The Nationals and Tigers Just Made a HUGE Trade for Kyle Finnegan!

The Nationals and Tigers Just Made a HUGE Trade for Kyle Finnegan!

Another deadline day trade for a closer has officially hit the timeline as Kyle Finnegan is being moved to the Detroit Tigers from the Washington Nationals. And a move that the Tigers are hoping will propel them towards another American League crown. With many relievers on the injured list, including the new acquisition Paul Seawald, Alex Lan, Jason Foley, and Sean Gunther. The Tigers really hope that Finnegan can help back fill a bullpen that hopefully will be at full strength going into the 2025 postseason and the Tigers can win a World Series ring. The Nationals, on the other hand, in full rebuild mode, get a prospect to try and solidify their future and cement themselves as a World Series contender in a couple years where they’ve been trading away a lot of their expiring contracts to do so. In this video, we’ll dive into the Kyle Finnegan trade that just dropped, get you all of the latest updates on all the players involved in the deal, and give you some gut reaction trade grades for each player as well. If you like this kind of content and want to stay up to date on everything happening this trade deadline, make sure to subscribe to the channel. It’s the easiest way to do that. support my channel and you get even more great baseball content from me and other creators out there as well. Without further ado, let’s dive into this Kyle Finnegan trade and see exactly how the Tigers and Nationals made out. Finnegan, who will be a free agent at the end of this year, has spent his entire career with the Nationals, breaking out in the CO shorten 2020 season, pitching in 25 games as a reliever, finishing four of them with a 0.9 B war, which is definitely solid across only 24 and 2/3 innings pitched, striking out 27 and walking 13. So he’s always been a heavy walk guy and over the past couple years he’s lowered that walk rate but also lowered the strikeout rate. Last year as an all-star he had a three-8 record, one B war, 368 year rate at the end of the season across 63 and two/3 innings pitched. Strikeouts per nine was 8.5. So down about a full strikeout per nine, but the same thing with the walks down from 4.7 to 3.4. This season he’s put up some more pedestrian numbers. 1 and4 record 43A erra, but his fielding independent pitching is 3.6, six, the lowest of his career actually, suggesting he should be a little bit better than the results his RA is currently getting out. He’s also put up 20 saves so far in a national uniform in 2025, striking out 7.4 per nine and walking 3.2 per nine. He’s also got a career-l home run per nine. He’s actually cut it in half since his career norm. So, this year he’s definitely been good at keeping the ball in the ballpark. Finnegan was a steal for the Nationals as he was drafted originally by the Oakland A’s in the sixth round of the 2013 draft, but was granted free agency and signed a minor league contract with the Washington Nationals. He ended up signing a contract with the Nationals again this year after hitting free agency. And the Nationals are very happy with what they’ve gotten out of fitting so far on his one-year deal. Finnegan, in my opinion, projects to be the closer for the Detroit Tigers, but if they decide to go Will Vest or Alex Lange, you now have three really good back in arms, who I would be happy throwing out 789 to close out a game seven of a World Series. The first of two prospects heading back to Washington in this deal is Josh Randall, a right-handed pitcher who was their third round pick in the 2024 MLB draft. Randle followed a somewhat similar path to current Tiger starter Tory Melton, who has rose through the prospect ranks after being a relatively low draft pick and has really come on as a very strong prospect for the Tigers and someone who just recently made his major league debut as they both started off as catchers before transitioning to pitching. He spent his first two collegiate years at Arizona and he struggled as a freshman out of the bullpen and ended up only playing in one game as a sophomore before going down for the year because of a back injury. He then transferred to the University of San Diego, becoming their Friday night starter, which is the pinnacle for teams. The if generally you put your best pitcher on Friday nights in college baseball. And then he ended up being a third round pick in 2024 and actually made his major league debut in 2024, which the Tigers tend not to do, actually most teams tend not to do with pitchers when they get drafted. Part of Randle’s appeal, though, is the fact that he hasn’t had a ton of work on his arm. He’s been injured a little bit and he hasn’t had a ton of opportunity to really go and stretch out longer than he needed to be. But he was a starter at San Diego State and the Tigers definitely want to give him every chance to start that they can. So far across two levels this season, single A Lakeland and High A West Michigan. He started 17 games. He recently just got the promotion and had a great first start pitching five scoreless innings with just five hits. Didn’t walk a single batter, struck out six and across 16 games and 75 and a third innings pitched at single eight Lakeland. He’s got a five and five record, 418 ERA, strike out 64 batters across those 75 and a3 innings pitched, 15 walks total, so he’s got some pretty decent control as well. Randle has two above average pitches, some outlets you might see ranking as a plus pitch, which is his sinking fast ball and his slider. The fact he has those two things are really a positive for him and will allow him at the very least should he not get to keep the control he currently has, it’s going to be a very solid middle of the bullpen kind of arm. somebody you could count on in a sixth inning, seventh inning of a relatively close game to get you some outs. Given that he’s a little bit safer because you could probably see him fitting into a decently middle leverage relief role should he not work out of the starter, but control really isn’t one of his issues except with his change up. It’s a below average pitch because it really doesn’t have any velocity separation from his slider and isn’t something that he has a ton of control with. So, he really needs to work on that to cement himself as a starter. He needs that third pitch. But so far, it seems like he’s doing a good job of maintaining low ERAs, not necessarily striking out a ton of guys, but he’s also not walking a ton of guys, too. Randle could very easily see himself being a number four or number five starter long term for the Nationals. The final player we’ll talk about is RJ Sales, the Tigers 10th round pick in the 2024 MLB draft, who’s currently unranked on both MLB pipeline and Baseball America’s top 30 list for the Tigers. Sales is a 6 foot 170lb righty who’s got a fast ball that sits around 94, tops around 96. He has a cutter and a really nice 12-6 curveball. Thanks to Emily Walden for that quick scouting report as well. And he definitely is going to be a starter long term. It looks like he doesn’t have a strong breakout pitch that would make him into a reliever at all. So the floor for sales is a little bit lower as someone who if he isn’t great with his control could end up staying as a minor leaguer forever instead of being a bullpen arm. Maybe he becomes a long reliever, but really his ceiling is something more of a four or five starter at best. probably closer to a five and his floor is probably as a long reliever if not someone who doesn’t make the major leagues at all. Unlike Randall, Sales did not make his debut in the minor leagues in 2024. Instead, making his debut this year at Lakeland, their single A affiliate going 4 and three with a 271 RA and just like Randall, they’re known to be striketh throwers. He’s got 63 strikeouts and 66 and third innings pitched and only 17 walks. So, the Nationals are targeting two guys who have decent control from the 2024 draft class, and they’re hoping they can develop them and continue to grow as they go through the minor league system. This is an opposite to players that they got in the past couple trades they’ve made before this deadline, like for Josh Clem from the Cleveland Guardians, who is very much a high octane, really incredible stuff, but lack of control. So, maybe these guys can play off each other and develop together and improve each other’s weaknesses. Now that we’ve talked about all three players in this deal, let’s go ahead and actually give this trade some trade grades. For the Washington Nationals, I’m going to give this trade a solid B. I think it’s fine. I don’t know if it jumps out of the page in any significant way for me. I don’t know if it really changes the needle of how I project them to be in the future. As well, I think getting a couple depth guys is always good. We’ve seen injuries really ravage teams out of the Dodgers right now with their starting rotation in bullpen. So having depth is always a good thing, but I don’t know if sales or Randall really moved the needle for me in any significant way. Randall is currently number 20 on the Tigers top 30 prospect list and started the season ranked inside the top 15 for the MLB pipeline list. 15th overall actually. So definitely some prospect pedigree there. Definitely not a bad addition at all. But the underlying metrics tell me that he doesn’t have the potential to be anything more than probably a mid level reliever at worst and a number three starter at best. Probably more likely a number four. So, I don’t know if the upside’s right there. And as reliever prices have been skyhigh this year, I feel like Finnegan’s a better get than the Rogers brothers, for instance. But, he didn’t command as much. So, there might be some other reasons why, but I don’t think this is as great of a deal as some of the other relievers that have already been traded. So, I think a B is a fair grade for the Washington Nationals for the return they got in this deal. For the Tigers, I’m going to give this an A minus. And that really stems from the fact that they traded away two pitchers in a minor league system that is littered with hitting prospects. Pitching is definitely their weakest spot. And you look at a lot of players like Troy Milton, Jackson Job, Tai Madden who recently made their major league debut and their pitching depth right now in the minor leagues is severely lacking. So they traded away from a place of weakness in their minor league system, which is fine. You obviously want to get the best players you can, but man, it is tough to see them trade away from their pitching when they have so many quality hitters in their minor league system. At the end of the day though, I do think it’s a fair trade. I think they got good value, which is what really matters. If I was the GM of the Detroit Tigers, I would probably make this trade. I would have no hesitation doing it. You’re trying to go all in. You want to win not only the AL Central, but you also want to win the AL Pennant and then the World Series. And to do that, you need to be able to compete with some of the bullpens that these teams are throwing out right now. And getting Kyle Finnegan absolutely does that. Thank you so much for getting to the end of the video. Make sure to hit that subscribe button if you made it this far and tell me in the comments who you think won this deal. Thanks again for getting to the end of this video and I hope to see you in the very next video as we break down even more trades this trade deadline.

A huge trade between the Washington Nationals and Detroit Tigers was just announced, as star closer Kyle Finnegan is heading from the Nationals to the Tigers in exchange for pitching prospects Josh Randall and RJ Sales. The Nationals, having a very disappointing year, trade away their most valuable trade chip on an expiring contract to build toward a future World Series-winning team. On the other hand, the Tigers know their competitive window is open now, and they acquire a piece that they hope can propel them toward a World Series ring. This trade has massive ramifications at the 2025 MLB trade deadline, as the reliever market is quickly dwindling. Both teams decide to make the 2025 MLB Trade Deadline a wild event, with more trades across baseball in the coming hours. In this video, we dive into the Kyle Finnegan trade and the implications of one of the most impactful trades of the 2025 MLB Deadline.

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00:00 – Push to the Playoffs!
1:06: Kyle Finnegan
02:45 – Josh Randall
05:23 – RJ Sales
06:57 – Trade Grades