The Juan Soto trade sweepstakes have now officially kicked off. Following some scuttlebutt earlier in the season, the Washington Nationals are now definitely looking to trade Soto after the superstar outfielder declined a historic, $440 million contract extension.

There's never a good time for a report about a star player denying a contract and ultimately setting the clock for a trade. For the Nationals, though, the timing of the Juan Soto report was extra bad. On the same day of the news dropping, the Nationals have a bobblehead night scheduled for Soto.

Washington's Star Wars promotional night and punny bobblehead for Soto are now tainted with the realization that his days in DC are almost up. Losing to the division-rival Atlanta Braves would sting much worse.

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The 23-year-old Juan Soto is one of the greatest on-base machines in the game of baseball. He has a majors-leading 79 bases on balls in 89 games this season to go along with 75 hits, 19 home runs, 17 doubles and an OPS of .895, which is currently a career low for him. However, his OPS+ of 160 is the third-best mark of his five-year career.

Soto helped the Nationals win a title in his second season alongside stars like Max Scherzer, Trea Turner, Anthony Rendon, Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin. The first three names are all on new teams and the latter two are nowhere near the best versions of themselves.

The only good news for the Nationals is that they will receive a massive haul in return for Soto. Their rebuild should be kicked into high gear after trading him and other players like Josh Bell and Nelson Cruz.