Though Wander Suero and Roenis Elías have rejoined the Nationals and have been cleared to work out with the club, neither reliever will be ready to open the season on the active roster. Suero and Elías were among the group of 11 players who were not initially cleared to participate in summer training at Nationals Park, either because they tested positive for COVID-19 or were exposed to someone else who did. Both were placed on the 10-day injured list July 13. Elías, though, was cleared...

Though Wander Suero and Roenis Elías have rejoined the Nationals and have been cleared to work out with the club, neither reliever will be ready to open the season on the active roster.

Suero and Elías were among the group of 11 players who were not initially cleared to participate in summer training at Nationals Park, either because they tested positive for COVID-19 or were exposed to someone else who did. Both were placed on the 10-day injured list July 13.

Elías, though, was cleared to join camp Friday and has been throwing at the ballpark since. And Suero made his first appearance today, facing live hitters during the Nationals' final workout before the regular season begins.

Like many pitchers right now, Suero had diminished velocity; manager Davey Martinez said his cutter registered 89-90 mph today, down from its average of 93 mph last season.

"But he felt good," Martinez said. "What I liked is he had good command of all of his pitches, which is very important for us. And he felt good. He said his legs felt fine."

Martinez said Suero and Elías will be sent to Fredericksburg to join the Nationals' auxiliary camp, the only place for anyone from the 60-man player pool not in the big leagues to work out this season. They'll need to face live hitters several times and build up their arms before potentially coming back to Washington.

Both pitchers were projected to make the Nationals' opening day bullpen, so their absence opens even more spots for less familiar names. The club intends to carry 10 relievers on its expanded, 30-man roster for the season's first two weeks, and only five of those jobs are set in stone: left-hander Sean Doolittle and right-handers Daniel Hudson, Will Harris, Tanner Rainey, and the loser of the competition for the No. 5 starter's spot between Austin Voth and Erick Fedde.

That leaves five more spots from a pool of seven candidates who have been healthy and in camp throughout: left-hander Sam Freeman, plus right-handers Aaron Barrett, James Bourque, Kyle Finnegan, Javy Guerra, Ryne Harper and Kevin Quackenbush.

If Nationals starters are consistently able to pitch six innings, their bullpen depth won't need to be tested quite so much. But even in a best-case scenario, Martinez acknowledges he'll need to be cautious with his frontline relievers early in the season, because none has had a chance to pitch on back-to-back days yet and won't be thrown to the wolves right out of the chute.

Add in Major League Baseball's new three-batter-minimum rule for pitchers and bullpen management becomes an even greater challenge.

"For the most part, these guys are ready to go," Martinez said. "I think everybody in our bullpen can pitch at any given time. I've got confidence in all those guys. We'll see what happens, but we have to be very careful about how we use these guys, and how we get them up. Another thing is getting them up, sitting them down, getting them up, sitting them down. This year, that probably won't work. We've got to be really careful."