Arizona Fall League Preview: Washington Nationals
By Marcus Bailey ·
The Washington Nationals placed all eight of their Arizona Fall League representatives on the Salt River Rafters. The group's identity is straightforward: pitchers who barely threw in 2026, a toolsy infielder-outfielder making up lost reps, and a catcher who posted numbers at two levels that deserve more attention than his prospect ranking suggests. Susana is the obvious headliner, but Bazzell may be the name to track through October.
Susana Gets the Innings His 2026 Season Didn't Allow
Jarlin Susana ranks No. 7 in the Nationals system and No. 157 overall on 80Grade's prospect list, the highest-ranked name in this group. The reason he's in Arizona is simple: surgery to repair a torn right lat ended his 2025 season and kept him off the mound until August, and his regular-season line across three levels, eight starts and 20.1 innings, adds up to a truncated development year for a 22-year-old with a mid-rotation ceiling.
The stuff is not in question. His 80Grade report has the four-seam fastball averaging 100 mph and touching 104, and his slider grades as a plus pitch that gives him a bat-missing complement. At Double-A Harrisburg, his longest stop this year, he struck out 39.6 percent of batters faced across four starts, and he struck out 37 against 11 walks over all 20.1 regular-season innings.
The concern, as always with Susana, is location. His regular-season walk rate was 11.7 percent of batters faced, and his September 18 start for Triple-A Rochester was rough: four walks and four earned runs in 2.2 innings. His 80Grade report grades the command below average, and even his better outings show a pitcher who leans on the fastball-slider combination when his location drifts. The changeup, at 92 mph, is the least dependable of his pitches, which creates exposure when he faces a lineup a second or third time.
The AFL stint is about piling up innings and working on sequencing with a full starter's routine. Watch whether his slider command holds in multiple-inning outings and whether the changeup gets used against left-handed hitters. Susana signed with the Padres in January 2022 and is not on the 40-man roster, so the Nationals face a protection decision this winter, and they need a better look at him healthy and stretched out first.
Kevin Bazzell's Two-Level Line Deserves Attention
Kevin Bazzell isn't a headline prospect; 80Grade ranks him No. 54 in the Nationals system. But his 2026 numbers at two levels are worth a look before anyone dismisses him as a depth piece.
At High-A Wilmington he hit .276/.376/.448 across 53 games with a 16.4 percent strikeout rate and an 11.7 percent walk rate. After an August promotion to Double-A Harrisburg, he hit .327/.393/.551 in 13 games with five walks and five strikeouts. Combined across 66 games, he hit .287/.379/.470 with nine home runs, 15 doubles, a 14.8 percent strikeout rate, and an 11.1 percent walk rate. He also missed a month early in the season on the injured list.
Power was the known question mark coming into the year. The 2024 third-round pick out of Texas Tech had no professional home runs before 2026. Nine across two levels, including two at Double-A, doesn't fully resolve the concern, but it is progress. His 80Grade report projects a hit-over-power approach with gap power as the realistic ceiling, and the line fits that read. The report grades his arm as plus and notes that his receiving is still developing after a move from third base to catcher in 2024.
The AFL gives him more upper-level competition and a chance to put more catching experience on film. Whether the organization sees him as a backup catcher on a 2027 or 2028 timeline or as a potential everyday option will depend partly on these fall reps. A 23-year-old contact-first catcher who walked as often as he struck out at Double-A is worth following.
Jorgelys Mota's Tools Show Up, the Approach Is Still Catching Up
Jorgelys Mota is 21, splits time between third base and center field, and carries grades that make evaluators pay attention: his 80Grade report has above-average athleticism, power, and speed and a 70-grade arm. The tools are obvious. The approach is the issue, and 2026 didn't resolve it.
Mota played only 36 games across three levels in a season broken up by three trips to the injured list. His best work came in short rehab stints at Single-A Fredericksburg and the Florida Complex League, where he hit three home runs in 28 combined at-bats. At High-A Wilmington in 24 games, the line was .211/.364/.239 with no home runs and 28 strikeouts in 88 plate appearances, despite a solid 13.6 percent walk rate.
His 80Grade report lists swing-and-miss, chasing breaking balls, and a high groundball rate as the main concerns, and those habits keep his raw power from showing up in games. He hit six home runs in 81 games at Fredericksburg in 2025, a modest total for a hitter with his strength.
At 21 with a limited game log, the sample is too small to conclude anything is fixed or broken, and the AFL simply adds reps against advanced pitching. He's a long-term project.
The Pitching Group: Innings Accumulation Across the Board
The remaining four Nationals arms share a theme: each threw very few innings in 2026, and the AFL exists to get them competitive work.
R.J. Sales, 23, came over from Detroit in the July 2025 Kyle Finnegan trade. He spent until August on the 60-day injured list and was limited to 13.2 innings. His Single-A Fredericksburg numbers were rough (7.71 ERA in seven innings), but after an August promotion to High-A Wilmington he posted a 1.35 ERA across 6.2 innings with a 39.1 percent strikeout rate and only two walks. His carrying pitch is a 12-6 curveball, 80Grade grades his command as average, and he's a back-end starter candidate if he can log consistent innings.
Noah Dean, a 25-year-old left-hander, signed a minor league deal with Washington in March after the Red Sox released him. He had a difficult Double-A stretch (9.00 ERA, 14 walks in 11 innings) before going on the injured list in July, and that stint was transferred to the 60-day list in September. The control is the problem: a 24.1 percent walk rate at Harrisburg and only half his pitches thrown for strikes across the season. At 25, the timeline for finding the zone is short.
Nolan Hughes, a 24-year-old left-hander, went on the injured list in early May and did not pitch again during the regular season. In four appearances at Single-A Fredericksburg, he struck out 17 of the 34 batters he faced but walked 10 in seven innings and needed more than 23 pitches per inning. The bat-missing ability is there, but the control is extreme, and the AFL is about tightening a strike-throwing profile that can't survive as-is at upper levels.
Owen Puk, 23, had the smallest sample of the group: three appearances at Single-A before an April trip to the injured list that lasted the rest of the season, with six hits and four earned runs allowed in two innings. The 2025 18th-round pick is early in his development, and fall reps against better competition are a baseline-setter more than an audition.
Teo Banks, 23, rounds out the group as an outfielder who spent his season at High-A Wilmington. He hit .251/.333/.375 across 92 games with six home runs, 21 stolen bases, and a 23.7 percent strikeout rate against a 9.3 percent walk rate. He played all three outfield spots, mostly right field, and projects as organizational depth.
Bottom Line
Susana is the name with the most at stake for the Nationals' long-term rotation picture, and these AFL innings carry weight after a lost development year. If he stays healthy, holds his slider command across multiple outings, and gives the changeup real usage, this fall answers a question the lat surgery left open. Bazzell is the secondary name to watch: a 2026 line that held up at two levels, a contact-first skill set that has translated, and enough defensive projection at catcher to keep monitoring as he logs more reps. For the pitching group, the goal is simpler: throw strikes, stay healthy, and give the organization a better idea of what it has.