Biggest Surprises, Disappointments at 2018 Spring Training Halfway Point
Given how little it matters in the grand scheme of things, the best way to absorb Major League Baseball spring training is to not read too much into anything.
But in the immortal words of Hobie Doyle: Would that it were so simple.
Spring training may be baseball's silly season, yet there's never a shortage of things to react to with either surprise or disappointment. So, we're going to go ahead and get our reactions about 10 things in particular out in the open and be done with it.
Surprise: Jason Kipnis Is Healthy and Making Up for Lost Dingers
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Jason Kipnis played in only 90 games last season and hit just 12 home runs. Those figures marked perhaps the worst season of the two-time All-Star's career.
Take a look at him now, however, and you'll see a guy with a 1.767 OPS and six homers in only 28 spring training at-bats.
Spoiler alert: Kipnis won't keep up this pace forever. He's never hit more than 23 homers in any season, so suffice it to say, he's not a slugging savant.
If nothing else, though, his spring dinger binge is a testament to the wonders of being healthy after he lost time with shoulder and hamstring injuries in 2017.
"When you are not healthy, you are spending time doing treatment and other things instead of working on your craft and hitting in the cages," the 30-year-old explained to Jack Magruder of MLB.com. "It is nice to have that freedom and that luxury to be able to go out and train without having to worry about a specific injury."
The Cleveland Indians ranked second in MLB in OPS last year despite Kipnis' injury-marred production. If he rides his hot spring to a return to form in 2018, their offense might become even more elite.
Disappointment: Marcell Ozuna Has Gone from Big-Ticket Acquisition to Flop
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No spring training is complete without a big-ticket hot-stove acquisition getting off to a slow start, thus inviting everyone to raise skeptical eyebrows.
This year, it's Marcell Ozuna.
It took four prospects (including well-regarded right-hander Sandy Alcantara) for the St. Louis Cardinals to pry Ozuna from the Miami Marlins. And to be fair, the two-time All-Star did give the Cardinals a taste of his upside with a long homer on March 1.
But to date, that remains his lone spring home run. Sandwiched around it, meanwhile, are a .540 OPS and 13 strikeouts in 32 plate appearances.
There's more than a good chance that Ozuna, 27, will shrug this off and get back to the form that produced a .924 OPS and 37 homers in 2017. And yet, it's hard to consider his poor spring without also considering what a frustrating player he was before last season.
Although Ozuna never made a secret of his power or athleticism, he had a problem translating his tools into consistent results. This was especially true at the plate, as his production had about as many peaks and valleys as the Himalayas.
So even if he'll probably be fine, the "probably" modifier is indeed necessary.
Surprise: Ronald Acuna Is Ready to Be Your Next Baseball Obsession
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It also wouldn't be spring training without a brand-name prospect having a coming-out party. This year, the floor belongs to Ronald Acuna Jr.
The young outfielder has played in 12 games with the Atlanta Braves and has put up a .419/.526/.548 slash line with a homer and four stolen bases. At the start of play Monday, his 1.075 OPS was tied for 10th among all spring qualifiers.
The catch is the same one that almost always follows whenever a prospect is lighting up spring training: Acuna has faced weak competition. Baseball Reference rates his opponent quality at 6.6, which is slightly below Double-A level.
Nonetheless, it's not worth nothing that his homer came off Masahiro Tanaka. It's also notable that Acuna is deserving of his chance to shine despite only being 20 years old.
He forced his way from High-A to Triple-A throughout the 2017 season and then dominated the Arizona Fall League with a 1.053 OPS. He began the spring as the No. 2 prospect in MLB.com's rankings, in which every single one of his tools was rated as plus or better.
So, maybe this isn't just a flash in the pan. It might be Acuna's latest preview of what's to come.
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Disappointment: Shohei Ohtani Is a Bit of a Work in Progress
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On the flip side of Acuna, you'll find Shohei Ohtani.
The more that was said about Ohtani before a crowded sweepstakes landed him with the Los Angeles Angels, the more he sounded too good to be true. A young phenom with a high-velocity arm and a powerful bat, with the ability and the willingness to wield both on the regular? Yeah, right.
Now, there's no escaping the sense that maybe it all was too good to be true.
The 23-year-old has taken the mound three times this spring. His best moment came when he struck out eight of the 12 batters he faced in a "B" game against the Milwaukee Brewers on March 2. Despite that, he's been lit up for 10 runs over seven total innings, only 1.2 of which have come in Cactus League action.
It hasn't been much prettier for Ohtani at the plate. He's come away with just two singles and three walks in 21 plate appearances. He's struck out six times.
"He's basically like a high school hitter because he's never seen a good curveball," one scout told Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports. "He's seen fastballs and changeups. And you're asking a high school hitter to jump to the major leagues?"
Obviously, it's only spring training. And Ohtani doesn't need to figure out everything right away.
It is, however, nonetheless clear he has a few things to figure out.
Surprise: How Easy Noah Syndergaard Is Making It Look
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If Ohtani was at least living up the legend on the mound, he'd look something like Noah Syndergaard has looked this spring.
The New York Mets right-hander, whom everyone in the nine realms knows as Thor, has toed the rubber three times. All told, he's struck out 13 of the 31 batters he's faced and has allowed just three hits and one run in 8.1 innings.
To boot, Syndergaard hasn't achieved these numbers by tearing through the dregs of teams' rosters.
Among his strikeout victims are Houston Astros standouts Jose Altuve and Marwin Gonzalez. Most recently, he had a start against the Washington Nationals in which he punched out seven in a row, including Trea Turner, Bryce Harper, Anthony Rendon and Matt Adams.
And who can blame them? Syndergaard has regularly hit triple digits with his fastball this spring, and he has also mixed in a low-90s slider, curveballs and changeups in the mid-80s, all with mostly good command.
At the least, it's evident that the 25-year-old is over the lat injury that cost him all but seven starts last season. He's also making it easy to wonder if he's never been better. That's a thought that should scare the ever-loving pants off of all hitters.
Disappointment: Zack Greinke's Radar Gun Readings and the Diamondbacks' ERA
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On the opposite end of the spectrum from Syndergaard lies Zack Greinke.
The one official start that Greinke made for the Arizona Diamondbacks this spring wasn't good. He lasted just 1.2 innings against the Milwaukee Brewers on February 25 and gave up a run on three hits with no strikeouts.
However, Greinke's real problem may be reflected on the radar gun. According to Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic, the 34-year-old's fastball velocity has been hovering in the mid-80s. That's quite a step down from the 91 mph he averaged last year.
Granted, Greinke struggling with his fastball velocity is an annual spring training feature. But even he's getting the willies this time.
"Every year, I get nervous that it's not working good enough, that it's not going to come fast enough," he said on March 8, per Ted Berg of USA Today. "Same thing this year. I think it's going to be ready, but in the back of my mind, I'm always a little nervous that it's not going to be there, and I'm not going to be ready by the time the season starts."
In the meantime, Greinke isn't the only pitcher the D-backs have to worry about. The whole team has a 5.99 ERA this spring. That could be nothing. Or, it could be an early indicator that the exceptional pitching Arizona had in 2017 was a fluke.
Surprise: The Giants Have the Best Offense in MLB
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Anyone who cared to look up the team OPS leaderboard at the end of the 2017 season would have found the San Francisco Giants at the very bottom with a .689 mark.
Now, anyone who cares to look up the same leaderboard for spring training will find the Giants at the very top with a .911 mark.
It would be irresponsible to not be suspicious of such a drastic 180, and this is a case where the smell test only incites further suspicion.
The Giants' top spring performers are guys like Mac Williamson, Jarrett Parker, Steven Duggar, Chris Shaw and Pablo Sandoval. None of them is actually expected to do any heavy lifting for the big club this season.
Even still, the optimistic forecast created by all this can't be dismissed out of hand. With two decorated veterans (Andrew McCutchen and Evan Longoria) joining Buster Posey and other solid incumbents (Brandon Belt, Brandon Crawford, Hunter Pence and Joe Panik), the Giants lineup does have fewer easy outs than it did a year ago.
"Our lineup is as deep as any right now," said Longoria in an MLB Network Radio interview. "[We have] a lot of guys who know how to hit, have been around, know how to prepare. And I think it makes my job a lot easier."
Disappointment: The Nationals Are Unwell
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Then there are the Washington Nationals, who look like they could use another month of spring training.
They've performed poorly with just a 8-8 record in 16 exhibition games. Such things must be taken with a grain of salt, of course. But in this case, two things make Washington's spring record particularly unnerving.
The Nationals really have been that bad in at least one sense. While their pitching has done just fine with an MLB-best 2.94 ERA, their offense has stunk up the joint with a .669 OPS that ranks second from the bottom.
It hasn't helped that the club's lineup has been at less-than-full strength. Daniel Murphy and Adam Eaton have been held back by recoveries from 2017 knee injuries. Michael A. Taylor has been sidelined by a side injury. Due to his age (33) and the mileage on his body, Ryan Zimmerman has played in just one Grapefruit League game.
Because none of these injury issues are of the serious variety, it may not be long before all this becomes water under the bridge as Washington's lineup catches fire.
Or there could be a prophetic feeling to it all in the end. The Nationals ultimately crashed in 2017, going 10-11 in their final 21 games before getting knocked out of the first round of the playoffs. Perhaps that volatility isn't a thing of the past.
Surprise: The Marlins Aren't the Worst Thing Ever
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As the Nationals struggle to live up to their mantle as the beasts of the NL East, go figure that it's the Miami Marlins who look ready to supplant them.
They entered Monday with a 10-5 record in Grapefruit League action. That's a .667 winning percentage that placed them behind only the Chicago Cubs among National League teams.
Which brings us to the "one of these things is not like the other" portion of this program.
The Cubs won the 2016 World Series and are going into 2018 with an excellent chance of winning another title. By contrast, the Marlins spent their first winter under new owners Derek Jeter and Bruce Sherman stripping a 77-win roster of players who threatened to make the team good and/or interesting in 2018.
Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich and Dee Gordon are all gone, in addition to Ozuna. The team is now so devoid of talent that even Marlins Man is fed up.
And yet, there they are. Winning games. All it's taken is excellent pitching (3.59 ERA) and just enough hitting, largely thanks to top prospect Lewis Brinson (1.069 OPS).
What does it mean? In all probability: nothing, nothing and more nothing.
But since baseball isn't known for its predictability, there's at least a one-in-a-million chance that it could mean something.
Disappointment: Mere Pennies for Some Quality Free Agents
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One thing that figured to be different about this spring training is that it would tie up many loose ends left from a slow-moving free-agent market.
Some players have made out just fine. Eric Hosmer and J.D. Martinez, for example, each collected more than $100 million. More recently, the Associated Press reported that Jake Arrieta got a deal from the Philadelphia Phillies that will be worth at least $75 million, and perhaps as much as $135 million.
But for others, long stays on the open market have resulted in disappointment.
To wit, MLB Trade Rumors called for Eduardo Nunez, Carlos Gomez, Logan Morrison, Mike Moustakas, Jonathan Lucroy, Carlos Gonzalez, Lance Lynn and Neil Walker to make $269 million in free agency. All eight have signed since spring training opened for less than $55 million altogether.
Since we're still talking about millions of guaranteed dollars, it may be hard to sympathize with the gap between what these guys were projected to get and what they actually got.
Nonetheless, it's a bad look for an industry that, according to Maury Brown of Forbes, pulled in over $10 billion in revenue last year. And as far as the MLB Players Association is concerned, it's not likely to be forgotten or forgiven when it comes time to discuss the next collective bargaining agreement.
Spring stats courtesy of MLB.com, and are current through March 11. Other stats courtesy of Baseball Reference and FanGraphs.
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