WASHINGTON — Two weeks ago, two Triple-A hitting coaches brought Dylan Crews into their office and gave him two tasks that would have seemed inconceivable just five weeks before. They asked him to cut his chase rate to under 25 percent. Then they asked him to make more outs in the air than he did on the ground.The version of Crews who was demoted to Triple A before Opening Day, candidly, was not ready to hit those goals in early April.“In this last week,” Triple-A Rochester hitting coach Travis Fitta said in a phone interview with The Athletic on Tuesday, “he smashed those goals.”Now, the 24-year-old is a National again, recalled ahead of Tuesday afternoon’s game against the New York Mets. He hit .291 with a .527 slugging percentage with Rochester in May, lifting the ball with more authority and, especially over the last week, chasing less.“It’s a great feeling being back here,” Crews said Tuesday. “Makes you realize it’s very special being here.”At the end of last season, a front office that did not draft him with the No. 2 pick in the 2023 MLB Draft evaluated Crews with fresh eyes. They saw a franchise player, but one who had been rushed through the minor leagues. They saw a player who dealt with an oblique injury last season and had a .634 OPS since he made his MLB debut at the end of 2024.This spring, they saw a player who went 3-for-29 with no extra-base hits. At the start of the season, the team chose to go with Joey Wiemer, who was optioned alongside third baseman Brady House on Tuesday in corresponding moves.Those in the organization who spoke with The Athletic over the phone and in media scrums Tuesday spoke of two important psychological traits, and two important offensive characteristics. At the plate, they talked about Crews’ ability to get the ball in the air and make smarter swing decisions. Mentally?“There was a confidence and a belief in the work he’s put in,” farm director Devin Pearson said Tuesday over the phone. “And the maturity to realize he’s still young and has a lot of success ahead of him, and this is just part of the journey.”This past week, Crews crushed the goals the Red Wings’ hitting staff gave him at the start of May. (Mike Janes / Four Seam Images via Associated Press)There is also the uncomfortable financial aspect. Crews entered the season with service time of one year and 35 days. Had he been up for the entirety of this season, Crews would have reached two years of service time and become a free agent in 2030 at 28 years old.Now, however, there are just 131 days left in the season, so Crews will end up with 1.166 years of service time if he stays with the big league club the rest of the season. It will leave him about a week short of reaching two years. He will now hit free agency at 29.“That (had) nothing to do with it,” Nationals president of baseball operations Paul Toboni said Tuesday, when asked about Crews’ service time. “(If) we had an injury two weeks ago, and he was playing his tail off, he would have been up two weeks ago. We always say, ‘you should do right by the player, and more importantly, do right by the team,’ and we want to win games up here.”