Spring Training Recap: March 10, 2025

If you have kids, you know to always expect the unexpected. Two years ago on my birthday, my wife was hospitalized with sepsis after an infection from a miscarriage. Yesterday, my almost four-year old son fell and hit his head pretty hard, giving him a pretty serious concussion. Probably too much information, but we thought he was fine at first but four hours after hitting his head he began throwing up consistently for 12 hours. It has been pretty scary, but this morning he is more cognizant and better. We will be seeing several doctors today, but I did find a little bit of time to sneak and write this.

Baseball is in full swing, Spring Training at least! Every day, we will feature the Spring Training recap, breaking down everything you need to know that happened on the field. From the top prospects performers to players with pitch mix changes and more, I break it down.

Spring Training brings a lot of noise, but what is legit and what isn’t? This article should help you out everyday with what the important takeaways are.

Sunday Exit Velocity Leaders

You love to see all the young players highlight the top of the exit velocity charts!

Sunday Whiff Leaders

March 8 Spring Training Breakdown

Aroon Escobar, 2B, Philadelphia Phillies

Of course I want to lead off with Escobar, who has been my guy since seeing him on the complex last year. Having just turned 20 years old and not having any experience outside of complex ball, smacking a 108.2 mph home run in big league camp is impressive.

The underlying data is highly impressive for a 19-year-old at the time. He chased at a sub-20 percent clip and made strong contact, posting an in-zone contact rate near 85 percent. He puts the ball in the air often enough and gets to the pull-side at a near 40 percent mark.

The exit velocity data stands out, as Escobar posted a 90th-percentile exit velocity north of 104 mph. Given the combo of skills, Escobar looks like a potential breakout in 2025.

Clay Holmes, RHP, New York Mets

Holmes shoved again, striking out eight over 3.2 innings. He looks to be transitioning to the rotation quite well. Strike-throwing was a bit of an issue at times, as he walked three batters and landed just 56 percent of pitches for strikes. Despite that, Holmes generated 13 whiffs for a 50 percent whiff rate and he had a 36 percent CSW.

Throwing three new pitches in his slider cutter, changeup, and slider, Holmes has six legit pitches in his arsenal. The sinker looks good still and is playing well with his four-seam fastball which has legit traits. The sweeper is averaging 20 inches of horizontal movement and the kick-changeup is a dirty pitch that is going to miss a ton of bats.

How many innings does Holmes get this year? You hope he can get to 140, but 120-130 might be more realistic. Regardless, they should be very good innings.

Gavin Williams, RHP, Cleveland Guardians

Williams looks like he could blossom into one of the game’s better arms with what he has shown this spring. Sunday’s outing saw him strike out seven batters over 3.2 scoreless innings. He generated a daily best, 16 whiffs, while only walking one batter and allowing two hits. After a strong rookie season in 2023, injuries limited Williams in 2024 and the results were quite sub-par.

He has been heavy on fastball usage but it continues to work. 11 whiffs on 22 swings on the fastball will certainly play. Williams sat 95.5 mph on his fastball which was down from the 97 he sat last time out, but averaged 17 inches of IVB which is a two inch gain from his average in 2024. He also has touched 21 inches of IVB this spring, which is crazy ride.

Williams also completely reworked his slider to now have much more depth and sweep, almost playing like a slurve. It sat 86 mph after averaging 88.6 last year.

The curveball was similar to what we had previously seen, and Williams threw just one changeup, which generated a whiff. Year three for Williams might be the charm in Cleveland, especially if he is healthy.

Jac Caglianone, 1B, Kansas City Royals

Caglianone went deep and doubled in his two trips to the plate on Sunday and they were no ordinary hits either. The double nearly left the yard, traveling 383 feet and leaving the bat at 101 mph. The home run, however, 444 feet and 114.6 mph off the bat.

Last season at Florida, Caglianone had an impressive 111.7 mph 90th percentile exit velocity, and his max exit velocity of 121.7 was among the best in college baseball. With wood, Caglianone posted a 90th percentile exit velocity of 110 mph and topped at 117.3 in his pro debut. The power is legit.

Cags might be forcing the Royals hand. What originally seemed like a late 2025 debut, could be earlier with how impressive he has been.

Corbin Burnes, RHP, Arizona Diamondbacks

Burnes was dealing like he has all spring and looks back to his ace-level ways. He tossed four innings on Sunday, allowing just two hits and one walk while striking out five batters. He generated eight whiffs and added nine more called strikes for a 30 percent CSW.

The cutter looked quite good. Even though the velocity was down to 93.5 mph, the movement pattern was what we have seen when the pitch is at its best. It produced a 38 percent whiff rate.

Burnes also relied heavily on his slider and changeup, which generated the two other whiffs. The curve, sinker, and sweeper all looked sharp. Burnes is reliable and he looks to get back to his dominant strikeout ways in 2025 with the Diamondbacks.

Tomoyuki Sugano, RHP, Baltimore Orioles

Sugano continues to try to prove me wrong. He has yet to allow a run this spring and is coming off his best start so far on Sunday. Striking out five batters over three scoreless innings will definitely make a statement, and that is what he has done.

His fastball velocity is higher than we expected it to be coming over. After sitting around 90 mph last year, Sugano has worked around 92 mph on average and topped north of 93 mph. Sugano has also shown a strong arsenal with a splitter, cutter, curveball, sinker, and sweeper.

I was worried about the strikeouts with Sugano, but even if he gets to 20 percent and puts up good ratios, he could return solid value for fantasy managers.

Joey Bart, C, Pittsburgh Pirates

With all the questions I had about Bart entering the spring, he has continued to hit and looks the part so far. Bart had three more hits on Sunday, all singles, but raised his average to .444. Two of Bart’s singles left the bat at 107.3 and 102.3 respectively.

Joey Bart is one of the tougher players to evaluate at the catcher position. From the beginning of the season through July 8, he slashed .240/.333/.440 with four home runs and a 30 percent strikeout rate. Bart did miss time with an injury there. From July 9 through July 23, Bart struck out 23 percent of the time and slashed .302/.362/.552 with eight home runs. Bart again missed more time but returned in September and slashed .241/.302/.345 with one home run and a 29 percent strikeout rate.

Who will Bart be in 2025? It looks like the Pirates’ primary catcher to start the season.

Oswald Peraza, 3B, New York Yankees

It feels like the Yankees’ third base job is wide open at this point, Oswaldo Cabrera or Oswald Peraza could win the job. Yesterday, even Cabrera got the start at first base while Peraza was at third.

Peraza collected a single and double, with the double being hit to the deepest part of the park, traveling 372 feet. The exit velocities on his two hits were 97.3 and 107.4 mph respectively.

Luis García Jr., 2B, Washington Nationals

García collected three hits on Sunday, including a double. All three of his batted balls were hard-hit and north of 103 mph. His double left the bat at 106 mph and traveled 385 feet, nearly leaving the yard.

Enjoying a breakout season in 2024, García hit 18 home runs and stole 22 bases in just 528 plate appearances. It is important to remember he is still just 24 years old, but he has 1773 MLB plate appearances as the Nationals brought him up as a 20-year-old.

The positives in the profile: we have seen a three-year increase in exit velocities for Garcia, who posted an 89 mph average exit velocity last year, which is right at the MLB average. His 104.5 mph 90th percentile exit velocity was also north of average. The ground balls limit the power output a bit, but we did see that number fall by five percentage points, a notable mark.