Ryan Zimmerman

It’s a question you might face on draft day. Do I draft an up-and-coming player entering his prime or an aging superstar who in previous years was a no-brainer to be drafted first? In this year’s draft, Ryan Zimmerman is that up and coming player while Alex Rodriguez is the aging superstar. So which one would you rather have?

Chien-Mang Wang is a National again this year.  To many it may be surprising that he even was a National last year considering he never pitched an inning.  Wang must have made strides rehabbing last year though because he was offered and accepted a $1 million contract (with $5 million in incentives) from the Nationals.  

The 2005 MLB Draft has brought in some of the youngest and greatest hitters of todays game. Not only hitters, but pitchers too.

The 2005 Draft has created a pool of young, power hitting, power pitching athletes that are some of the best in todays game.

Here is a look at some of these athletes that clubs took a chance on, and came into the bigs surprising everyone.

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With two outs in the 9th inning, the Phillies' Jimmy Rollins homered to tie Houston at 2-2.

With two outs in the 16th inning, and two men on, Ryan Howard should have been in a position to win the game 5-4.

But Howard had long hit the showers.

Why?

He was tossed from the game several innings earlier by third base umpire Scott Barry, a minor league replacement ump.

Howard's crime?

The race for Most Valuable Player in the AL looks to be dominated by Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton. But what about in the NL?

The non-waiver trade deadline has passed and the Washington Nationals have continued to accumulate critical pieces to their future championship puzzle.

There was no purge of all veteran players for prospects, but there were deft moves to acquire highly thought of prospects, including Wilson Ramos, and create major league openings for young talent already in their system.

Evan Longoria was drafted by the Tampa Bay Rays with the 3rd pick of the 2006 amateur player draft out of Cal-State Long Beach. Rays fans knew as soon as they heard about this kid that he was going to be great.

After spending two years in the minor leagues, Longoria hit a combined .301/.386/.534 with 44 home runs and 144 RBI, all before his 22nd birthday.

Knowing what they had on their hands, with a team that they felt confident with, Andrew Friedman knew that he had to call up Longoria if the team was going to contend.

The hot corner was once the place of royalty in Major League Baseball.  Some of the greatest players to ever play the game manned third base, including the great Mike Schmidt, Eddie Matthews, George Brett, and Brooks Robinson.

Ever since the Washington Nationals settled in the nation's capitol in 2005, the franchise has consistently been the laughing stock of the National League East, and at times even the entire Major Leagues.

After a quick start in 2005 that placed the Nationals first in the NL East at the halfway mark, their downward spiral began, and so did their constant struggles.

The team has never finished higher than fourth in the division and has only won more than 80 games once.

Wednesday was a very good day for the Washington Nationals.

Ryan Zimmerman, who former general manager Jim Bowden described as a “future Gold Glove winner” when he drafted him 4th overall in 2005, won his first Gold Glove award earlier this afternoon.

A few hours later, Jim Riggleman, who single-handedly skippered the Nationals away from the horror of becoming the latter-day ’62 Mets, was named the team’s permanent manager.