WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Shalom … er, hello from The Ballpark of the Palm Beaches, where tonight the Nationals take a break from official Grapefruit League play to face Team Israel in a tune-up for the upcoming World Baseball Classic!

It won’t just be the opponent that looks different tonight. The rules will be different as well. As in, the old rules. No pitch clock. Shifting allowed. Smaller bases. And yet, none of the stats actually count for official MLB purposes. Oh, also there may be a Nationals pitcher or two actually pitching for the opponents later in the game because the Israelis are trying to save some arms for the WBC. You’ve been warned.

The Nats will have an intriguing combination of regulars and top-end prospects taking the field tonight. Cade Cavalli makes his first actual start of the spring after two relief appearances. While there’s only so much to glean from how he performs against this particular lineup, it’s still important to see the young right-hander complete three solid innings with no real issues.

Cavalli will have mostly big leaguers behind him in the field, but he’ll also have the organization’s No. 1 prospect: James Wood, who gets his first start in center field (perhaps a ramification of the knee injury Victor Robles sustained yesterday against the Tigers. Stay tuned, as we hope to have an update on him. Other prospects expected to play the second half of this game include Brady House and Elijah Green.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS vs. ISRAEL
Where: The Ballpark of the Palm Beaches
Gametime: 6:05 p.m. EST
TV: None
Radio: None
Weather: Clear, 74 degrees, wind 10 mph in from right field

TAMPA – James Wood boarded the Nationals’ team bus in West Palm Beach at 6:15 a.m., before the sun rose. He sat through a 3 1/2-hour bus ride across the state of Florida, watching the driver deal with heavy fog, construction and on-and-off traffic before arriving at Steinbrenner Field for the first Grapefruit League game of his career.

Wood, the Nats’ newly anointed top-rated prospect, had all morning to think about it. And he figured he’d have at least five innings to anticipate his insertion into the nationally televised game against the Yankees.

He did not anticipate his time would come during the top of the third, with no advance notice, after a teammate was injured.

When Derek Hill pulled up lame beating out an infield single, Wood suddenly found himself taking over as a pinch-runner and eventually as the Nationals’ center fielder for the final seven innings of this game, which ended a 4-2 Yankees win on Carlos Narvaez’s walk-off homer off Gerardo Carrillo.

“Hey, the best way to do it is just put him in, right?” manager Davey Martinez said. “He looked good. He took some good pitches, worked some good counts, and he moves well. … He’s going to be really good.”

TAMPA – The Nationals’ spring relocation from remote Viera to centrally located West Palm Beach six years ago cut their travel down to a fraction of what it used to be. Most of their road games now are played on site against the Astros or 15 minutes away in Jupiter, with a few 45-minute trips to Port St. Lucie thrown in.

There are, however, still two long trips on the Grapefruit League schedule this year. And the longest of them has come today, with the Nats making the 3 1/2-hour trek to the opposite side of the state to face the Yankees.

Given that, you can imagine Davey Martinez wasn’t going to make most of his regulars ride the bus for a seven-hour round trip. So today’s lineup features only a handful of regulars (most of them young and/or inexperienced). It also doesn’t include a member of the projected Opening Day rotation. Instead, it’s Cory Abbott (whose best chance of making the team is as a long reliever) taking the mound to face the Bronx Bombers.

There are some kids from minor league camp who were promoted for the day and given the opportunity make this trip, though, headlined by the organization’s new No. 1 prospect: Outfielder James Wood. Stay tuned for the later innings to see if he gets an at-bat.

Today’s game is being broadcast nationally on ESPN. It’s Kevin Brown, Jessica Mendoza and the great Tim Kurkjian on the call. It’s also the last game of my first stint down here this spring. Bobby Blanco has arrived in West Palm Beach and will take the beat writer reins for the next week, so be sure to follow him and read his work until I return on March 9.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – As the 67 players in big league camp retreat to the clubhouse following their daily workout here, they pass by another group of players in Nationals uniforms. They are younger, less experienced, though not necessarily less noticeable.

The organization’s top prospects who reported early for spring training ahead of the rank-and-file minor leaguers who will arrive in a few weeks are a physically impressive group. This is particularly obvious in the outfield, where James Wood, Robert Hassell III, Elijah Green and Cristhian Vaquero strike an imposing presence.

Add Jeremy De La Rosa (already in major league camp after he was added to the 40-man roster over the winter) to the mix, and the Nationals have every reason to believe they’ve got at least three future outfield studs in their farm system right now.

For these young players, the opportunity to work out alongside each other this spring is superseded only by the possibility of playing alongside each other in D.C. someday down the road.

“It’s exciting, for sure,” the 6-foot-7 Wood said Sunday. “I just want to get up there and keep doing my thing. And hopefully that becomes reality pretty soon.”

After a dismal year in D.C., César Hernández will try to resurrect his career by making Detroit’s roster off a minor league deal.

Hernández agreed to a non-guaranteed contract with an invitation to big league camp Wednesday, according to multiple reports. If he makes the Tigers’ roster, he’ll earn a $1.5 million salary, with the possibility of another $1.85 million in performance bonuses.

It’s a steep drop-off in financial security for the 32-year-old infielder, who got a $4 million major league deal with the Nationals last winter and was handed the Opening Day job at second base.

Hernández never lived up to the billing. His .629 OPS was his lowest since 2014, when he was still trying to make it with the Phillies. After launching 21 homers for the White Sox and Cleveland in 2021, he homered just once for the Nats, and that blast didn’t come until Sept. 4 in his 124th game played.

In spite of his struggles, Hernández actually took more plate appearances than any other member of the Nationals last season, coming up to bat 617 times. He remained the everyday second baseman into late August, at which point the team was finally ready to go with a young middle infield combo of CJ Abrams and Luis García. Hernández wound up seeing some playing time in left field down the stretch.

Baseball America unveiled its Top 100 Prospects list for the start of the 2023 season Wednesday, and there’s good news: The Nationals not only had four players make the list, they had four players make the top 61.

Outfielder James Wood leads the way at No. 11. Robert Hassell III (57), Elijah Green (58) and Cade Cavalli (61) are all bunched together farther down the list.

That’s a nice development for the Nats, and evidence of the influx of talent they’ve had in what used to be one of baseball’s worst farm systems. Three of those four players, of course, weren’t even in the organization one year ago at this time. Wood and Hassell came from the Padres in the Juan Soto-Josh Bell blockbuster trade. Green was the No. 5 overall pick in last summer’s draft.

And when you add two young players who were highly rated entering the 2022 season but now are full-time major leaguers (CJ Abrams, No. 9; Keibert Ruiz, No. 11), it further underscores just how far the Nationals have come in the last 18 months.

Which isn’t to say they’re anywhere close to achieving what they ultimately need to achieve.

We’ve reached the final week of the year, so it’s time to look back at the Nationals’ most significant stories of 2022. We begin the series today with something taking place away from D.C.: The rebuilding of the organization’s farm system …

The Nationals knew a successful 2022 season was going to be less about what happened in the major leagues and more about what happened in the minor leagues. In the first full year of an organization-wide rebuild, progress was more likely to be found in places like Fredericksburg, Wilmington and West Palm Beach than in Washington.

And in some regards, that’s exactly what happened. While the big league club slogged its way through a 107-loss campaign, two of the franchise’s lower-level affiliates finished atop their respective divisions: Single-A Fredericksburg went 75-55 to win the Carolina League’s North division before falling in the playoffs, while the Rookie-level Florida Complex League Nats tied with the Mets atop the East division with a 33-22 record.

For years, general manager Mike Rizzo and his lieutenants downplayed the significance of won-loss records in the minors. This year, they were more apt to mention it, insisting team success on the farm does carry some weight.

“I think it’s important,” director of player development De Jon Watson said last month. “Because we’re trying to teach kids to play the game the right way, and teach them how to win.”

We know the 2022 season wasn’t a success for the Nationals at the major league level. Was it at least at the minor league level?

It certainly was a season of improvement, not that the organization had anywhere to go but up.

The Nats entered 2021 with the lowest-ranked farm system in baseball according to MLB Pipeline. They moved up from No. 30 to No. 23 entering 2022, thanks to their July trades of Max Scherzer, Trea Turner and others, plus the drafting of Brady House and signing of top Dominican prospect Cristhian Vaquero.

Then came the 2022 trade deadline, and the blockbuster deal that sent Juan Soto and Josh Bell to San Diego for six players, five of whom were among the Padres’ top ranked prospects. That influx of talent, coupled with the drafting of Elijah Green, brought the Nationals’ ranking up to No. 15, the highest this system has been regarded in some time.

“I think our system’s different right now than it was a year ago,” general manager Mike Rizzo said. “I think it’s deeper. We’ve had two what I believe are successful trade deadline acquisition periods. We’ve had two successful drafts. We’ve done a good job in the international market. I think that our prospect depth is as good as it’s ever been here in the organization, and I think that the upside of our prospect list is probably the highest it’s ever been.”

The Nationals have decided not to give MacKenzie Gore a start before season’s end, not wanting to push the left-hander to come off the injured list given the shaky weekend forecast and his stamina issues during a lengthy minor league rehab stint.

Gore, who was acquired from the Padres while on the 15-day IL with left elbow inflammation, had been building himself back up with the intention of making one or two big league starts before the season ends. And after throwing 72 pitches over 3 2/3 innings Monday in his fourth rehab outing for Triple-A Rochester, he expressed optimism he’d make a start against the Phillies this weekend, even if he was limited to three or four innings.

But after conversations with manager Davey Martinez and general manager Mike Rizzo, Gore was told his season would end now, with an offseason plan implemented to help him build up more strength and stamina heading into spring training.

“For me, that’s good enough,” Martinez said. “When we started this and started your rehab stuff, that’s the point we wanted to get to. For me, if it was something different – if we didn’t have enough pitchers, or whatever, which we do – it would be a different conversation. But I don’t want to push it. I think we’re in a good spot right now.”

Gore had totaled 70 big league innings for the Padres before going on the IL in late July, going 4-4 with a 4.50 ERA, 1.472 WHIP and 72 strikeouts, those numbers turning worse as he was beginning to deal with his elbow issue. He was highly motivated to come back and pitch for the Nationals, but the organization doesn’t feel like he needs to prove anything to them.

Jump back in time all of one month and make a mental list of the Nationals’ top prospects.

You’d start with Cade Cavalli, include Brady House and then try to come up with the names of other kids who may or may not develop into major leaguers some day in the short or long term.

Now consider what that list looks like in the wake of a dramatic (and, yes, controversial) overhaul of the organization that culminated with last week’s trade of Juan Soto and Josh Bell to the Padres.

Cavalli and House remain on the list, but not in the top two spots. Those now belong to the likes of C.J. Abrams and Robert Hassell III, two of the six players acquired from San Diego in the blockbuster deal. Right behind them are Elijah Green and Cristhian Vaquero, teenage sensations who were the organization’s top amateur draft and international signing additions of 2022. Also include James Wood and Jarlin Susana, two more younger prospects who came over in the trade with the Padres. And then don’t forget to keep Cavalli and House, the 2020 and 2021 first-round picks, in the mix as well.

What you now see is a farm system that no longer is dependent on the rise of one or two blue-chip prospects, but has enough depth to account for the inevitable injuries and/or struggles that are bound to occur when trying to turn players right out of high school and college into big league stars.