Nationals finalizing hire of 33-year-old Blake Butera as manager, AP source says

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The Washington Nationals are finalizing a deal to hire 33-year-old Blake Butera as manager, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.

The person spoke to The Associated Press on Thursday on condition of anonymity because nothing had been announced. The Nationals fired Dave Martinez in July, and Miguel Cairo took over on an interim basis.

Butera would be the youngest manager since Minnesota's Frank Quilici in 1972, according to ESPN, which first reported Butera’s hiring.

Washington has had six straight losing seasons since Martinez managed them to the 2019 World Series title. The Nationals went 66-96 this year.

Washington also fired president and general manager Mike Rizzo in July. Paul Toboni is the team's new president of baseball operations.

Butera was a senior director of player development in the Tampa Bay organization. He played two seasons in the Rays’ minor league system after being drafted in the 35th round out of Boston College in 2015. It did not take him long to go into managing.

He was a bench coach for short-season Hudson Valley in 2017, then was promoted to manager the following year, becoming the youngest skipper in minor league baseball at 25. He managed Hudson Valley for two seasons and Class A Charleston (2021-22) for two more.

Butera’s player development background may be even more intriguing for the Nationals, who broke up their championship core by trading Juan Soto, Trea Turner and Max Scherzer and have tried to rebuild around players like 23-year-old slugger James Wood. It’s been slow going.

Toboni is just a couple years older than Butera, and now the Nationals move forward with those two leading the way after an extended stretch under Rizzo and Martinez. They'll certainly hope this new pairing can bring them to similar heights.

Washington has not spent much recently, and after a couple years attempting to sell the team, Mark Lerner and his family decided not to. But the young core still has potential. Wood hit 31 home runs this year in his first full season. The Nats also took shortstop Eli Willits with the No. 1 pick in last year's draft.

Atlanta, San Diego and Colorado remain uncertain about their managerial spots heading into the offseason. Texas hired Skip Schumaker, Baltimore went with Craig Albernaz, San Francisco pulled Tony Vitello from the college ranks, the Angels picked Kurt Suzuki and Minnesota announced Thursday it had chosen Derek Shelton.

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AP National Writer Howard Fendrich contributed to this report.

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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb