3/20 Spring Training News & Analysis
Dodgers/Cubs recap, spring standouts, and links to new resources
We have this awkward week now between the first two games of the season and True Opening Day™. I really hope they don’t do this stuff again. Next year, I might just have my league drafts after the two games. That might be the correct way to go.
There is a lot to talk about. The dashboards are filling out, I’ve launched the 2025 Main Dashboard. That’s always an exciting thing to do. I want to commit to spending more time in the dashboard and publicizing it a bit more this year. It’s an amazing tool and I use it daily during the season when writing and researching, but I tend to go long periods of time without really mentioning it. The link is below the paywall, and you can check out last year’s version of it here to see what it’s all about.
I’ve made some demo videos on it as well:
So that should help you out if you’re trying to learn how to use it. The people who have spent the time to get comfortable with it end up using it an absolute ton. But okay, I’ll stop talking about it for now.
Dodgers vs. Cubs Standouts
Yoshinobu Yamamoto looked great.
5 IP, 72 PC, 15.3% SwStr%, 47.2% Strike%, 33.3% Ball%, 1.00 WHIP+
Splitters and four-seamers all day. Nobody whiffed on the four-seamer, but nobody squared one up either. The splitter was filthy and he threw it for a ton of strikes. Great for Yamamoto, and I think he has SP1 potential. Maybe the K% won’t rival the Skubal’s and Crochet’s of the world, but the ground ball rate should keep the ERA down and the team context can’t get any better. I think he can get to 170 innings and be one of the most valuable SPs in the fantasy game.
It was not so good for Roki Sasaki.
3 IP, 56 PC, 8.9% SwStr%, 33.9% Strike%, 55.4% Ball%, 2.00 WHIP+
You will almost never see a Strike% that low and a Ball% that high. There were only a handful of times in all of 2024 where a pitcher went for a ball rate above 55%. The league average on that is about 36%, and the highest numbers you’ll see over the full season are around 39-41%, so this was insane.
The good news is that Sasaki hasn’t had this problem in the past. His walk rate was only a little bit above the Japanese League average last year, and prior to last season, he posted really good walk rates. I don’t think he’ll be a sub-8% walk rate guy this year, but history would suggest it won’t be a massive issue. Maybe a 9-10% BB%. I think we can chalk this bad start up to randomness, the strange timing of it all, and probably even some nerves making his first MLB start.
He’s mostly a two-pitch guy, it would seem. The four-seamer has huge velo (averaged 98), and the splitter has everybody raving. But the nastiness factor only matters if you have at leasta decent command of your stuff.
I have long been operating by the rule of “don’t trust a splitter”, at least not for consistency. It’s a weird pitch and a hard one to command, I think. We have seen most of these splitter-dependent pitchers be very spotty from start-to-start. The end-of-year results are usually good, but you just have these spots where they don’t have the feel for the pitch and it turns into a bunch of walks and very short outings.
Remember that Shohei Ohtani’s featured pitch early on was the splitter. But he had a huge walk issue early on because of it. When it was on, it was untouchable, but it wasn’t always on. And now, he’s scrapped the pitch entirely in favor of fastballs and sliders.
Shota Imanaga was effective but did not have his usual command. He walked four hitters with a 38% Ball%. He got the quick hook after just four innings, and then Ben Brown came in and took the loss. He generated a huge 21.5% SwStr% and struck out five in 2.2 innings. However, he gave up two earned runs on four hits and three walks and made pulling Imanaga that quick look like a pretty dumb decision.
Brown’s curveball is really something else. It generated a 37% SwStr% on 35 offerings. It’s one of the better pitchers in the league, so he will be interesting to watch this year. You would think he’d get some starts if they have an injury, but for now, he’s in a middle relief role.
Justin Steele struggled. And it’s not even right to say “well, it was the Dodgers!” because they did not have Betts or Freeman in those two games. The Dodgers lineup did not look very good in those games.
4 IP, 67 PC, 13.4% SwStr%, 49.3% Strike%, 34.3% Ball%, 3.50 WHIP+
Those numbers are pretty good, but he gave up two homers.
The other notable thing was the Dodgers bullpen usage. They trotted out Tanner Scott in the first game in a traditional save situation, but they elected not to use him in the second game. Alex Vesia grabbed the second save while Blake Treinen was the 8th inning guy in the first game and Kirby Yates grabbed it in the second. I think Scott, Treinen, and Yates are great options in saves + holds leagues. The Dodgers are going to win a ton, and those are clearly the three back-end bullpen guys. But I’m still holding to the belief that nobody reaches 25 saves from this bullpen.
I wouldn’t be changing my mind on anybody for just two games, obviously. I’d still draft the exact same way, but maybe I’d wait a round longer if I wanted Sasaki since it’s possible your league will be less interested in grabbing him after seeing those five walks.
Jared Jones Elbow
We don’t even have a prognosis on the guy, but everybody is pretty much taking this as inevitable elbow surgery. He had elbow discomfort in a bullpen session and will miss his final spring start.
There’s probably some of that “survivorship bias” thing going on here. I would guess there are examples of pitchers who have some elbow discomfort and then go on to pitch a mostly full season. I don’t think that’s impossible, but yeah there’s a real shot we don’t see him for a long time. And that would be another point in favor of the velocity theory. Jones has one of the fastest four-seamers in the league and threw it a bunch last year. He’s also not the biggest frame at 6’1’’. It’s possible that the bigger guys can get to those high velo marks without as much effort as the shorter guys. I have no idea if there’s anything to that, but certainly not all 97mph fastballs are created the same.
Anyways, everything is terrible. The Pirates already looked like a mediocre team, and losing their SP2 is devastating. They do have some depth, but their rotation goes from very good to “fine”, and that will not work with their bottom-five offense.
Thomas Harrington could make the rotation.
I don’t think he’s a standard fantasy league guy, but he could be. The comps to him are Zach Eflin and Nick Martinez. He can be a decent WHIP guy, but I don’t see much of a chance at a high strikeout rate, and I don’t want to use fantasy roster spots on low strikeout rates (generally).
Caleb Durbin
It looks as though Durbin will make the Brewers team out of camp. He came over in the Devin Williams trade. He’s an infielder with a ton of speed.
The good news is the elite 10% K% last year with 31 steals. The bad news is the lack of power. There’s also no saying with certainty that he’ll be able to get on base against Major League pitching.
I do think we should expect a K% below 15% in the Majors. But I have no idea if the walk rate will actually be decent. MLB pitchers have better command and are not going to be pitching around a rookie like this. So, if Durbin ends up just smacking everything into the ground or hitting a bunch of high fly balls, he won’t get on base enough for the steals to be enough to make it worth it.
But yeah, I’d rather have him than some other late-round infielder who you know you won’t get much from. I bought him for $1 in the MLB DW auction draft, so I’m in.
Spencer Schwellenbach
Just a quick comment that Schwelly struck out ten Yankees yesterday and has a 37% K% and a 3% BB% this spring. He’s a stud, and I’ve been out in front of him the whole time. Shout out to me, shout out to us. You should be drafting him as a top-20 fantasy SP.
Here’s your list of spring training hitters with 5+ homers:
Trayce Thompson (6)
Rhys Hoskins (6)
Matt Wallner (6)
Gavin Sheets (6)
Vinny Capra (5)
Ryan Mountcastle (5)
Ben Rice (5)
Wallner is interesting. I’d call him must-own in leagues with daily changes. He’s going to lead off for the Twins against righties. You want that guy in your fantasy lineup when he’s in the Twins lineup (155 wRC+ last year). But it’s a tougher sell in a league where you set one lineup per week. He’ll sit 2-3 times a week on average when the Twins face lefties.
Ben Rice is making a real case for regular playing time with the Yankees, and there are more and more openings presenting themselves. First, Giancarlo Stanton is out long-term, and now Paul Goldschmidt has some back issues. I think Rice is the DH against RHP, and he could end up filling in a bunch at first base and catcher. He’s worth a flier in deeper leagues, but I don’t think he’ll see much playing time against lefties, and that limits the overall upside.
And maybe we slept a bit too much on Rhys Hoskins after his very poor return to the Majors in 2024 after that missed 2023 season. #SpringStatsDontMatterBUT he’s reminding us that he’s a legitimate MLB power bat, and that plays nicely in Milwaukee if he can manage the strikeouts a bit better this season.
That’s it for now. I’m going to share the new links below the paywall. You can bookmark those, or just reference the Resource Glossary page.
Pretty soon, I think, I’ll share that player lookup app that I took some screenshots from above. It’s just not ready yet, and it’s not at the top of my priority list. But it might be cool enough for people to enjoy using at some point.
There will be many more new Python apps this year since I learned that skill this spring. I cannot wait to fire up that Live Game Tracker on Opening Day!