Guardians-Nationals Lane Thomas trade comes full circle after Cleveland’s waiver claim

On Aug. 5, 2023, José Tena made his big league debut for the Cleveland Guardians, though it took a second for everyone to realize it. About 15 minutes before Tena ran on to a big league diamond for the first time in his career, José Ramírez knocked Tim Anderson on his wallet, which kicked off a wild benches clearing crawl that resulted in multiple players being ejected — Ramírez being one of them. 

Enter Tena, who ran out to second base to take Ramírez’s spot for the first big league action of his career. For a while it looked like that action was going to be the highlight of Tena’s time with the Guardians since they traded him to the Nationals in 2024 as a part of their return for Lane Thomas. 

That may not be the case anymore, as the Guardians acquired Tena on waivers today after he had been designated for assignment by the Nationals earlier this week. 

Tena’s not the most exciting player in the big leagues, but he’s a solid infield depth option who has yet to hit arbitration.

The Guardians reunited with José Tena via waivers

Tena played in a career-high 114 games with the Nationals last season and posted a slashline of .222/.302/.370 with seven home runs and 27 RBI. He recorded 58 appearances at designated hitter (which ended up leading the Nationals), but he also spent some time at second base, third base, shortstop and the corner outfield spots. 

Tena hit .200 in the 21 games he played with the Guardians prior to getting traded to Washington. 

That kind of performance has been the story of Tena’s career so far. He’s been good enough to stick on the Nationals’ big league roster, but he never did enough to truly announce himself as an everyday player. 

Whether he’s going to get that with the Guardians is a different story. They’re going to have to add him to their 40-man roster since they claimed him on waivers, but it remains to be seen if he’s going to stay there all offseason. There have been plenty of players who have had brief, offseason stays on a team’s big league roster. 

But the one thing going for Tena is that he’s largely known for his bay, which gives him a clear advantage over previous Guardians bench options like Daniel Schneemann and David Fry. 

This could also be the first move in a potential Guardians restructuring since they already have an infield logjam consisting of Bryan Rocchio, Travis Bazzana and Angel Genao. Their claim of Tena doesn’t automatically mean they’re going to trade someone from that picture, but it does give them a bit of insurance should they choose to do so. 

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