MLB Player News

The highly-touted 18-year-old backstop looked like he fit right in on the big league field on Sunday as he laced an RBI double (103.5 mph EV) off of Giovanny Gallegos to open the scoring in the second inning. He then raced around to score on an RBI single off the bat of Forrest Wall. Salas is extremely unlikely to break through to the big leagues in 2025, but the future behind the plate looks unbelievably bright in San Diego.

The right-hander mixed in breaking balls during this session and his fastball topped out at 97.5 mph. He continues to make progress in his recovery, and the likelihood continues to increase that we see him back on a big league mound before the end of May. The better that he looks throughout the spring, the higher his draft cost is going to get.

The 26-year-old speedster left Thursday’s game against the Astros due to tightness in his calf, so it’s encouraging to hear that it was only a minor issue. Hopefully it doesn’t linger and impact his ability to be aggressive on the basepaths at the start of the regular season.

The 28-year-old outfielder continues to work his way back from a mild right hamstring strain. The Marlins are naturally proceeding with caution there, but there’s still plenty of time for Stowers to get himself right before Opening Day.

Berríos, who would prefer to be pitching for Puerto Rico right now, gave up five hits, including a Dominic Fletcher homer, walked one and struck out three. He’s in line to open the season in Toronto’s rotation, though he could be in jeopardy of losing his spot once Max Scherzer or Shane Bieber is deemed ready.

Hoffman was sharp today and a little extra velocity on his pitches; his six fastballs averaged 97.2 mph, compared to 96.4 mph last year, and his two sliders were up 1.8 mph to 88.8 mph. Of course, it was just eight pitches coming on a bit more than four months of rest.

Chandler walked three for a second straight start. He hasn’t had nearly as bad of an inning since the second frame of his spring debut, when he walked four before getting pulled, but he’s up to 10 walks in six innings for the spring. We still imagine that he’ll bounce back from this — and he was effective today in spite of the walks — but there’s a non-zero chance that he’ll start the season in Triple-A.

With Harry Ford homering in the fourth, Great Britain kept this one tight until the end, but Aranda’s 346-foot homer into the Crawford Boxes in Houston’s Daikin Park settled matters. Mexico then added four runs in the ninth before Great Britain surprisingly pushed one across against Andrés Muñoz in the bottom of the inning. Javier Assad started for Mexico and pitched 3 2/3 scoreless frames. Nacho Alvarez Jr. homered for Mexico’s only run through seven innings.

Assad averaged 94.4 mph with his fastball today, which is up 2.2 mph from last year and 2.9 mph from when he started 29 games for the Cubs two years ago. It was just a one-day thing, either, as he was at 94.1 mph in his two spring outings. Assad has always been effective for the Cubs in spite of mediocre peripherals — he has a career 3.43 ERA with a 4.46 FIP, a 4.68 SIERA and a 4.76 xERA — and if the extra velocity sticks around, there’s a good chance he’ll be helpful again. It would just probably be as a middle reliever initially.

That’s never what you want to hear. While it doesn’t always necessarily mean UCL surgery of some form, that could be the eventual outcome. Expect the Marlins to provide another update on his status after that appointment.

Velázquez is 5-for-17 with just one strikeout. He has a realistic shot at a spot on the Cardinals’ bench as a platoon guy against lefties, though it doesn’t help his case that he doesn’t really have much of a positive split against lefties in his career. He’s hit .211/.306/.428 with a 30% strikeout rate versus lefties and .212/.276/.435 with a 28% strikeout rate against righties in his 615 major league plate appearances.