2029 SPRING TRAINING
Not a single injury to speak of. Knock on wood.
Pitching staff
Hall, Drake, Hernandez, Bowman and RJ are the starting 5 with Casas closing, Sheppard, Buffy Hansen as the righties and the Gonzo twins as the pens lefties.
Shimizu had a very good spring, but some AAA innings can't hurt. Carlos Hernandez has some scouts worried, on our last eval his tools came back as regressing, the exact opposite of what you'd expect from a 25 year old. RJ has to start proving himself, especially with the depth of arms knocking on the door.
I think this is the best pen, by far, 1-6 that I have had since I was here.
Lineup
No real surprises. Paco Martinez was sent down at the end of camp. He's 23 and still getting better and needs to play every day. The outfield is stacked, enough so that Raul Aguilar was sent to Eagan, despite his wishes to remain. He too needs to play every day and keep improving. This outfield is very good, and getting better. Cook in left, Morton in right with Brady in CF. Cabrera will spell corners and play to stay fresh and Young will be the RHH guy to help Cook make this a more formidable offense vs LHP. My only concern is that I have not one CF beyond Brady.
Two deals at camps end. A highly unpopular trade with Baltimore, sending the insanely popular fringe guy in Bill Caldwell to Baltimore for 23 year old SP Paul Williams. A 2024 2nd rounder by West Michigan our scouts think he could be a sleeper. (Fan interested dropped to 76 after this one)
The second was to move a guy out of options in Bobby White. 23 year old lefty Luis Padilla is a good arm, incredibly durable who could be a left hander out of the pen if needed.
