The Yankees and Nationals have engaged in trade conversations regarding LHP MacKenzie Gore according to Andrew Golden of The Washington Times.
Whether these two sides come together on a deal or not remains to be seen; the Nationals do not feel overly pressured to deal the young left-hander away and could hold onto him for now.
For the Yankees, their interest in pitchers such as Tatsuya Imai could keep them from being only focused on adding the Nationals’ young ace, but they are intrigued by the idea of having a young cheap starter with upside.
As these two teams eye each other down in a potential deal, here’s what I’d consider a fair mock deal for both parties.
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Potential Swap Has Yankees Landing Big Piece In MacKenzie Gore For Rotation
MacKenzie Gore has been more of a league-average starter if you look at his results, as over the past two seasons he has a 101 ERA+ which means he was only 1% better than the average pitcher at run prevention.
That being said, teams such as the San Francisco Giants have shown interest in his services due to the unique upside he has as a hard-throwing left-hander that spent most his career with a poor organization.
Under Mike Rizzo, who was fired midseason, Gore had developed under arguably the worst pitching development group in the league outside of the Rockies.
Washington has struggled to develop pitching over the last few years, and its why the Yankees are a team showing interest in his services.
Brittany Ghiroli of The Athletic reports that the Nationals would want controllable MLB talent, which is why Brian Cashman could pull off a deal for the left-hander.
In this deal I’d have the Yankees trading RHP Will Warren, OF Jasson Dominguez, and OF Dillon Lewis, giving the Nationals two players with five years of control for their MLB roster and a top-10 prospect in the organization.
This deal would give Washington a good chunk of value for their Major League team and allow their player development to flex their muscle with Warren specifically, who drew plenty of interest from teams last winter.
As for Dominguez, the Yankees have included him in trade conversations with teams for high profile players such as Jhoan Duran, paired with Warren and a solid outfield prospect like Dillon Lewis he could push a deal across.
Lewis is a rising prospect inside the Yankees’ organization who played the Nationals’ High-A affiliate plenty across the 2025 season, with his power and speed giving him a shot to become a top-100 prospect if his 2026 season is strong.
This deal gives the Nationals a nice blend of MLB-ready talent and a good prospect, but time will tell whether something of this nature could go through at the Winter Meetings.
Gore projects for a 2.9 WAR and 3.76 ERA in 2026, and while he’s never produced that strong of an ERA, projections believe in the inmproved K-BB% we saw this past season.
I think adding a sinker wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for Gore, the Yankees added one for Carlos Rodon and finetuned the one that Max Fried throws.
Furthermore, we could see an increase in non-fastball usage to try and keep him unpredictable, which could help his heater perform better than it did in 2025.
All-in-all, this feels like a fair trade for the Yankees and Nationals, but that depends on how these two teams evaluate these players among other things.