Fresh off naming three people 35 years old or younger to significant positions within the organization, the Washington Nationals continue an offseason trend of hiring young. This time, the club is set to name 31-year-old Ani Kilambi as its general manager, a league source told The Athletic’s Matt Gelb on Wednesday.
Phillies are losing assistant GM Ani Kilambi to Washington Nationals, who are hiring him as GM, as @JeffPassan reported. Kilambi oversaw club’s R&D department. He’ll be one of the youngest GMs in baseball.
— Matt Gelb (@MattGelb) December 17, 2025
Kilambi, who previously served as the Philadelphia Phillies’ assistant GM, began his career as an intern with the Tampa Bay Rays in 2015. A graduate from UC Berkeley, Kilambi spent multiple years in Tampa Bay’s R&D department before joining the Phillies in 2021 as a 27-year-old.
The Nationals, who finished the season with a 66-96 record, the third-worst mark in baseball, fired president of baseball operations Mike Rizzo and manager Dave Martinez before the All-Star break. At the time, the Nationals (37-53) were just days away from selecting the No. 1 pick in the draft, which they eventually used to select shortstop Eli Willits.
By late September, the club had hired 35-year-old Paul Toboni, an assistant GM for the Boston Red Sox, to be its top decision maker. A month later, Blake Butera was tabbed to be Washington’s manager, making the 33-year-old the youngest MLB manager in over 50 years. The youth movement didn’t stop there, as Simon Mathews, a 30-year-old former assistant pitching coach with the Cincinnati Reds, was hired to be the organization’s pitching coach.
The oldest member so far of the new-look Nationals? Bench coach Michael Johns, who is 50, but carries nearly 20 years of professional coaching experience.
