Former Guardians reliever signs minor league deal with Nationals after injury odyssey

On Thursday, former Guardians pitcher Alex Young signed a minor league deal with the Washington Nationals. 

You’re also forgiven if you forgot that Young ever pitched for the Guardians. 

Young appeared in 10 games with Cleveland at the end of the 2021 season while the Guardians were playing out the string before getting a single out in his lone appearance with the team in 2022. 

He’s bounced around baseball in the time since and ended up missing all of the 2025 season due to elbow injury that he said was due to a distal tear in his left elbow. 

But it seems like he’s healthy and ready to work toward getting back to the bigs thanks that minor league contract. 

The Nationals assigned Young to their rookie affiliate in the Florida Complex League, but that seems like a temporary stop for him. 

Alex Young signs deal with the Nationals after missing all of last season

Young earned his first big league call-up in 2019 with the Diamondbacks, and he ended up posting a 3.56 ERA in 83 1/3 innings while working almost exclusively as a starter. 

He had a 5.44 ERA in the truncated 2020 season and had a 6.26 ERA through his first 30 appearances with the D-backs in 2021 before being designated for assignment. 

The Guardians scooped him up off waivers before recalling him at the beginning of August, where he mostly worked in a swingman role. 

They DFA’d him after the season, but he re-upped on a minor league contract after the season, which set up his lone appearance with the Guardians in 2022. 

The Guardians ended up trading him to the Giants after designating him for assignment after that appearance, which set up one of the more successful stints in his career. 

Young posted a 3.29 ERA in 95 2/3 innings after leaving the Guardians across stints with the Giants, Reds and Mets. 

Most of that action came in 2023 when he tossed 53 2/3 innings with the Reds while also picking up the first save of his career. 

But he didn’t pitch at all last season due to that distal tear, which he mentioned in a since-deleted Instagram post. 

It makes sense that it took him some time to recover from that injury since it involved an invasive surgery, but all that waiting could end up being worth it since he found a great landing spot in the Nationals. 

Washington entered play on Friday with a bullpen ERA of 4.81, which is one of the worst marks in MLB. 

Even though they’re coming out of a rebuild, their bullpen is still clearly a work in progress, so there’s clearly space for him if he’s able to show that he’s healthy in the minors.

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