After late-season surge, is Gore ready to assume role as Nats' ace?

PLAYER REVIEW: MACKENZIE GORE

Age on Opening Day 2025: 26

How acquired: Traded with CJ Abrams, James Wood, Robert Hassell III, Jarlin Susana and Luke Voit from Padres for Juan Soto and Josh Bell, August 2022

MLB service time: 3 years

2024 salary: $749,600

Contract status: Arbitration-eligible, free agent in 2028

2024 stats: 10-12, 3.90 ERA, 32 G, 32 GS, 166 1/3 IP, 171 H, 93 R, 72 ER, 15 HR, 65 BB, 181 SO, 11 HBP, 1.419 WHIP, 103 ERA+, 3.53 FIP, 0.8 bWAR, 3.2 fWAR

Quotable: “I thought it was solid. A career-high in innings. A career-high in strikeouts. I still think there’s some room for improvement. But we went through a tough stretch, and we were able to get through it.” – MacKenzie Gore

2024 analysis: The Nationals saw last year how dominant MacKenzie Gore can be on his best days. They also saw how much he could implode on his worst days. The objective entering this season: Maintain those best days, then reduce the number of worst days, or at least minimize the damage on those occasions when he’s not at his best.

Two months in, the left-hander seemed to have it all mastered. Through 11 starts he sported a 2.91 ERA with 11 strikeouts per nine innings, thrusting himself into the All-Star conversation. He still dealt with a decent amount of traffic on the bases at times, be he was able to avoid the blowup innings that plagued him in 2023, thanks in part to his ability to keep the ball in the park (0.8 home runs per nine innings).

And then things began to go south in midsummer. With his velocity down a tick or two, Gore started giving up lots of contact and helping the opposition with too many free passes. Over an eight-start stretch from July 6-Aug. 17, his ERA stood at a gaudy 7.71, an astounding 75 batters reaching base in only 35 innings. Had he ruined a once-promising season?

No, because a persistent Gore figured things out and climbed out of the abyss to finish even stronger than he started. His velocity ticked back up, he threw strikes again and over his final seven starts he delivered a pristine 1.55 ERA and 0.910 WHIP. All of which added up at season’s end to a 3.90 ERA (best since 2019 by any National who made at least 20 starts) and 181 strikeouts (also most by any Nats pitcher since 2019).

2025 outlook: Since the day he was acquired in the Soto-Bell blockbuster, Gore has been touted as the potential ace of the Nationals’ next winning team. He flashed glimpses of that form in 2023. He flashed more consistent glimpses of that in 2024. Now it’s time for him to fully ascend to the role and lead the way in 2025 and beyond.

Gore has elite velocity and swing-and-miss stuff. That’s always been true. What he did this season was dramatically reduce the loud contact he too often surrendered the previous year, lowering his home run rate from 1.8 to 0.8 per nine innings. He didn’t miss a start for any reason and set a career-high with 166 1/3 innings pitched. And maybe the most important thing he did was overcome that troubling midseason slump, proving he could adjust on the fly and rediscover the best version of himself when he really needed to.

The Nationals haven’t had a true frontline starter, a guy who has both the stuff and the demeanor to want to be The Guy since Max Scherzer. Gore has those qualities; that’s never been questioned. Now that he has begun having some success, he looks poised to take that next critical step and actually lead this staff to brighter days. There’s no guarantee he’s going to become a true ace in 2025. But if he does, the Nats are going to be in pretty good shape.