Just a year ago, Washington Nationals Dylan Crews looked like a can’t-miss future star. Taken No. 2 overall by the Nationals in 2023, he dominated college baseball at LSU and was viewed as one of the most polished hitters in a generation. But 38 games into the 2025 season, the 23-year-old looks overwhelmed — and it’s getting harder to justify keeping him in the big leagues.
Through Monday, Crews is hitting just .183/.238/.321 with five home runs and a stunning 41 strikeouts in 147 plate appearances. His 44 wRC+ ranks among the worst in baseball, and his overall production has dipped below replacement level. FanGraphs states he’s been worth -0.5 WAR, underscoring how far off course he’s drifted.
Fastballs Now a Problem, Not a Strength
What’s most alarming is that even Crews’ calling card — his ability to hit fastballs — has cratered. Last season, he slugged over .500 against heaters and whiffed less than 10% of the time. In 2025, that whiff rate has spiked to 22%, and he’s just 1-for-22 with seven strikeouts on fastballs.
These numbers indicate more than a slump. It’s a complete confidence collapse, and it’s playing out in real time against the toughest competition in the world.
Chase Rate, Swing Path, and Overthinking
The mechanical red flags are hard to ignore. As Bleacher Report noted, Crews’ chase rate sits in the 40th percentile, but his contact rate on those chased pitches is just 32.1% — among the worst in the league. His swing has changed noticeably, too. He starts tall, collapses into his lower half, and often finds himself chasing high heat or flailing at breaking balls.
There’s also a mental component. Crews appears to be second-guessing everything in the box. He’s more competitive against breaking balls than last year, but it has seemingly come at the cost of fastball recognition — an ironic tradeoff for a player once praised for his elite bat-to-ball skills.
Time to Follow the Jackson Holliday Blueprint?
Crews’ struggles resemble those of Jackson Holliday, who was sent back to Triple-A just 10 games into his MLB debut. The key difference? The Orioles acted quickly. The Nationals, by contrast, have let Crews stay in the fire despite his prolonged struggles.
The comparison to Holliday isn’t perfect — Holliday is 20, Crews is 23 — but the logic holds. Sometimes a young star needs a lower-pressure environment to make critical adjustments. Crews never dominated Triple-A (.792 OPS in 2024), and there’s no shame in letting him breathe.
As Sam Sallick of SB Nation wrote last month, “Right now Dylan Crews does not look like the world beater we saw at LSU. He looks much tighter and tense at the plate. Pitchers are way ahead of Crews right now.”
The Risk of Letting It Spiral
The longer this continues, the greater the risk that Crews’ confidence erodes beyond repair. Baseball history is full of elite prospects who never recovered from early struggles. That’s not a fate the Nationals can afford — not with a player they expect to be a franchise cornerstone.
Crews remains an outstanding athlete and defender, with elite speed and strong makeup. His power hasn’t vanished — he’s still hit five homers — and the raw talent is still there. But the gap between tools and production has never been wider.
A Reset Is the Right Move
Sending Dylan Crews back to Triple-A isn’t a sign of failure. It’s an investment in his future. Let him work through his swing in a lower-pressure environment, rebuild his confidence, and return to D.C. ready to stay for good.
Because right now, he’s not developing — he’s drowning. And the longer the Nationals wait, the harder it will be to pull him out.
Nationals Top Rookie Looks Lost at the Plate — It Might Be Time for a Reset