The Spring Signal, February 18th
Only two days away from our first Spring Training games!
Pablo Lopez
As I referenced on Monday, Pablo had experienced elbow discomfort during a live BP session. Yesterday, @aarongleeman reported Lopez has a torn elbow ligament and “surgery is very much on the table.” The referenced surgery would be Tommy John. Pablo Lopez is seeking a second opinion.
Don’t count on seeing Lopez this year, but at age 29, it’s not a situation where you bail on him in dynasty leagues. Plenty of years left, and it’s probably the right call just to get everything surgically fixed and aim for a mid-2027 return.
This opens things up for Mick Abel, whom we like a little bit here. It wasn’t pretty in the Majors last year, but he has a strong fastball + curveball combination to lead his pitch mix. There’s some upside there.
We’ll also see plenty of Taj Bradley, and David Festa enters the picture again, although his health situation is very much in question right now.
Hurston Waldrep & The Braves Disaster
Also discussed on Monday, Hurston was dealing with elbow discomfort. Today, it was announced that Waldrep will undergo surgery (similar to Schwellenbach), and there is no timeline for his return this year. New Manager Walt Weiss said he “hopes both will be able to pitch again this year”. Quote from @mlbbowman. This creates an opening for the fifth starter position for the foreseeable future.
We’ve already seen Didier Fuentes in the bigs, so he’ll play a big role in this rotation this year if he can stay healthy and improve a little bit. He was 58% fastballs in the Majors last year. That works a lot better in the minors than against top-level competition, but he does have a good fastball, so there’s plenty of upside for improvement in the future if his pitch mix rounds out (the kid won’t turn 21 until this summer). I’d call Fuentes a pretty phenomenal DC target right now.
Let’s take another gander at Tim’s top 20 Braves prospects.
Tons of starting pitching there, but they’re a very young group:
Murphy: Finished last year in A+
Caminiti: Finished last year in A
Ritchie: Reached AAA last year, but just a 15% K-BB%, he’s a limited upside guy, but certainly a guy who could throw a bunch of MLB innings this year
Sinnard: Finished last year in A+
Braun: Reached AAA last year (three starts), but another lower strikeout guy (24% in minors in 2025).
So, other than Fuentes, the upside dudes probably won’t reach the Majors this year. But Ritchie and Braun are interesting if you’re just talking about guys with a chance to throw some MLB innings this year.
Full podcast on the Braves top 20 prospects.
Matt Shaw
Shaw could see starts in right field vs LHP, according to Bruce Levine. Shaw was destined to be in a platoon situation ever since Bregman was signed this offseason. Manager Craig Counsell said that Suzuki would slide to the DH position when lefties are on the mound, and Ballesteros would ride the pine.
At Shaw’s price, it is worth a risk in deep roster leagues to stash on the bench. Bregman dealt with a right quad strain last season, which kept him out for over a month. Check out the new MLB Data Warehouse transaction tracker if you’re a paid subscriber.
Diamondbacks Closer Situation
Manager Torey Lovullo wants to have one man for the job. Right now, his options are Kevin Ginkel, Paul Sewald, and Ryan Thompson. During the 2026 season, we expect AJ Puk and Justin Martinez to return and dominate the role. It sounds like it could be closer by committee until those guys return.
Chase Burns
In a video interview with @char_cliff, Chase notes he has put a lot of work into his changeup and curveball. Last season, it was a two-pitch mix: a fastball and slider, thrown together 93% of the time. Burns is claiming these pitches have been drastically improved. His changeup was thrown 43 times, and 24 of them resulted in groundballs (57%). Leaning on this pitch more would be tremendous for his career, especially at Great American Ball Park. Something to watch going forward in spring training games coming up.
Lawrence Butler
The 25-year-old outfielder is dealing with rehabbing from multiple knee operations. During October 2025, Butler underwent surgery to repair a torn patellar tendon, and his left knee was injected with platelet-rich plasma (PRP shot). That honestly sounds concerning for someone so young. It gives me flashbacks to Yordan, who has 60-year-old man knees as well. Butler’s value comes in his ability to be a 20-20, heck, even a 25-25 player. If he cannot steal, his value drops tremendously.
Butler is expected to have a delayed spring training and be fully ready and healthy for Opening Day.
Dodgers Lineup News
Dave Roberts has announced Shohei Ohtani will remain in the leadoff spot this year with Mookie in the three hole. This is how the Dodgers lined up last year.
As we can see, Mookie was their two-hole hitter for the majority of the games with Freddie Freeman hitting third. It sounds like they are moving back Betts and Freeman to slot Tucker in the two hole. Earlier this offseason, Dave Roberts said Tucker would be hitting in the top third of the lineup.
Ohtani-Tucker-Betts-Freeman. What a 1-4 punch.
Spring Training Coverage
This is Jon now
Never forget MLB DW commandment #9
Ignoreth spring training. And if you already are, ignoreth it even more.
But we’ve all been waiting for months for baseball, and a lot of us have been toughing through some single-digit temperatures and several feet of snowfall. So we’re not actually going to ignore it.
We have a live game tracker ready to go here, and it will be loaded with Statcast data this year since we get all of these parks registering Statcast this year (I think). I’ll spin up a dashboard of some sort to track the data. We’ll be looking for pitchers with more/less velo, new pitches, and what kind of lineups teams are showing us.
So it’s a great time to take the leap and become a paid subscriber today!
Until next time!