Wire Taps: Washington Nationals & Fernando Abad; Scott Boras on 2020 MLB season + the Nats play again tonight...

Washington’s Nationals have called players up to Nationals Park from the Alternate Training Site in Fredericksburg, VA to take part in workouts and scrimmages when possible, and the prospects (mostly) who do come up get to show the big league team and staff what they’re capable of doing.

Manager Davey Martinez likes what he’s seen. “Yeah, it makes me feel pretty good about the future of our organization,” Martinez said on Sunday afternoon.

“We’ve got some pretty good young players. We saw [Yasel] Antuna today, played some shortstop, made a nice play.

“We’ve seen Luis Garcia in Spring Training and now here. Seth [Romero], who’s coming off Tommy John surgery and threw the ball well. So I mean, you start seeing these guys and seeing what things could look like, things are bright. Things are bright here, and I’m excited to have these kids around.

“Excited to get to see them now play a little bit with us, so they get a chance to come here, see the stadium, and we always tell them, ‘Hey, you could be playing here one day.’ And it makes them feel good.”

They are in the 60-Man Player Pool, so they could end up in the majors sooner than later in this 60-game, injury-filled-so-far 2020 campaign, so while they’re in Fredericksburg, they’ll mirror what the big league club is doing so they’ll be ready if needed when the call comes from D.C.

“Randy Knorr is running the camp down there,” Martinez said, “... constantly communicate with him about what’s going to go on, what transpires. We put guys on a set schedule, the pitchers, so we know what days they pitch, what days they don’t pitch. So, we knew the guys that we wanted up here, it was their day to pitch, and it worked out well. We talked about this way in advance. And every week we talk about what needs to happen down there to keep guys ready and keep them fresh.”

Go read your links...

NATS BEAT:

Former National Michael Morse says 60 games isn't enough to crown World Series champ - (NBC Sports Washington)
"Add former National Michael Morse to the list of people that want an asterisk on the 2020 World Series champion."

As others try to adjust, Rainey thriving early in Nats 'pen - (MASN)
"It’s only been a week, and these things can change quickly and dramatically, but at this point Tanner Rainey looks like an outlier among major league pitchers."

Fernando Abad lost a chance with the Nationals after testing positive for coronavirus - (WaPost)
“Then he tested positive for the novel coronavirus July 2. The Nationals had 16 days to make a decision on him, and covid-19, the disease caused by the virus, made it for them.”

NATIONAL(S) BEAT:

Scott Boras on how to save MLB season - (New York Daily News)
"Boras is relieved that MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred did not follow through on his threat to cancel the season despite the Miami Marlins’ outbreak of 21 COVID-19 cases, the St. Louis Cardinals’ continuing flare-up and the postponement of 17 games, including three more Sunday."

NL EAST UPDATES:

After layoff, Phils set for packed schedule - (MLB.com)
"On Monday, the Phillies announced no new positive tests for a fourth consecutive day. Two positive tests they received on Thursday were later determined to be false positives."

Rosario (quad), Canó (groin) exit with injuries - (MLB.com)
"Batting with the bases loaded in the top of the third, Rosario moved slowly out of the batter’s box after grounding a ball to third base."

Jeter: Marlins’ COVID-19 outbreak due to false sense of security, not salacious activity - South Florida Sun Sentinel - South Florida Sun-Sentinel
The Miami Marlins' 18 positive coronavirus tests sent Major League Baseball spiraling. Now, they'll return to the diamond, with the season hanging by a thread.

Soroka helped off field after 2 1/3 innings - (MLB.com)
"Mike Soroka had to be helped off the field after he suffered a lower right leg injury during the third inning of Monday night’s game against the Mets at Truist Park."