As the Nationals prepared to make their first ever World Series appearance in 2019, Mark Lerner said he “couldn’t imagine” the turnaround that the team had brought to fruition after famously starting the season 19-31.

Five years later, it’s Nationals fans who are struggling to see how the team can climb out of a rut, with the Lerner family at the center of the angst.

A potential light loomed at the end of the tunnel, with the team up for sale and a TV rights resolution potentially on the horizon. But much of that optimism came to a screeching halt on Monday, as Lerner announced that his family has decided to retain ownership of the club for the foreseeable future.

For better or worse, the Nationals have a stable ownership situation for the first time since early 2022. The quality of that ownership group in the post-Ted Lerner era remains to be seen (and is off to a rather terrible start), but Monday’s news allows

Mike Rizzo and Davey Martinez have both done things to create genuine questions about their job security over the last few years. But with a sale pending, there was no real chance the team was ever moving on from either apart from some sort of scandal or misconduct.

The reason for that is simple: truly upgrading were slim to none. No promising candidate for either position was ever going to take the gig knowing a new owner could come in tomorrow and clear house to pick their own personnel. While fans will quip that “it would be hard to do worse,” the reality is any candidate worth their salt would have foregone the Nationals vacancies so long as the team had pending new ownership looming in the background.

With Mark Lerner now seemingly entrenched as the team’s principal owner for the long haul, the Nationals can actually evaluate whether Rizzo and Martinez are the men to actually helm the ship in their respective roles. Both men signed extensions with the club late last season, with Martinez’s new deal running through 2025 and Rizzo inking a multiyear contract with exact terms unknown. While Rizzo is likely in place for at least the next few seasons, Martinez’s two-year pact was hardly the kind of long-term commitment that signals he’s been handed the reigns to the next competitive Nationals club.

Now that it’s clear who’s calling the shots from the ownership chair, a real evaluation of the men helming both major facets of the organization can actually begin.

The Nationals are set to enter 2024 with a payroll of $112-million, as well as another $18-million in salary deferrals. (Did you know that Rafael Soriano’s due money in 2024? Well now you do.)

$25-million of that is going to Patrick Corbin, who is off the books at season’s end. Another $14.6-million will come off the books between Trevor Williams, Joey Gallo, and Victor Robles’s respective deals coming to an end, leaving the Nationals with $39.6-million coming off the books discounting any raises from salary arbitration.

So even if the team is going to run the same payroll in 2025 as it does this year, there will some room to work with - at least $25-30 million. That will be the ultimate test of if the Lerner ownership group is truly just waiting for the rebuild to move along before investing in the roster or if the lack of spending the last several years has just become the new normal.

Maybe the fan dreams of a Corbin Burnes + Juan Soto free agency haul don’t come to fruition, but another offseason without real substance would send a loud and clear message that any claims the front office has spending resources have been nothing but false promises. Even a collection of moves that looked something like Christian Walker, Brandon Lowe, John Means, and a bullpen arm would be at least show some signs of life. 

It’s clear the Nationals were looking to avoid putting any additional long-term financial obligations on the books while the team was still up for sale. With that process now over, it’s time to begin pursuing long-term deals with players like CJ Abrams, MacKenzie Gore, and even Dylan Crews or James Wood.

Mike Rizzo should also be free to explore moves for extendable young pieces similar to what the Nationals did when they acquired Gio Gonzalez in 2011.

Again, this is contingent on the team showing signs of life financially. But if the pending sale was truly to blame for the financial inactivity, the team has no excuse not to explore different avenues for securing talent for the long-term.