Athletics

Spring training stats don’t matter but we’re obligated to point out that Kurtz is apparently saving all of his hits for the regular season. The 23-year-old elite slugger is batting .205 (9-for-44) with three homers in 17 Cactus League contests. There is zero reason to be concerned.

Morales is pretty much guaranteed a spot in the Athletics’ season-opening rotation, but he’s been hit extremely hard this spring, posting a bloated 7.16 ERA and 15/10 K/BB ratio across 16 1/3 innings of work. The hard-throwing 23-year-old’s fantasy appeal is limited to deeper mixed leagues based on his extremely hitter-friendly home ballpark.

Muncy was unable to establish himself as an everyday option for the rebuilding Athletics before finishing last year in a versatile utility role. A strong performance this spring ensures that he’ll open the regular season as the Athletics’ starting third baseman but the lack of any real power/speed combo upside limits his realistic fantasy appeal to AL-only formats.

Calling hitter’s paradise Sutter Health Park his temporary home won’t do Springs any favors but he’s a perfectly cromulent innings-eater in deeper mixed leagues when he’s taking the ball on the road. The lack of big-time strikeout upside remains his biggest obstacle to mixed-league relevance. The 33-year-old lefty has posted a lackluster 7.94 ERA and 11/9 K/BB ratio across 11 1/3 innings this spring.

Severino’s velocity has been up since his spring debut, but he was especially amped tonight, topping out at 99.8 mph. HIs 98.6 mph average on his fastball was up 2.5 mph from last year. It definitely makes him more interesting for fantasy purposes, but it’s hard to say whether it will hold up, and he’s still pitching half of the time in a fantastic ballpark for hitters in Sacramento.

De Vries put together an extremely impressive showing in Cactus League play, hitting .409 (18-for-44) with three homers and 11 RBI in 17 contests. The switch-hitting 19-year-old prodigy was the centerpiece of the Mason Miller blockbuster at the trade deadline last July and will open the minor league season at Double-A Midland. It wouldn’t be shocking at all if he reached the big leagues as a teenager in the second half. He’s one of the top 10 prospects in the entire fantasy landscape entering 2026.

The A’s gave Zack Gelof a start in the outfield today, so he might be a potential alternative to Thomas as a platoonmate for Lawrence Butler. Thomas, though, projects to be the better player of those two right now. He didn’t excel in hitting .225/.267/.417 in 132 plate appearances as a rookie last year, but the pop is legit and he’s a quality defender. We also don’t know for sure that Butler will be platooned, but given that he’s being slowplayed this spring while coming off knee surgery, it’d make sense to go that route initially.

The third of those was the second of back-to-back shots with Nick Kurtz in the fourth. The A’s are poised to have Langeliers bat second in between Kurtz and Tyler Soderstrom at the beginning of the season, even though he’d seem to be the clearly worst bet of their top six hitters when it comes to OBP. He did come in at a respectable .325 there last year, but he was at .276 through his first 2 1/4 big-league seasons. Of course, it’ll be fine if he maintains that 2025 performance, and he’s looking the part with his six homers this spring.

Lopez walked one, but 36 of his 52 pitches today were strikes. Given his success for the A’s last year (4.08 ERA in a rotation that came in at 4.85 overall, 113/37 K/BB in 92 2/3 IP), it was surprising that Lopez entered spring training without a rotation spot locked up. Still, he’d seem to be in good shape now, and he could remain useful in AL-only leagues.

Civale had a 4.85 ERA last season, and he’s currently throwing about two mph slower than he did then. As friendly as Sutter Health Park played for hitters last season, this could get ugly quickly.