Jacob Young’s rookie season for the Nationals, while stellar in the field, was not ultimately deemed golden.
Despite holding a statistical advantage over his fellow nominees, Young lost out to Rockies center fielder Brenton Doyle, who earned his second straight Gold Glove Award tonight.
Doyle beat out Young and the Brewers’ Blake Perkins in balloting, which was determined by a combination of an end-of-season vote by National League managers and coaches and a statistical component that accounted for 25 percent of the final tally.
Young had a particularly strong case for the award.
According to Baseball Savant, the 25-year-old finished the season with 20 Outs Above Average, tied with Guardians second baseman Andrés Giménez for most among all major leaguers, regardless of position. His 18 Runs Prevented led all big leaguers and represented the highest number posted in that statistical category since 2019.
According to FanGraphs, Young also led all NL center fielders with a 13.4 Defensive Rating and tied Doyle for the lead with 11 Defensive Runs Saved. Perkins, a former Nationals draft pick who played fewer innings than Young and Doyle, ranked sixth in DRS and eighth in Defensive Rating.
Young was hoping to join select company as only the third player in two decades of Nationals history to win a Gold Glove, not to mention the first outfielder. Ryan Zimmerman won in 2009 while still a third baseman. Adam LaRoche won in 2012 at first base.
A seventh-round pick out of the University of Florida in 2021, Young nevertheless represents a significant win for the Nationals’ scouting and player development departments, which had struggled for some time to produce quality big league players who weren’t initially regarded as top prospects. Young produced 2.6 bWAR this season, making him the Nats’ first non-first-round pick to exceed 2 WAR for them since Michael A. Taylor (a fifth-round pick in 2009).
He made his major league debut late in the 2023 season and showed off some of his skills down the stretch but did not make the Opening Day roster this season. He was quickly recalled from Triple-A Rochester, though, when Victor Robles suffered a hamstring injury and wound up taking over the starting center field job and never gave it up.
Young’s emergence helped convince the Nationals it was time to cut ties with the enigmatic Robles in June (though Robles wound up playing well after joining the Mariners). It also helped convince club officials to deal Lane Thomas at the July trade deadline, knowing Young could man center field while top prospects James Wood and Dylan Crews took over the corner positions.
* The Nationals declined their half of the $8 million mutual option on Joey Gallo today, making the veteran first baseman a free agent.
The move was expected after a dismal season by Gallo, who was signed last winter in the hopes he would generate power while playing Gold Glove-caliber defense himself but wound up with two lengthy stints on the injured list and only 10 homers and 27 RBIs to go along with an abysmal .161 batting average.
Gallo’s contract included a $2.5 million salary for 2024, and he also earned an additional $200,000 for reaching the lowest of five performance bonuses based on his plate appearances. There was never much chance both sides would pick up the $8 million mutual option, but in declining it the Nats are now on the hook for a $2.5 million buyout.
So, the club ends up paying Gallo a total of $5.2 million for his one season in D.C. and now will again be in the market for a first baseman this winter.