could do a couple different things. One we can add a couple guys in the bullpen,” he explained.
“We can add a third catcher. We could possibly add somebody that’s got some speed. As you all know, we’ve got to play this extra inning man on second base deal, so it would be nice to have somebody that has some speed in case you want to pinch run.
“So we’re looking at all kind of options of how we want to see this roster.
“It’s nice, like I said, to start off with 30 guys for a couple weeks and then we dwindle down to 28, but have the 30 guys start off is kind of nice. It gives us some options.”
Martinez announced on Wednesday that two of the Nationals’ relievers who got a late start to Spring Training 2.0 would not be ready for the season opener.
“We told [Roenis] Elías and [Wander] Suero last night that they were going to start on the IL,” Martinez explained, “and then everybody else is rip-raring to go.
“We still have a couple decisions to make. We’re going to sort that out here in about an hour or two and then we’ll have the final roster by tomorrow.”
We have it now.
HERE’S THE NATIONALS’ 30-MAN OPENING DAY ROSTER:
60-game sprint starts tonight.#OpeningDay // #NATITUDE pic.twitter.com/zjKEaNNS6U
— Washington Nationals (@Nationals) July 23, 2020
UPDATE: According to a report by ESPN’s Jeff Passan, Juan Soto tested positive for COVID-19 in advance of tonight’s game. More information when we have it...
Washington Nationals star Juan Soto has tested positive for COVID-19 and will miss tonight's season opener against the New York Yankees, sources tell ESPN.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) July 23, 2020