WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The Nationals have been taking the field at the CACTI Ballpark of the Palm Beaches since January. But after weeks of pre-camp training, they held their first full-squad workout on Monday.
“It was nice to have the first official workout,” first-year manager Blake Butera said. “It feels like we’ve had the first workout like seven times.”
The Nationals entered Spring Training following an offseason of revamping the front office and coaching staff. Butera and president of baseball operations Paul Toboni addressed the team in the clubhouse Monday morning to set the tone for the season.
“It was the first time with the whole group here having a chance to get in front of them, letting them know what we're about and our expectations as a staff, as a front office, as an organization -- [there are] a lot of new faces, obviously,” Butera said.
“Also, letting them know this is a fully clean slate. They get to write their new chapter, and what that's going to look like is totally up to them. I talked a little bit about the player-led clubhouse, holding each other accountable and just having each other's backs throughout.”
Butera has been involved in on-field drills, and he continued to do so Monday with pickoff and rundowns. He wanted to emphasize the prioritization of handling the baseball. A new baserunning drill also stood out to young slugger James Wood.
“It looked like rush hour traffic,” Wood said with a laugh. “But it was good. You got what you needed, and you were out pretty quick.”
The team completed a schedule that was built around efficiency. The Nationals already had implemented drills to double-up on pitchers’ mound work, and they took the same approach of timeliness with the full squad.
“A few players made comments before they left today that they felt like they got a ton of work in and they weren’t here for seven, eight hours,” said Butera. “... I told them in our meeting today: we're aware of the fact that some of you have families, you have kids, you have significant others, there's other stuff going on. We're going to ask you to be here and we're going to ask you to lock in, but we're not going to ask you to be here for eight to 10 hours where there's a lot of standing around time. There's a lot of purpose behind our schedule and what we're asking them to do.
“I hope when they leave, they feel like they got a ton of work in, they're tired, yet they still have several hours to go home, rest, recover, spend time with family, things like that.”
The majority of the players wrapped up their work for the day by 12:30 p.m. ET.
“It was definitely busy. It was a lot of moving parts. The schedule, I had to read over a few times,” Wood joked. “I think we got a lot of good work in. All the groups felt small, so it felt pretty individualized with what you’re working on. So it was a good day.”
For all the workouts the Nationals had held this offseason, there was a different feeling around the training complex on Monday. The 2026 season is very much in sight.
“It was like that first official kickoff, when you rally everybody together and let them know what they can expect and what this is going to look like,” Butera said. “Then you go outside and ‘Here's the schedule’ and ‘Go get them.’ It just felt good to get it really get it rolling.”