WASHINGTON — Manager Dave Martinez and general manager Mike Rizzo were fired by the Washington Nationals on Sunday in moves that were surprising for their timing, even if the club is more than halfway through its sixth consecutive losing season since winning the 2019 World Series.
The team announced the changes just hours after Washington’s 6-4 loss at home completed a sweep by the Boston Red Sox.
The Nationals are 37-53 and last in the National League East Division — the only NL club with a worse record is the Colorado Rockies (21-69), who beat the American League-worst Chicago White Sox (30-60) on Sunday to avoid tying the MLB record for most losses in the first 90 games of a season in the modern era — but the amateur draft is just a week away, and Washington has the No. 1 overall pick.
Mike DeBartolo, the assistant GM and a senior vice president, is taking over for Rizzo on an interim basis. A replacement for Martinez wasn’t named immediately.
Washington could have exercised options to extend the contracts of both Martinez and Rizzo beyond this season.
“While we are appreciative of their past successes,” Nationals owner Mark Lerner said in a statement issued by the team, “the on-field performance has not been where we or our fans expect it to be. This is a pivotal time for our club, and we believe a fresh approach and new energy is the best course of action for our team moving forward.”
Rizzo’s time running the Nationals is over after more than a decade and a half. One of the Lerner family’s first hires when it assumed control of the organization, Rizzo had been GM since 2009 and added the title of president of baseball operations in 2013.
“He played an instrumental role in leading the transformation of our farm system and building a roster that reached an unprecedented level of organizational success,” Lerner said. “Mike helped make us who we are as an organization, and we’re so thankful to him for his hard work and dedication.”
Martinez is the fourth manager fired since the start of this season, after Derek Shelton (Pittsburgh Pirates), Bud Black (Rockies) and Brandon Hyde (Baltimore Orioles) were all dismissed in a 10-day stretch from May 8-17.
Overall, Martinez was 500-622 as manager of the Nationals. Last month, he bristled at a reporter’s question about how to split the blame for poor performance among players and his staff.
“It’s never on coaching,” Martinez said then. “Never on coaching. Coaches work their asses off every single day. We’re not going to finger point here and say it’s coaches. It’s never on the coaches. They work hard. The message is clear. All the work is done prior. So, sometimes, they have to go out there and play the game. It’s always been about the players. Always.”
Martinez had never been a manager at any level when Rizzo hired him to replace Dusty Baker before the 2018 season. The Nationals went 82-80 in Martinez’s first season and got off to a 19-31 start the following year, leading to some calls for him to be replaced.
Rizzo stuck with Martinez, though, and that decision paid off in a big way. Led by starting pitchers Stephen Strasburg and Max Scherzer, rookie outfielder Juan Soto, young shortstop Trea Turner and a string of veterans — including Howie Kendrick, Anthony Rendon and Ryan Zimmerman — the Nationals delivered the franchise’s first World Series championship that fall, with Strasburg voted MVP of the Fall Classic.
No one from that World Series roster is still playing for the franchise, which began as the Montreal Expos from 1969 to 2004 before moving to Washington.
The Nationals took a step back in the 2020 season, which was delayed and shortened due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and then Rizzo began tearing apart the roster, making a series of trades that sent Scherzer, Soto, Turner and others elsewhere.
The reconstruction has continued, without much in the way of concrete progress in the standings to show for it, although the team does have some building blocks who show promise. Those include starting pitcher MacKenzie Gore and outfielder James Wood — each was named Sunday to the NL team for the upcoming MLB All-Star Game — along with shortstop CJ Abrams, who was an MLB All-Star a year ago.
“Nationals fans have a lot to be optimistic about, and we see these changes as a difficult, but necessary move in a positive direction,” Lerner’s statement read. “As has been the case since my late father took control of the team almost 20 years ago, our family remains committed to winning.”
Washington finished fourth or fifth in the NL East every year from 2020 through 2024, never putting together a higher winning percentage than the .438 (71-91) each of the past two seasons.
“I’ve always appreciated and admired Davey’s passion for the game of baseball and the love he has for his players,” Lerner said. “Davey’s ability to connect with our staff, our players, our fans and our community set him apart. While this chapter has come to an end, we know that it doesn’t close the book on what should continue to be a long and successful career in baseball.”