Flamethrowing Nats right-hander looks to make up for lost time in Arizona Fall League

At the Triple-A National Championship in Las Vegas on Sept. 26, Jarlin Susana took the mound in the third inning for Rochester and unleashed a first-pitch 104 mph four-seam fastball to Oklahoma City catcher Ben Rortvedt. It was the fastest pitch recorded by a Washington or Rochester pitcher in a regular season or postseason game in the Statcast Era (going back to 2015).

Over the course of his two scoreless frames out of the Red Wings' bullpen, Susana delivered nine more pitches (seven four-seamers, two sinkers) between 103 and 103.8 mph. Those rank No. 2-10 on that same Nats/Wings Statcast leaderboard, all from one night.

Four days later at Arizona Fall League Media Day in Scottsdale, Washington’s No. 4 prospect was asked what a successful AFL would look like over six weeks with the Salt River Rafters.

“It wouldn’t be a normal Susana,” he said via interpreter Chanel Zapata. “It would be Don Susana.” 

Both the pitches and the answer were statements in their own right, ones that should be downright frightening to hitters in the AFL and Major Leagues alike. The 22-year-old right-hander is already one of baseball’s elite fireballers, and he believes there’s still another level to come.

In many ways, Susana is exactly the type of pitcher who should be headed for the Fall League. For starters, there’s the obvious arm talent. The velocity on the fastball is a big reason why he ranks at No. 66 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 100, and there’s a case to be made that his upper-80s slider is just as good of a pitch with the way it generates so many empty swings from batters sitting on the heat.

This time of year, most top-ranked arms are clocked out for the offseason, having met their innings limits for the year or gotten close enough that an AFL assignment isn’t worth it. Susana, however, missed much of this summer’s Minor League action after undergoing lat surgery last year, and after returning to game action in mid-August, he finished with only 22 1/3 innings across High-A Wilmington, Double-A Harrisburg and Triple-A Rochester between the regular season and playoffs. He topped out at 3 2/3 frames in a single outing with Harrisburg on Sept. 12, so there’s still some room to grow in terms of workload in individual appearances too. 

But to get there, Susana will have to find the zone with somewhat regularity. That is something that hasn’t always been a given throughout his career, which wouldn’t come as a shock (when fully healthy or when rehabbing) for someone with his radar-gun readings. Susana was clear about that in sharing his other AFL goals.

Even so, Susana’s current rise and whatever comes with a healthy 2027 (including a potential MLB debut) could be massive for the growing youth movement happening at the Minor and Major League levels for the Nationals under president of baseball operations Paul Toboni’s front office.

Much has been made about the “I don't care how fast you throw ball four” signs posted around bullpens at the Nationals’ Spring Training facility in West Palm Beach, Fla., in 2024, two years after Susana came over from the Padres with current Nats stars James Wood and CJ Abrams in the Juan Soto blockbuster.

The current player-development group, by contrast, puts a much bigger emphasis on improving velocity and focusing on developing Major League-quality stuff as the primary goal, even if it means some speed bumps along the way. They don’t have to teach one of their best arms to add any extra heat though. He’s already packing plenty for the desert.

“They told me to stay the same,” Susana said. “I was good before. I’m still good now. Just making sure I do minor adjustments with how I position my arm, but otherwise, stay the same. I’m still the same me.”

Nationals hitters in the Fall League

Teo Banks, OF: A 2024 18th-round pick out of Tulane, Banks spent the entirety of his second full season with High-A Wilmington, hitting .251/.333/.375 with six homers and a 90 wRC+ over 312 plate appearances. He swiped 21 bags in 28 attempts, making him one of six Blue Rocks with at least 20 thefts in 2026. Banks has played all three outfield positions in his career but was mostly focused on the corners in his age-22 season this summer.

Kevin Bazzell, C: Ranked as the No. 55 talent in the 2024 Draft, Bazzell went in the third round to the Nationals but has been behind fellow ‘24 pick Caleb Lomavita on the organizational catching depth chart since then. He still deserves credit for making a ton of contact, leading to a .287 average and 14.8 percent strikeout rate in 66 games at High-A and Double-A this season, and he jumped from zero homers in 84 games at Single-A in 2025 to nine this summer because of a significant cut in his ground-ball rate. Bazzell also threw out 33.3 percent of attempted basestealers with Harrisburg as his above-average arm strength has carried over from Texas Tech.

Jorgelys Mota, OF/3B: Mota’s combination of plus-plus raw power and plus speed gives him some of the best collections of pure tools in the system. Some Washington fans will remember he had the highest exit velocity (115 mph) and longest homer (434 feet) recorded by a Nats player in Spring Training. But the hit tool remains a major concern after he made contact on only 57.1 percent of his swings in 24 games with Wilmington this summer. Originally brought up as a third baseman, Mota saw time in center field this year with the Nats hoping to give him more space to display his athleticism.

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Nationals pitchers in the Fall League

Noah Dean, LHP: The 2022 fifth-rounder was released by the Red Sox on March 19 and signed by the Nationals 11 days later. He managed only 10 appearances for Double-A Harrisburg afterward in which he allowed 11 earned runs while striking out 15 and walking 14 over 11 innings. Dean has a history of control issues in the pros but relies heavily on a riding 93-95 mph fastball while getting whiffs with an 85-88 mph slider.

Nolan Hughes, LHP: Since being taken in the 16th round out of Xavier in 2024, Hughes has struggled to stay on the mound and to deliver strikes when he is pitching, having walked 10 batters in only seven innings of Single-A ball over the last two years. But the 24-year-old southpaw certainly has size at 6-foot-5 and interesting stuff in a fastball he can run up to the upper 90s and a mid-80s slider that drew whiffs on 12 of 19 swings in the small Fredericksburg sample earlier this year. 

Owen Puk, RHP: Puk is the brother of D-backs reliever A.J. Puk and joined the Nationals organization as an 18th-round pick out of Florida International last year. He managed only three relief appearances for Fredericksburg in April before getting this AFL assignment to make up for lost time. In school, the 6-foot-5 righty was primarily a fastball-slider thrower with a heater up to 97 and a low-80s breaker to generate empty swings and chase. 

R.J. Sales, RHP: Sales was one of two arms the Nationals acquired from the Tigers for Kyle Finnegan at the 2025 Trade Deadline, but he’s thrown only 42 innings in the system since then, none above High-A. His fastball can sit mid 90s, but the stars of the show are an upper-80s slider and low-80s curveball that each posted whiff rates above 45 percent (per Synergy) in his small sample this season, helping Sales fan 30.2 percent of his batters faced in ‘26.