After 4 or 5 years as a professional, a player must be added to his club’s 40-man roster or exposed to the 29 other clubs in the Rule 5 draft. (A club has 5 years to evaluate a player who signs his first pro contract at 18 years old or younger, but only 4 years to decide on a player who signs at age 19.) For purposes of calculating years as a pro, the counting begins the day a player signs his first pro contract, not the season he begins to play.

When a player is added to the 40-man roster, his club has three “options,” or three separate seasons during which the club may to move him to and from the minor leagues without exposing him to other clubs. A player on the 40-man roster playing in the minors is on optional assignment, and within an option season, there is no limit on the number of times a club may demote and recall a player. However, a player optioned to the minor leagues may not be recalled for at least 10 days, unless the club places a Major League player on the disabled list during the 10-day window.

After three options are exhausted, the player is out of options. Beginning with the next season, he must clear waivers before he may be sent to the minors again.

If a player is not sent to the minors during a year, an option is not used.

If a player is on the 40-man roster in spring training but optioned to the minors before the season begins, an option is used.

If a player’s optional assignment(s) to the minors total less than 20 days in one season, an option is not used.

A player may be eligible for a fourth option year if he has been optioned in three seasons but does not yet have five full seasons of professional experience. A full season is defined as being on an active pro roster for at least 90 days in a season. (If a player is put on the disabled list after earning 60 or more days of service in a single season, his time on the DL is counted.)

What is your take on Balester and Whitesell? Why were they not called up?

Balester and Detwiler are the same age, but Balester has more professional experience.

On Whitesell, he may be a marginal prospect and all that, but the Nats could use a decent bat. Whitesell has a nice OBA of .425 with good power. With all the new relief pitchers, you can see some PH opportunities. You see conflicting reports on his defensive abilities.

Maybe they will be called up later?

drafted out of college
AAA: 23-24 years old
AA: 22-23
High A: 21-22
Low A: 20-21

drafted out of high school
AAA: 22-24
AA: 20-23
High A: 19-21
Low A: 18-20

You can fudge around the margins on those ranges.

Am I just imagining it, or does it seem that the Nats have a number of solid AAA guys that have terrible records in the bigs. Levaile Speigner, Winston Abreu, Larry Broadway, Jiminez (.368 at Columbus!) etc. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

(And, as a separate issue: why not just get rid of Brandon Watson if they’re never going to give him a fair shot. After all, he “only” batted .313 at AAA this year, 2d on the team to Jiminez. No matter how many times it’s explained to me, I’ll never understand why Langerhans got such a long look (and another call up this week), while Watson is a AAA star. Yeah, yeah, he “only” hits singles and has a bad OBP, but it’s higher than anyone on the Nats other than Young and Batista).

Does this apply to Chico? Did we burn an option year on Chico this season?

Since Manny only carries 5 bench players (instead of 6), bench players who can play more than one position are important to him. Broadway and Whitesell are strickly first basemen. Fick provides Manny with another catcher, first baseman and outfielder plus he’s a great “clubhouse guy”. But his lack of hitting is a concern which may have them looking for another versatile player. A factor to be evaluated is: was Fick’s poor hitting performance a result of his distraction concerning his mother’s illness and subsequent death (he was travelling back to California during the season on some off days to be with his mother).

I wonder if Bowden puts too much stock in “his player” be they draftees with the nats, or guys he drafted in Cincy and doesn’t “like” guys he didn’t bring in?

While I believe, in general, that Jim Bowden has done a good job since the Lerners became the new owners, I believe he is bias against the players who were before him and has convinced management that MLB has done a poor job of drafting during the 5 years that MLB owned the team. A good example was Valentino “Val” Pascucci who was drafted in 1999 out of Univ. of Oklahoma as a power hitting OF. He had a great 5 year minor league career but at the peak of his career, he was released in Dec,2004 when the Expos traded for Jose Guillen. In 2007, he’s playing for the Marlins AAA team after playing 2005-2006 in Japan and his stats are 132 games, 284-389-577 with 34 HR & 27 doubles. If Bill Beane’s theory of AAA being a good sign of a players potential, Bowden ignored Pascucci’s stats and his power hitting potential because he was with Expos before him.
The system that needed to develop young power hitters, let another escape.