Job security or not, Rizzo believes in Nats' future

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Mike Rizzo has found himself in this spot before. He’s been tasked with building a franchise from the bottom up, from a 100-loss season into a consistent contender. And he’s been asked to work without a contract beyond the current year.

So the Nationals’ longtime general manager isn’t about to publicly bemoan the situation he now finds himself in entering the 2023 season.

“I’ve got a job to do,” Rizzo said Friday in his first session of the spring with reporters. “It’s not the first time, won’t be the last time, I’m on a lame-duck contract. It doesn’t affect me. It doesn’t bother me. I have been there before. I was an area scout. I worked on 20 one-year contracts in a row. So I’m no stranger to limited security. My work will be my resume, and we’ll see how it goes on from there.”

Rizzo’s sentiment is accurate. He has been through plenty of contract years during his decade-and-a-half in D.C. And he indeed helped build the Nationals from back-to-back 100-loss seasons in 2008-09 into a division champion in 2012 and eventually a World Series champion in 2019.

But there is one significant difference this time around. All of his previous challenges at least came with stability in the owner’s box at Nationals Park. Now, for the first time, there’s tremendous uncertainty.

The Lerner family, which purchased the team from Major League Baseball in May 2006 and made Rizzo (then the assistant GM to Jim Bowden) their very first baseball hire, revealed last April its intent to explore a sale of the franchise. That sale process, though, has stalled. Then this week began with news that family patriarch and founding principal owner Ted Lerner died at 97.

The Lerner family, with managing principal owner Mark at the helm since 2018, still runs the organization. But there’s no telling how much longer that will be the case, whether the franchise still could be sold in the coming year or whether the family will opt to continue owning the Nationals for the foreseeable future.

“Ted was huge in my career, maybe the biggest individual to have to impact my career,” Rizzo said. “He was a man that commanded – did not demand, but commanded – great respect from you, and he had it from me on day one.”

Rizzo hearkened back to his early days as the Nats’ GM, comparing the building years of 2009-11 to what he’s now going through. He noted they didn’t spend much on veterans back then, instead building a young core of Stephen Strasburg, Jordan Zimmermann, Ryan Zimmerman, Ian Desmond and others before splurging on a premium free agent like Jayson Werth once they believed they were ready to take the next step.

In that vein, the Nationals spent only $16.5 million this winter on free agents, all but one of them (No. 5 starter Trevor Williams) receiving one-year deals. The focus now is on establishing a new, young core made up of MacKenzie Gore, Cade Cavalli, Josiah Gray, Keibert Ruiz, CJ Abrams and Luis García, hoping to improve from a dreadful 55-107 season on the merits of in-house performers first.

“It kind of mirrors what we did back in ’09, ’10 and ’11,” Rizzo said. “When you establish yourself with some good, reliable, durable starting pitching and you develop, you get yourself some homegrown prospects, you see more guys coming, and then usually your payroll is at a point where you can go and add in that direction down the road. That’s kind of how we built this thing back in the day, and I don’t see us veering off that roadmap right now.”

It all sounds good, but it also depends on ownership (whether the Lerners or someone else) providing the financial resources to increase payroll the next two winters to bolster the young, homegrown group.

And while it would seem to make sense to keep Rizzo and manager Davey Martinez, whose contract also expires after this season, in charge until they’ve had enough time to see the rebuild through, there simply are no guarantees in this organization at this time.

“I’m optimistic,” Rizzo said. “I’m excited about this time in our developmental curve with the organization. When you guys do get back out there to see (minor league camp) on the back field, those prospects, it’s an exciting time. It’s the best group of upside players we’ve ever had here. I’ve been here since day one; I've never seen it like this before.

“And then when you filter in, there’s 22-, 23-, 24-year olds that are already kind of established in the big leagues, I think you see what we’re trying to accomplish here. I think that will be the first rung on the ladder to get back to the championship.”