WASHINGTON – Burlington native Zack Littell has pitched in post-season play for four Major League Baseball clubs since he made his debut in The Show in 2018.<\/p>\n
But the right-handed pitcher from Eastern Alamance High School is now in a new environment in his first season with the Washington Nationals \u2014 a young team that hopes to build for a future playoff run.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a wild off-season,\u201d said Littell, 30, standing by his locker before the Nationals\u2019 home opener on Friday against the defending World Series champion Dodgers. \u201cThe Nats kind of hung around the entire time and checked in regularly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Littell, who made 10 starts for the Cincinnati Reds in 2025 after 22 outings for Tampa Bay, and his agency fielded offers from other clubs but decided to go with Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had to figure something out. The Nats felt it was a decent fit for them, and we will see what happens later in the year,\u201d he said. \u201cI had some offers from other teams. I felt this was a good opportunity for me, plus it is a fun staff to play under. We have a talented group of young players, and to really shift the culture has been fun to be a part of.\u201d<\/p>\n
Washington won the World Series in 2019 but has had a losing record every year since then. The Nationals were 66-96 last season, and most preseason forecasts have them pegged for last in the five-team National League East \u2014 and one website gives them a 0.9% chance of making the playoffs this year.<\/p>\n
But Littell \u2014 who pitched in the playoffs for the Twins in 2019, the Giants in 2021, Tampa Bay in 2023 and the Reds last season \u2014 welcomes the challenge.<\/p>\n
“It is different,” he said. “It is a good opportunity for me to get to work with these guys. I have no doubt, whether it is this year or in two years, this group will be in meaningful games, playing in October. I want to be a sounding board for these guys.”<\/p>\n
Littell made his first outing of this season on March 31 in Philadelphia as he pitched five innings out of the bullpen and was tagged with the loss as he allowed three runs.<\/p>\n
Littell knew he would come on to pitch the bottom of the second as Washington rookie manager Blake Butera used an opener, P.J. Poulin, who threw the first inning.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought it went exactly how we had hoped,\u201d Butera told reporters. \u201cCouldn\u2019t have been better.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was the first time Littell came in after an opener.<\/p>\n
He has plenty of experience as a starter and reliever. In games through April 2 he had pitched in 235 big league games, with 79 starts.<\/p>\n
Littell was mostly a starter earlier in his Major League career, then appeared in a career-high 61 games out of the bullpen for the Giants in 2021.<\/p>\n
“It was probably one of the best things that could happen to my career,” he said of being used out of the bullpen. “You don’t want to get married to a routine. Being able to talk to the bullpen guys, that experience is definitely going to help.”<\/p>\n
Littell welcomes giving advice to younger Washington pitchers, such as Opening Day starter Cade Cavalli, a top prospect who is early in his pro career.<\/p>\n
“Don’t ride the roller coaster too much,” he said of his advice. “Cade is well on his way. You are going to have great days. You are going to have bad days.”<\/p>\n
Littell signed a one-year deal in early March with Washington for $7 million, according to MLB.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n “The short spring (training) was kind of tough. There are still some things I want to clean up,” he said.<\/p>\n Now he is in Washington, just a few hours drive from family and friends in the Burlington area.<\/p>\n “I think that kind of played into it,” he said of signing with a team closer to home, making it nice for his wife, Autumn, and two children. “Both of our families are from there. We are looking for a place to settle in (in the Washington area). There are some great pockets around the city. My guys love to be outside.”<\/p>\n David Driver has covered the Nationals on a regular basis since 2013. He is the former sports editor of papers in Baltimore and Harrisonburg, Virginia, and the co-author of \u201cFrom Tidewater to the Shenandoah: Snapshots from Virginia\u2019s Rich Baseball Legacy,\u201d available at Amazon and daytondavid.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON – Burlington native Zack Littell has pitched in post-season play for four Major League Baseball clubs since…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":666609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2398],"tags":[5,1299,4,415,185,414,71,4222],"class_list":{"0":"post-666608","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-washington-nationals","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-local","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-nationals","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-washington","14":"tag-washington-nationals","15":"tag-washingtonnationals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116358591912927503","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=666608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=666608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=666608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=666608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}