20 days until Opening Day …
You don’t want to totally change your opinion about players based on what happens in Spring Training, but you also don’t want to just stick your head in the sand and avoid all new information. The whole point of these Friday newsletters is to try to differentiate between the noise of Spring Training and the stuff that might actually matter, after all. And one specific performance on Thursday does have me reconsidering my opinion on one specific player: Shane McClanahan.
McClanahan is coming back from Tommy John surgery, and I just couldn’t bring myself to rank him as much more than just a mid-round upside flier sight unseen. I’ve been ranking him behind his ADP (124.5) since I first put my rankings together, but after watching his start against the Phillies Thursday, I’m rethinking that.
Because he looked really good.
The four strikeouts and one walk over 2.2 innings tell some of the story, of course, but results really aren’t what we care about in the spring. We care about the process, and McClanahan more or less passed with flying colors there, too.
He averaged 96.2 mph with his fastball, and his velocity got a little better as the outing went on, too – he averaged 95.7 mph in the first inning, but had that up to 96.7 in the second and third innings. And the other physical characteristics of the pitch mostly looked to be in line with where he was prior to the injury, too.
And it wasn’t just the fastball. His changeup looked sharp, generating four whiffs on seven swings, including several ugly chases. He added three more whiffs on his slider, with the curveball being the only pitch he didn’t get any whiffs on over six attempts. Overall, he finished with 11 swinging strikes on 24 swings, a pretty monstrous mark.
It all just, mostly, looked like the same old Shane McClanahan. And while McClanahan has only given us one season of true ace-level production in 2022, he was a must-start pitcher in each of his other two seasons, and he sure looked like that guy on Thursday.
There will be worse days to come, of course. Days where he just doesn’t have it and he gets crushed – and I think those days will probably be a bit more common with the Rays no longer playing their home games in the pitcher’s haven of Tropicana Field. And I still have my concerns about how much value McClanahan is likely to provide over the course of the full season since the Rays will have to find ways to limit his innings at various points after he didn’t throw a single inning in 2024.
But at the very least, I’m not actively avoiding McClanahan now. There will probably be other people in my drafts who are more excited about him, so I can’t say I’m especially likely to end up with him on any of my teams in 2025. But I’m not opposed to it. For one start, that’s a pretty big shift.
In the rest of today’s newsletter, we’re going to go through a handful of other storylines from the past week of Spring Training to try to figure out what is real and what isn’t, starting with an update from one of yesterday’s injury situations.
Before we get to that, though, I do want to highlight something for those of you getting ready to draft this weekend: Our Draft Prep walkthrough. This link has everything you need from Scott White, Frank Stampfl, and myself to draft the best team possible. And keep this one bookmarked: We’ll be updating it plenty between now and Opening Day.
Spring Training Believe It or Not
Believe It or Not: It’s time to panic about Grayson Rodriguez
When he left Wednesday’s start early, Rodriguez said he wasn’t worried about it, so I decided to not be too worried about it. He said there was no injury to be concerned about, and his velocity being down was by design, as he focused on building up arm strength earlier in the spring.
So, that was a lie.
Rodriguez was diagnosed with triceps soreness Thursday and will be re-evaluated Friday. At this point, we don’t have any more details beyond that, so is that enough to justify a drop in the rankings?
Believe it.
I’ll go a step further: I’m going to remove Rodriguez from my Breakouts 2.0 column. My interest in Rodriguez was mostly speculative, to begin with – he has a solid floor of skills, and I was betting on a step forward through further tweaks of his pitch usage and general improvement in his overall skill set.
That may still happen. Maybe this injury is more or less a non-issue, they’ll clear him to throw as soon as this weekend, and we’ll barely remember this issue on the way to a Cy Young-caliber season. But it’s harder to make an affirmative bet on Rodriguez taking a step forward when he’s already dealing with an injury. I’ll move Rodriguez into the mid-round flier range of the draft until we get more details and just hope this doesn’t totally derail his season.
There’s still plenty of upside with Rodriguez, but you can say that about plenty of pitchers who aren’t currently injured.
Believe It or Not: Elly De La Cruz‘s new batting stance is going to lead to a big step forward
De La Cruz has all the tools in the world, and the next step in his development is finding the best ways to put those tools into action more consistently. To that end, De La Cruz has tweaked his batting stance a bit this offseason, standing taller at the plate and more open toward the pitcher, in an effort to keep his swing more controlled – and cut down on his league-leading strikeout total from 2024.
And it’s hard to argue with the results so far, as De La Cruz has three homers and just four strikeouts in his first 20 plate appearances this spring.
Don’t believe it.
I mean, sure, De La Cruz may take a step forward in his age-23 season. I can believe that. I just don’t have much faith that a new setup at the plate is suddenly going to cure everything that ails him – and that’s true for every guy who spent the offseason reworking their swing.
Sometimes, it works, of course – Mookie Betts turned himself into more of a power hitter in his 30s thanks to his work with DriveLine, to name just one example. But we also saw Anthony Volpe remake his swing to become arguably a worse hitter in his second season, while others like Ty France were even worse after an offseason spent reworking their swings. Unlike with pitchers, where we can get a look at a few data points and start to model what a new pitch or added velocity might mean, projecting improvement for hitters is much tougher.
It’s good to see De La Cruz dominating early in the spring, but he’s also doing exactly what should be expected of him against what has so far been essentially Triple-A-caliber opposition, per Baseball-Reference.com’s spring stats. It wouldn’t be especially worried if De La Cruz was 0 for 20 with 10 strikeouts, either, to be clear. It’s just way too small of a sample size to go on, and I’m certainly not going to change my opinion of De La Cruz based on a few anecdotes about his new swing and five games worth of PA against inconsistent competition.
Believe It or Not: Michael Soroka belongs on your late-round radar
Soroka made his second appearance of the spring Thursday and he continued to look absolutely terrific. Facing the Cardinals for the second time in six days, Soroka limited them to just one earned run while scattering six hits over four innings, with six strikeouts while getting his pitch count up to 61.
And he did it while continuing to throw even harder than he did out of the bullpen last season – he averaged 94.6 mph on Thursday, up 1.1 mph from his time with the White Sox, and he was up even more in his first appearance. He’s generated seven whiffs across 37 four-seamers and sinkers while adding three with his slider and one on four changeups. And Soroka has little doubt he can sustain this velocity increase as he pushes for six-inning outings.
“Yeah, absolutely. I think I knew I could,” he said after his first outing. “In relief last year, for the most part, I was still throwing multiple innings. And to be honest with you, the feeling of where the fastball got to at the end of inning three was really exciting because it feels like I can replicate it over and over again.
Believe it.
Look, the likeliest outcome is that Soroka doesn’t amount to much for Fantasy. He hasn’t thrown even 80 innings in an MLB season since 2019 when he posted a 2.68 ERA over 174.2 innings. Since then, he has suffered two separate ruptured Achilles tendon injuries, along with a forearm injury in 2023 and shoulder issues in each of the past two seasons. He’s trying to overcome a slew of injuries that, frankly, looked like they would totally derail his career.
But Soroka showed some real strikeout upside in a multi-inning relief role for the White Sox after transitioning to a four-seam/slider-heavy approach, and now that approach looks like it might be working even better. His four-seamer looks better than ever, and his sliders have a couple inches more break across both the horizontal and vertical planes, which could help it play up even more as a whiff pitch.
Soroka has belonged on the late-round radar in H2H points leagues all along, simply because he is a starting pitcher with relief eligibility – I’ll draft basically any SPaRP with a rotation spot, because even average production can be pretty valuable there. But I’m starting to move Soroka into the 300-ish range of the rankings even in my Roto leagues, just in case the flashes he’s showing this spring are real.
Again, I’d bet against him finishing as a top-50 pitcher this season, even if you gave me pretty good odds. But I would have bet against Reynaldo Lopez pulling that trick off this time last year too, so I’ll keep an open mind here. And I’m opening it even more with every mid-90s fastball he throws past hitters.
Believe It or Not: Sandy Alcantara isn’t going to be worth starting early in the season
We talked about Alcantara last week, and since then we received a report from Jeff Passan that indicates the Marlins plan to limit Alcantara’s innings early in the season. Given that Alcantara’s main appeal for Fantasy has historically been the sheer, overwhelming volume he provides when he’s on the mound, is it fair to say that he’s going to be an afterthought for Fantasy at the beginning of the season?
Don’t believe it.
I have no trouble believing the Marlins will look to limit Alcantara’s exposure early on – Alcantara has said as much himself. But what I don’t believe is the idea that we’re looking at an inverted Garrett Crochet situation, where the Marlins routinely limit him to four innings and skip starts in April and May to keep his innings in line.
That’s not to say there won’t be things that limit Alcantara’s value. He’ll be pitching for what I think is the worst team in baseball, which means wins are going to be tough to come by. And he’s never really been a high-strikeout pitcher, though I do think he’ll be better than his 19.8% strikeout rate in 2023 – and his new slider grip, which is leading to a bit more two-plane break with the pitch should help.
He probably won’t be a Fantasy ace early in the season, but I think he’ll have plenty of appeal. I don’t expect there to be many seven-plus inning starts early in the season, and there will probably be a few situations where he is pulled after five innings while cruising with 84 pitches, which will be frustrating. But I don’t expect to see many situations where he is pulled after four innings, and by the time May and June roll around, we should expect Alcantara to look more or less like himself. There’s only so long Miami can hold him back – and, of course, the potential for a trade looms as a big boost to his value.
Believe It or Not: Gunnar Henderson isn’t a first-rounder anymore
Henderson has been diagnosed with a mild intercostal strain, and while manager Brandon Hyde told reporters he is “very, very hopeful” Henderson will be ready for Opening Day, he stopped short of saying that’s the plan as of now. A first-rounder missing significant time in Spring Training, with a chance to miss Opening Day? Yeah, that’s tough to stomach.
Don’t believe it.
Intercostal strains cost hitters an average of 21 days, per BaseballProspectus.com’s Recovery Dashboard tool, which would put Henderson on track to return on March 21-23 if he follows that timetable. That would put him right on the cusp of being able to return in time for the end of spring games, the last of which is on the 23rd for the Orioles. It would be less than ideal for Henderson to return without getting back into a game, but it wouldn’t be unprecedented – if memory serves, Corey Seager made the Opening Day lineup last season without playing in a spring game ahead of time after recovering from an injury.
I did move Henderson down a few spots, but not out of the first round yet. And he really didn’t go for any kind of discount on our H2H points Salary Cap/Auction Thursday night, coming off the board with a $41 price, the 13th-highest price of the night. If you wanted to push him down below the likes of Corbin Carroll and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. I wouldn’t argue too much, but I’m not ready to go there yet.
Believe It or Not: A Kevin Gausman bounceback season is coming
Gausman managed to piece together a decent Fantasy season in 2024 despite clearly not having his best stuff. The veteran put up a 3.83 ERA over 181 innings despite opening the season with a shoulder injury that derailed his spring, and with his strikeout rate collapsing from 31.1% to 21.4%.
Well, so far this spring, Gausman’s velocity is back to 2023 levels, as he averaged 94.9 mph with his four-seamer in Wednesday’s spring start. That’s pretty close to where Gausman has been at his best, which sure feels like a good sign.
Believe it … mostly.
I’m not entirely convinced Gausman is back to being who he was prior to 2024, to be clear. The velocity is a good sign, but there’s a difference between doing it for a couple of innings and doing it for six innings 30-plus times. And the movement on Gausman’s splitter isn’t quite where it’s been in the past, either – he was getting a couple of inches less vertical break with it than he was last year when he was already getting a couple of inches less vertical break with it than in 2023.
And that’s no small thing, given how much Gausman relies on his splitter for whiffs. Without his best splitter, Gausman won’t be able to replicate his 2023 upside, so that’s certainly something we’ll want to keep an eye on over the next couple of weeks.
But I was pretty much completely out on Gausman coming into the spring, thinking the chances of an age-34 bounceback were pretty slim. Now? Well, it’s not the likeliest outcome, but I’ve moved Gausman from outside the top 200 in my rankings to closer to 150. I’ll have him on a few teams just in case he can get back to it.
Believe It or Not: Luis Gil isn’t worth drafting now
Gil has been diagnosed with a lat strain, and Yankees general manager Brian Cashman acknowledged Thursday he’s going to miss significant time.
“Being a starter, he’s got six weeks minimum of no throw and obviously it could be longer if it takes longer,” Cashman said. “They’ll reimage and re-MRI it and see where he’s at during that rest period. So, is it six, is it going to be seven weeks, is it eight weeks, whatever, and then we’ll get him going, and then he’s got to go through a flat-ground throwing program and obviously bullpens and then rehab games, so you’re talking three months.”
That feels like something close to a worst-case scenario for this injury, and Gil figures to now miss at least the first two months of the regular season if he avoids setbacks.
Believe it.
I mean, if you’re in a league with a bunch of IL spots to play with, he’s a fine stash. But if you only have three or fewer IL spots to work with, I think it’s going to be extremely hard to keep Gil around when the season starts. Remember, we’ve still got 20 days until the season starts, and there will be more injuries between now and Opening Day to account for, plus our usual slew of early-April injuries to contend with. To highlight this point, here’s an IL Stash Rankings piece from last April 9 where Scott White identified 13 can’t-drop players, plus another 16 who are “really difficult to drop” and 34 total you’d want to have stashed; by the end of April, there were 42 stash-able players on Scott’s updated list.
Gil is a talented pitcher, but he was a long shot to repeat last year’s success even before this injury totally derailed his spring. A high-3.00s ERA and a bunch of strikeouts have value even with an iffy WHIP, but it’s not something worth waiting for – especially since the injury increases the degree of difficulty for Gil even more.
Believe It or Not: Julio Rodriguez is going to avoid his usual slow start
If you’re keeping track of Spring Training lineups, you might have noticed an awful lot of Rodriguez in the early going. He has already logged 22 PA, two-thirds of his total from last spring with more than two weeks left in the exhibition schedule. That’s not a coincidence, and it’s in conjunction with Rodriguez looking for more non-game reps against live pitching with the goal of making sure he avoids the slow starts that have become characteristic for the young outfielder.
“I’m trying to get more reps, prepare myself a little bit better to hit the ground running,” Rodríguez told MLB.com last week. “There’s no better training in the league than against the pitchers that we’ve got over here.”
Believe it.
Not necessarily because he’s getting these extra reps in Grapefruit League action, though I’m certain that can’t hurt. But mostly because I just don’t believe Rodriguez’s slow starts are likely to continue one way or another for much longer.
Rodriguez is a career .238/.296/.347 hitter in March and April, which is really quite bad, obviously – by comparison, he has an OPS north of .900 in each of July, August, and September. But we’re also still talking about just 328 plate appearances scattered across three seasons, one of which came when he was a 21-year-old rookie with no prior MLB experience. In 2023, he had a perfectly acceptable .743 OPS before May, so it’s not even like he’s been uniformly disastrous early in the season.
That’s not to say it’s a fluke that he’s gotten off to these slow starts. I just think he’ll figure out whatever it is that has caused these slow starts, and if maximizing his early exposure to live pitching helps, I’m all for it. Rodriguez remains one of the most talented players in the league, and I’m happy to draft him at a discount this season with the hope he puts it all together for an entire season for the first time.