In July, the Nationals made a bold move by making 17 year old Eli Willits the youngest first overall pick of all time. Willits still has not turned 18 yet, with his birthday coming up on December 9th. However, the type of game Willits plays is very mature. That means he can move quicker than most high school prospects.
Willits has stated that one of his goals is to be in the MLB by age 20. For most players, that would be a pipe dream, but not Willits. As a 17 year old straight out of high school he hit .300 in Low-A. With that kind of production out of the gates, he is tracking to be a big leaguer at some point in 2028, which would be his age 20 season.
The thing that stands out the most about Willits’ game is how polished he is on both sides of the ball. He is such a smooth operator at shortstop and projects to be a strong defender there. Willits is a good athlete and has a strong arm for his age. He has the ability to use a bunch of different arm angles, which is very valuable at shortstop.
Eli Willits polish should not come as a surprise. His dad is former big leaguer Reggie Willits who had a successful career by playing the game the right way. Reggie Willits had to be fundamentally perfect because he had no power and his tools were limited. Eli has much better tools than his father, but still plays the game with such great fundamentals. His brother Jaxon is also the starting shortstop at Oklahoma, where Reggie Willits is an assistant coach.
It is all ball all the time for the Willits family. That makes me confident that Eli will tap into every last drop of ability he has. He has already been working hard this offseason. One thing Willits needed to do was get stronger. His exit velocities were very low, which is not super surprising given his age. However, he has been in the weight room a lot this offseason.
Hopefully that added strength will result in more power. That is the only tool that Willits is missing right now. If he can even become a 15 homer guy, Willits has a very clear path to being a 5 WAR player in the big leagues someday. He is an above average defender at shortstop and a great baserunner as well.
Offensively, Willits is a smooth swinging switch hitter. He has elite bat to ball skills as well as strong plate discipline. The combination of bat to ball skills and plate discipline can be quite rare. A lot of players that are great at making contact fall into the trap of swinging at everything just because they can hit those pitches. Willits can hit those pitches, but instead decides to be selective.
How fast should Nationals fans expect Willits to move? Well, given his age we won’t be seeing him in the MLB anytime soon, but he should move pretty steadily. He performed well in Low-A and will probably start there again next season. However, if he gets off to a fast start, a promotion to High-A could come quickly.
That is not just due to performance though. The Nats have a lot of middle infielders at the lower levels right now. Coy James, Luke Dickerson, Angel Feliz, Ronny Cruz, Marconi German and Brayan Cortesia are all going to need to play, but there will be a log jam.
A lot of those guys should be in Low-A, but not all of them can be because there is not enough room. If Willits is super impressive in Spring Training, there is a chance he starts the season at High-A because of this. Willits should spend most of the season at High-A in my opinion. It is a good way to get him going in pro ball.
While Wilmington is known as a pitcher friendly environment, it should not matter as much to Willits as others. He is not a home run reliant player and his bat to ball skills should translate anywhere. Due to his lack of present physicality, moving him up to Double-A should not be on the cards unless he really goes off.
However, Willits should be in Double-A in 2027 and could even reach Triple-A by the end of that season. This timeline would put him on track to be a big leaguer by the time he is 20 years old, just like he wants. Of course, Willits has to perform for this timeline to work but I am confident in him.
As long as he continues to gain strength, the rest of his game is super well rounded. In the past, the Nats have taken a lot of athletes who needed to become better at baseball. Willits is not like that at all. His baseball skills are elite, he just needs to get stronger. I am excited to follow his journey because I think he will be the next great Nats prospect.