The Nationals are rebuilding their infield in real time, and Seaver King keeps making it harder to wait
With CJ Abrams shifting to second base and No. 4 prospect Seaver King homering in four straight games at Triple-A Rochester, Washington's front office is trying to manage a rebuild it may no longer fully control. Here's what's happening - and why it matters for the next few years.
In brief
The Nationals are rebuilding their infield in real time, and Seaver King keeps making it harder to wait
The Washington Nationals didn't announce a trade or sign a name-brand free agent this week. What they did was arguably more consequential: they began physically rearranging where their best young players stand on a baseball field, and one of those players responded by hitting a home run for the fourth straight game.
The sequence started on August 14, when manager Blake Butera told reporters - including ESPN and MLB.com - that All-Star shortstop CJ Abrams is moving to second base, vacating the only position he has played during his five seasons with the club. Butera said Abrams has begun working out at second, and that the transition will be more "multiday than multiweek," with Abrams swapping spots with second baseman Nasim Nuñez.
The numbers behind the decision are stark. Abrams carries a -13 run value and a league-low -17 Outs Above Average, and his 19 errors are the most among all players. He leads the majors in errors - just three shy of his career high from 2023 and 2025. Nuñez, meanwhile, is the guy going the other direction. He has nine errors and a .965 fielding percentage at second base, and leads the majors in range factor at the position.
Butera put it plainly to reporters. "Just thought this was the best thing for our team going forward," he said. "We think with those two up the middle and Nasim playing more shortstop gives us the best chance."
Abrams didn't hide what it cost him to accept the move. "That's just where I've been playing my whole life, and I believe I can be a great shortstop," he said when asked about his long-term positional future. He went along with it anyway. The Nationals made this change in mid-August instead of next season, specifically to get in-game reps and feedback to carry into the offseason.
The deeper story, though, is what the move signals about who's coming. The Nationals used first-round picks on shortstops Seaver King and Eli Willits in 2024 and 2025. Willits, selected first overall in 2025, is Washington's No. 1 prospect per MLB.com, while King ranks fourth. You can't have three shortstops at the big-league level. Something had to give, and Abrams - already a two-time All-Star and under club control through 2028 - was the one with the bat to justify a positional change rather than a trade.
King won't stop hitting
Enter Seaver King. On August 20, MLB.com reported that the 2024 first-round pick made his professional debut at third base for Triple-A Rochester. He did not go quietly. The 23-year-old homered for the sixth time in the past 10 games, slashing .375/.467/.719 in 16 contests since returning from a left oblique strain on July 30, and tallied three hits, a walk, two runs and three RBIs to help the Red Wings to a 7-2 win over Omaha. By August 22, MLB.com's prospect page confirmed King had homered in four consecutive games.
He came into this stretch already dangerous on paper. Earlier this summer, before the oblique strain sidelined him in early July, King was slashing .333/.416/.565 with seven home runs, 12 doubles, four triples and 38 RBIs through 45 games at Triple-A.
The third base reps are part of a concurrent position switch at the minor league level. King had played third base in 36 games in 2024 with Wake Forest while starring in the ACC, but since entering Washington's organization he has played 213 games at shortstop and 12 at second base. Now the Nationals are quietly adding third base to his repertoire, apparently banking on his athleticism to handle multiple spots as they figure out how to fit him, Abrams, and Nuñez into the same roster.
That calculus gets complicated by one fact: King keeps making the decision for them. One of the biggest storylines down the final stretch of the 2026 season for Washington is whether they are going to call him up, with the Nationals reportedly "reluctant" to promote the star prospect, preferring he get more reps with Triple-A Rochester given he has played less than 50 games at that level. Rosters expand on September 1, when MLB goes to 28 men, which gives Washington a natural on-ramp to promote King without immediately inserting him into a full-time role.
The front office's reasoning, per The Athletic's Spencer Nusbaum via Yahoo Sports, is about development rhythm, not doubt. The organization believes staying in Rochester is best for his long-term development so he can reach his lofty projected ceiling as a former No. 10 overall draft pick. But King is making it hard for the Nationals to keep him on the farm.
What it all adds up to
The Nationals are doing something they haven't managed cleanly in years: running a live rebuild without blowing up what's already working. Abrams, for all his defensive liabilities, is part of a plan to reconstruct the Major League infield around a younger core rather than away from it. He is slated for free agency after 2028, meaning the Nats still have him for the rest of this season and two further campaigns. That's enough time to see whether second base is genuinely his long-term home or just a bridge.
As for King, he improved his chase rate significantly this season, getting it down from around 40% in Double-A last season to 28% at the start of his Triple-A stint. The power surge since his return from injury adds another dimension to a player who was a major question mark just twelve months ago. He had massive struggles during the 2025 campaign before tearing it up in the Arizona Fall League and carrying that momentum into this season.
The Nationals will not win the NL East this year. Nobody is confusing this for a pennant race. But between Abrams sliding over, Nuñez anchoring short, and King homering every day in Rochester, the infield picture for 2027 and 2028 is coming into focus faster than anyone anticipated - and King's home run on August 21 at third base was his first professional rep at the position in affiliated ball.
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CAN I KICK IT? screens New Jack City at the Sylvan Theater, Washington Monument, on Aug. 22. (Courtesy SHAOLIN JAZZ)
The live-cinema series CAN I KICK IT? returns to the National Mall this month with what its producers are calling the "Gangsters on the Mall" chapter of their free outdoor summer run. On Saturday, August 22, the SHAOLIN JAZZ production brings the 1991 crime classic New Jack City to the Sylvan Theater at the Washington Monument for a night of film, music, and community under the DC summer sky.
What sets the event apart is the sound. As the film plays, DJ 2-Tone Jones builds an original score in real time, reimagining one of the most iconic crime movies of the ’90s through hip-hop, soul, funk, and more. It is less a movie screening than a live performance built around the film.
The details:
Film: New Jack City (1991), with a live soundtrack by DJ 2-Tone Jones
When: Saturday, August 22 — seating opens at 7:30 p.m. (bring lawn chairs and blankets); film begins at 8:30 p.m.
Where: Sylvan Theater at the Washington Monument, Independence Ave SW & 15th St NW
A parking note from the organizers: expect road closures and restricted parking east of 14th Street NW due to a separate race event in the District. Roads west of 14th Street NW will be accessible and available for parking.
New Jack City is the second of three screenings in this year’s free CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series, which opened with Black Panther at Skyland Town Center and concludes with Scarface at the Lincoln Memorial on September 5. Produced by the Washington, DC-based multimedia arts company SHAOLIN JAZZ, the series has presented more than 150 live cinematic experiences at venues across the country, from Lincoln Center to SXSW.
"I wanted to be able to tell good stories with substance and remove the ‘ego’ out of the art," said Andrew Huang during a recent interview. Now, he’s building his career at the intersection of discipline, creativity and innovation.
Andrew Huang, founder of New Place Studios. (Courtesy photo)
As a Chinese American, Huang was reared with a deep respect for hard work, consistency and excellence. He describes his childhood as "not so affluent" and later attended college to hone his passion for videography. "In college I tried to do something I loved, which was video, but along the way I knew that I had to find a job. And so I thought, ‘what was the low hanging fruit to get to that stable 9 to 5 job?,’" he stated.
Later in life, Huang found himself working for corporations where his creativity was often limited, eventually leading to burnout. "I worked in a corporation for a long time and there were a lot of missing pieces. I wanted to fill in gaps missing in corporate video production," said Huang.
He later described how his upbringing and a mindset of "survival" led him toward a corporate career. However, his desire for balance and authentic storytelling ultimately pushed him to take the entrepreneurial leap.
"I founded a new place where you can create video and film with ‘substance and style,’" said Huang. His desire for work-life balance and passion for storytelling naturally evolved into a small business based in Virginia. With the launch of New Place Studios, the entrepreneur quickly found himself reconnecting with the values that would become the foundation of everything he creates behind the camera.
Huang said being a business owner has allowed him to first embrace himself. While others may see video as simply capturing moments, he sees it as a way to preserve stories that inspire, connect and leave a lasting imprint.
By combining cinematic visuals with cutting-edge production techniques and a keen understanding of branding, Huang helps organizations and individuals communicate their vision with purpose. He said understanding a client’s "why" serves as the compass for delivering the services they need.
One benefit of working with a small business, he said, is that clients get to see the production process unfold through a micro lens while working with the same faces throughout the entire project. "The work feels personal," said Huang.
Huang does not regret leaving behind the flash-over-substance mentality and corporate hustle culture. That does not mean the Asian American entrepreneur has been without challenges in the industry. "It’s relatively hard to find other Asian American creatives or people who would want to work with me in the DMV," said Huang.
He identifies the industry culture in which everyone is trying to blend in, creatives may fear displaying their Asian identity and some feel pressure to adopt an American corporate persona. He also points to what he describes as a level of gatekeeping within the industry. According to the U.S. Small Business Administration’s 2024 statistics, Asian American and Pacific Islander entrepreneurs own more than 3 million businesses and employ 5.2 million people in the United States.
After tapping into organizations such as SCORE, which offers free small business mentorship, New Place Studios has become a trusted creative partner throughout the DMV (Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia). The company produces a range of creative services, including commercials, corporate branding, documentaries, film, 2D animation, motion graphics and photography.
For Huang, entrepreneurship has become more than a departure from corporate life. It has given him the freedom to create with intention, build meaningful connections and tell stories that go beyond the surface.
The 2026 CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series. Poster courtesy of SHAOLIN JAZZ.
For three Saturdays this summer, some of Washington’s most familiar public spaces will do something they rarely do after dark: fill up with blankets, lawn chairs, and the sound of a movie being scored live, in real time. CAN I KICK IT?, the traveling “live cinema” series produced by the DC-based multimedia arts company SHAOLIN JAZZ, is bringing a free outdoor run to the city — pairing three era-defining films with an original soundtrack performed on the spot by DJ 2-Tone Jones.
The premise is what sets it apart from a normal screening in the park. Rather than simply pressing play, 2-Tone Jones builds a score as the film unfolds, pulling from hip-hop, soul, funk, jazz, rock, electronic music, and sounds from around the world. The result, the organizers say, is less a movie night than a one-time performance — the same film you know, wired to a soundtrack you have never heard and will not hear again. Guest DJs warm up the crowd starting at 7:30 PM before each 8:30 PM screening.
The 2026 outdoor schedule
All three events are free and open to the public.
Saturday, August 8 — Black Panther at Skyland Town Center. A pop-up marketplace and community activities kick off the evening; guest DJs at 7:30 PM, film at 8:30 PM. Marvel’s superhero epic gets a one-night-only live score in Southeast DC.
Saturday, August 22 — New Jack City at the Sylvan Theater, Washington Monument. Seating begins at 7:30 PM; the film starts at 8:30 PM. The 1991 crime drama plays out at the foot of one of the country’s most recognizable landmarks.
Saturday, September 5 — Scarface at the Lincoln Memorial. Seating at 7:30 PM; film at 8:30 PM. The series closes with Brian De Palma’s crime saga against the backdrop of the Memorial, scored live from start to finish.
First up: Black Panther at Skyland Town Center on August 8. Poster courtesy of SHAOLIN JAZZ.
A DC company with a national footprint
SHAOLIN JAZZ describes itself as a Washington-based arts company working at the intersection of music, film, art, and culture, and CAN I KICK IT? is its signature production. According to the organizers, the series has staged more than 150 live cinematic experiences around the country — at performing arts centers, museums, festivals, and cultural institutions including Lincoln Center in New York, SXSW, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, Republic Square in Austin, the Tacoma Armory, and The Cary Theater.
“CAN I KICK IT? has always been about creating a shared experience,” said Gerald Watson, co-founder of SHAOLIN JAZZ. “When you combine iconic films with live music in public spaces, something special happens. People aren’t just watching a movie — they’re experiencing it together. That’s what makes these nights so memorable.”
Cinema as a community event
The DC run lands as cities across the country look for new ways to activate public space through arts and culture — and this series is a straightforward pitch for how to do it: take a landmark everyone already knows, add a film everyone has an opinion about, and let a live soundtrack turn the evening into something neighbors experience shoulder to shoulder. Families, film buffs, and music fans are all invited, and admission won’t cost a thing.
The CAN I KICK IT? outdoor series runs August 8, August 22, and September 5. All events are free; check SHAOLIN JAZZ (shaolinjazz.com) for the latest details and any weather updates before heading out.
