SPRING TRAINING COVERAGE 2025

THE LEAD

The big news around baseball right now is that New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole had Tommy John surgery yesterday in Los Angeles, leaving last year’s American League pennant winners without their ace for all of the 2025 season. What route do the Yankees take? Does Hal Steinbrenner channel his father and offer the Marlins the flower of their farm system for Sandy Alcántara, himself roughly eighteen months removed from the same surgery? George Steinbrenner would already have demanded a call to Marlins PoBO Peter Bendix, and some package along the lines of Jasson Dominguez, George Lombard, Spencer Jones, and Will Warren would be packing their bags for Jupiter. After all, the Yankees - the New York Yankees, the most successful organization in the history of North American professional sports - just saw the future Hall of Famer who had an incredible 2024 season for them move to Queens instead of staying in the Bronx, and George would not tolerate the Yankees losing ground to the Mets.

But Hal is not George; Hal eventually blinked and let himself get outbid for our old friend Mr. Soto, who probably would have put up 7+-WAR seasons for a decade in Yankee Stadium. Hal might prefer to eat those innings more cheaply, since he has demonstrated an aversion to just blowing away offers a la George. After all, the Yankees are hardly the only team that could use Alcántara, and while he has an incredibly reasonable contract for a proven Cy Young pitcher in his late twenties who is a top-five pitcher in baseball when fully healthy - $35 million over the next two seasons combined with a $21 million team option for 2027 - there are teams out there with a surplus of young MLB-caliber pitching that would come at a much lower freight, both in salary commitments and prospect capital. Can you think of such a team?

 SPRING TRAINING COVERAGE 2025

Game Preview

The Nationals were off yesterday for the first time since last Monday and are "hosting” the Astros at their mutual park this afternoon at 1:00 PM. RHP Trevor Williams (1-0; 4.32 ERA) is scheduled to start for the Nationals, and scheduled to start for the Houston Astros is LHP Brandon Walter (0-0; 4.50 ERA).

 WASHINGTON NATIONALS OPENING DAY

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  MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL NEWS

Whither the Yankees?

As discussed earlier, what team might possibly have a surplus of inexpensive pitchers who can at least eat the innings (and, for their own sake, continue to improve in one of the stronger organizations for pitchers in the majors) that Cole would have thrown in 2025? Well, the Nationals are one. I’m not saying that the Nats are going to or even necessarily should make a trade with anyone, but either DJ Herz or Mitchell Parker is otherwise likely to find themselves in Rochester this time next month, so a remote possibility exists that Brian Cashman calls Mike Rizzo to inquire about a minimum-salary pitcher with MLB experience.

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 WHAT WE THINK THE NATIONALS FRONT OFFICE IS READING

Speed Reads

📌 Susana & Sykora getting noticed (MLB.com)

📌 Nats’ players’ dream teammates (MLB.com)

📌 Spring Training Standouts (The Athletic)