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Texas Rangers lineup for February 24, 2025 against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

We have a lineup that looks like what we might see on Opening Day, save for Alejandro Osuna playing in place of Brandon Nimmo, who is still doing his ramp-up, and Jacob Latz, who hopefully isn’t the Opening Day starters, as that would give me 2014 Tanner Scheppers, Opening Day starter vibes. Oh, and the 1B/DH spots would probably be switched.

Behind Latz, the Rangers are planning on having Carter Baumler, Austin Gomber, Alexis Diaz, Luis Curvelo and Patrick Murphy pitch.

The lineup:

Carter — LF

Langford — CF

Seager — SS

Burger — DH

Pederson — 1B

Jung — 3B

Smith — 2B

Higashioka — C

Osuna — RF

2:05 p.m. Central start time.

What's not to love about Pete Crow-Armstrong? The young, talented Chicago Cubs center fielder is somehow simultaneously super cool and fiery. Nicknamed simply PCA, he should be an entertaining and accomplished player to watch for many years.

And he's Southern California born and bred, the product of esteemed diamond factory Harvard-Westlake High.

So why oh why did these words come out of his mouth during an interview for a 4,500-word article published Monday in Chicago Magazine?

“I love Chicago more and more,” he said. “It’s just an incredible city. The people are great. They give a [crap]. They aren’t just baseball fans who go to the game like Dodgers fans to take pictures and whatever. They are paying attention. They care.”

The love of Chicago and Cubs fans? Understood.

The dissing of all Dodgers fans as photo-obsessed, uncaring whatevers? Laughable.

Read more:'Pretty healthy' Kyle Tucker content to fit in among Dodgers' galaxy of stars

The Dodgers became the first team to draw four million fans in 2025 and have exceeded 3.7 million paying customers every non-COVID season since 2013.

And it's a false narrative to suggest the devotion is merely a byproduct of back-to-back World Series titles and a star-studded lineup. Remember, the Dodgers didn't win a title from 1989 through 2019, a 31-year drought during which their attendance exceeded 3 million 25 times.

So, where did a baseball-loving future MLB star growing up in Sherman Oaks come to such a contorted conclusion?

Blame it on dad.

PCA penned a first-person article for the Player's Tribune in September that spelled it out:

"Growing up in L.A., my dad gave me a couple of rules. 1) I couldn’t root for the Dodgers. 2) I couldn’t root for the Cardinals.

"He’s from Naperville, just outside Chicago. He didn’t force me to be a Cubs fan, but let’s just say it was heavily encouraged."

Read more:Stephen Nelson is now part of Dodgers fans' memories. Here's how he keeps it in perspective

The Cubs won the World Series for the first time in 108 years in 2016. PCA was 14, and he and his dad, actor Matthew John Armstrong, watched Game 7 together on television. Dad cried.

"I don’t think I fully got it in the moment, you know?" PCA wrote. "I was like, Dad, don’t be weird … stop crying. But I’m sure almost every Cub fan of a certain age had tears in their eyes that night. And now, a bit older, I get it."

PCA signed with the New York Mets after being drafted 19th overall out of high school in 2020. He was traded to the Cubs a year later for Javier Báez, Trevor Williams and cash and swiftly rose through the minor leagues, making his Cubs debut in 2023.

Last season he broke out as a bona fide star, becoming the first MLB player to accumulate 25 home runs, 25 stolen bases and 70 runs batted in during the first half of a season. He also cemented himself as the top center fielder in the game.

PCA slumped during the second half and finished with 31 homers and 35 stolen bases to go with a .247 batting average. Although the fans might not have noticed with all the picture-taking and whatever, he has done well in six games at Dodger Stadium, batting .333 with a home run and five RBIs.

But according to his teammate and close friend Nico Hoerner, PCA feels at home in the friendly confines of Wrigley Field.

“That’s one thing that is very cool about him that not a lot of younger players get,” Hoerner said. “He couldn’t have more of an appreciation for the history of the game and playing in Wrigley Field. He’s excited to be a part of the city of Chicago in a way a lot of guys don’t really understand.”

Get the best, most interesting and strangest stories of the day from the L.A. sports scene and beyond from our newsletter The Sports Report.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Pittsburgh Pirates vs. Boston Red Sox, February 24, 2025, 1:05 p.m. ET

Location: JetBlue Park, Fort Myers, FL

How to Listen: KDKA-FM 93.7

The Pittsburgh Pirates are on the road today against the Boston Red Sox looking to grab a win.

Please remember our Game Day thread guidelines.

• Don’t troll in your comments; create conversation rather than destroying it
• Remember Bucs Dugout is basically a non-profanity site
• Out of respect to broadcast partners who have paid to carry the game, no mentions of “alternative” (read: illegal) viewing methods are allowed in our threads
• The commenting system was updated during the summer. They’re still working on optimizing it for Game Day Threads like ours. If you don’t like clicking “Load More Comments”, remember that the “Z” key can be your friend. It loads up the latest comments automatically.

BD community, this is your thread for today’s game. Enjoy!

No TV covereage today, but the game can be heard through the radio.

First pitch is 1:05 against the Minnesota Twins at Charlotte Sports Park.

Here are the lineups. For the Phillies:

For the Marlins:

¯_(ツ)_/¯

Let’s talk about it.

The only player in this year’s top twenty that joins our rankings from another major league organization, Alex Hoppe has received more coverage this offseason than he’s likely ever gotten in his life. In what will be his third stand alone article in the span of three months, our staff placed Hoppe 16th in the Mariners system as he’s yet to debut and has full prospect status. If you’ve read the prior articles on him, there’s probably going to be some rehashing here. If not, fantastic! Welcome to the Alex Hoppe experience.

Hoppe, a 2022 sixth rounder out of UNC-Greensboro, has an intriguing array of stuff in his arsenal. With velocity being his primary calling card, Hoppe leans on a 98 MPH fastball that’s peaked as high as 101, but he’ll mix in a cutter at 93, slider at 88, and changeup at 89 as well. For a pure relief prospect, the arsenal here is rather complete; Depending on what the M’s seem to be intrigued by (postulated on here by our own Nick Vitalis), there’s a ton of stuff to work with from a developmental standpoint.

On the field, Hoppe worked to a 4.76 ERA in Triple-A this past year, an admittedly not good mark. This, however, is ameliorated slightly by his 3.83 FIP and 27.9 K%. The walks are a major problem still (12.3 BB% last season), but at least there’s some swing-and-miss to his game that makes the control issues more bearable.

This is assuredly not a finished product at present (something that doesn’t necessarily bode well for a now 27 year old), but the makings of a good pitcher is in there somewhere. The fastball-slider combo looks promising enough to work with, and swapping his subpar cutter in favor of his changeup looks like some low-hanging fruit that could lead to quick results. The borderline extreme over-the-top release point is another interesting tidbit with Hoppe that will be something to note moving forward; he’s a mold-breaker from the Seattle norm in that respect.

Now with one Mariner appearance under his belt this Spring Training (no need to look at the box score), Hoppe has officially made his organizational debut and will likely serve in an up-down bullpen role over the next several years. Even as somewhat of a mystery product, a reliever with three option years that can top 100 MPH is certainly not a bad thing to have in the system. Hopefully he can take to the teachings of the pitching lab to heart and find new levels of success with his new home.

One of the calling cards of the David Stearns era has been a glut of relievers brought it, called up, sent down, designated for assignment, released, waived, purchased, or otherwise moved around the fringes of the Mets’ organization. While for some folks, myself included, the constant churn can seem like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic at points, the process allows the Mets to get looks at a ton of pitchers and decide if those pitchers have a role in the team longer-term than just the inning or two that is directly in front of them.

In that regard, the Mets seem to like Kevin Herget quite a bit. Over the past 18 months, the Mets have acquired fellow Bergen County, NJ native Herget thrice: claiming him off waivers from the Reds after the conclusion of the 2024 season, signing him as a free agent in mid-July after his first stint with the Mets and subsequent stint with the Braves ended, and then signing him again to a minor league deal in December.

Now, to be fair, the Mets don’t like him that much, as he only threw 12 total innings for the big league club in 2025, and they designated him for assignment twice. The DFAs have more to do with roster construction than anything else; the fact that he was brought back each time is more of an endorsement than the releases were a referendum on his talents.

In his limited time in the majors, Herget only had one appearance that could be classified as bad, and that was when he was left in too long in a laugher against the Tigers. He didn’t strike out a ton of batters, but he limited damage and was dependably giving the Mets at least an inning, if not multiple innings, in each appearance. His final Mets line was a 3.00 ERA in 12 innings over six appearances with six strikeouts and three walks.

His numbers didn’t look too different in Syracuse either (2.81 ERA over 32 innings with 35 strikeouts and eight walks). Simply put, he limits hard contact with a mostly three-pitch mix of four seam fastball, cutter, and changeup. The fastball average velo was just 92.1 mph in 2025, which is not what you’d expect from a right-hander out of the bullpen, but he makes it work.

The question remains to be seen if he can make it work for any extended period of time in the majors and, just as importantly, if the Mets will give him the opportunity to answer that question. Herget is out of options, so if the Mets call him up, he’s going to really have to prove his worth to not have the same DFA shuffle happen again. And while his skillset is certainly useful, with limited bullpen roles, a soft-tossing righty without big strikeout numbers is going to be a hard sell.

Prior to beginning this deserved evisceration, this author would like to clarify that she is not related to Angels GM Perry Minasian (so far as she knows). She is proudly related to Raffi Minasian, who, when pressed into attendance, scrolls on Instagram and asks every half inning when they’re going to throw hot dogs to him. 

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim should be extremely grateful to the Colorado Rockies for existing. Hopefully Bradley Blalock got a fruit basket, at the very least, because the Rockies pitching staff were often the only thing standing between the Angels arms and the very cellar of most FanGraphs leaderboards. They had the highest BB/9 rate of any team in baseball, ranked second-highest in HR/9, put up a walk rate of 9.9% and tallied all that into a cumulative 6.4 fWAR (29th overall). As John pointed out yesterday, they certainly weren’t helped by the worst defense in baseball, but it was much more Felix the Cat running while holding a bomb than Félix Hernández.

To address these issues, this off-season Minasian opted to employ a strategy inspired by Armenians at any family gathering, and many nerds online: Remembering Some Guys.

Notable Transactions

Out: LHP Brock Burke, LHP Tyler Anderson, RHP Kenley Jansen, RHP Connor Brogdon, RHP Kyle Hendricks, LHP José Quijada, LHP Andrew Chafin, RHP José Ureña
In: RHP Grayson Rodriguez, RHP Alek Manoah, LHP Drew Pomeranz, RHP Kirby Yates, RHP Jordan Romano, LHP Brent Suter, LHP Jayvien Sandridge, RHP Huascar Ynoa, RHP Shaun Anderson, RHP Nick Sandlin, LHP Tayler Saucedo, RHP Kaleb Ort, RHP Angel Perdomo, RHP Hunter Strickland

Italics = Minor League Deals with Spring Training Invite

Here to tell you the story of the Angels’ off-season additions is Jake, an aspiring screenwriter whose favorite films include Transformers, Transformers: Age of Extinction and Armageddon.

We open on Yusei Kikuchi in the weight room at Angels Stadium, sweat pouring down his face.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

A screen recording of Grayson Rodriguez’s extensive injury history page, with the voiceover of Rodriguez telling a reporter that he didn’t go through a physical before being traded to the Angels.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

Alek Manoah throwing 89 MPH fastballs in Buffalo, New York.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

Jordan Romano’s entire 2025 season on 6.9x speed.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

Soft focus zoom into the gray hairs of Kirby Yates’ beard.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

Soft focus zoom into the gray hairs of Drew Pomeranz’s beard.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

Soft focus zoom into the gray hairs that would grow in Brent Suter’s beard.

SMASH CUT [plus explosion sound]

This picture

Fade to black

Starting Rotation

According to ZiPS, José Soriano is slated to be The Quiet Place of the rotation, with old friend Kikuchi as The Quiet Place II and Detmers rounding it out as Bumblebee. Beyond those three, it’s all just various iterations of The Purge.

There’s an argument to be made that the Angels’ 1-3 in their rotation represent the team’s most noble, respectful tribute to baseball in the 2026 season. The ceiling isn’t terribly high, but the holes are patched and it keeps you dry. But in 2026, you need more than three starting pitchers, and while Rodriguez, Manoah and Dana offer a little more clearance for your noggin, you’re going to need a few buckets handy in the event of a storm. It’s easy to see some upside here – Rodriguez had surgery in August to remove the bone spurs in his elbow that he claimed were the root of 2+ years of injuries and struggle, Manoah sat 93-94 in his debut Spring Training outing, Dana is still just a baby and Gregg Klassen is waiting in the wings like the Midwestern pitching version of Zach Neto. It’s also a thin line for competence and a generous promenade of risk.

I’m not here to pass judgement on my fellow 90’s babies, but I’m also not out there every day trying to hurl my arm around like a kid with one of those sticky hand toys. That’s a lotta 30-somethings in that table, to say nothing of the injury histories that get those names beeping like a metal detector being swept along the basin of the Trevi Fountain. This bullpen is the 2003 version of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre – the source material is haunting, but the remake lacks oomph or necessity.

To be honest, at this point I can’t tell if I’m more tired of making Michael Bay references or just considering the Angels franchise. It likely skews towards the latter, but I’ll take some blame myself. As the Halos know better than any, it’s tough to be a Michael.

The Dodgers on Tuesday take on the Cleveland Guardians at Camelback Ranch. Here are the active players for the fourth game of the Dodgers’ spring, including Freddie Freeman at first base in his first Cactus League game this year, just as he planned.

Lineup

Miguel Rojas SS
Kyle Tucker RF
Will Smith C
Freddie Freeman 1B
Teoscar Hernández LF
Andy Pages CF
Alex Freeland 2B
Nick Senzel 3B
Keston Hiura DH

Gavin Stone starts on the mound in his first game action in 542 days, after missing the entire 2025 season after surgery on his right shoulder.

Other pitchers

Justin Wrobleski, Edgardo Henriquez, and Paul Gervase are slated to pitch on Tuesday, as are non-roster invitees Ryder Ryan, Wyatt Mills, and Antoine Kelly.

From minor league camp, Antonio Knowles (wearing uniform number 05), Roque Gutierrez (89), Kelvin Ramirez (91), and Nicolas Cruz (93) are also active.

Other position players

Michael Siani is the lone position player on the 40-man roster available in reserve, along with non-roster invitees Ryan Fitzgerald, James Tibbs III, Josue De Paula, Zyhir Hope, Kendall George, Chris Newell, Noah Miller, and catchers Seby Zavala, Griffin Lockwood-Powell, Eliézer Alfonzo, and Nelson Quiroz.

Up from the minor league side are infielders Elijah Hainline (90) and Jake Gelof (06).

1928
The future third baseman for the 1959 pennant-winning White Sox, Bubba Phillips, was born, in West Point, Miss. Phillips originally came to the White Sox from Detroit, in a 1955 swap for Virgil Trucks. He played for four seasons on the South Side, covering his most productive seasons in the majors; all told, it was just 5.4 WAR, but his stints for the Tigers and Cleveland in his career both finished as negative-WAR efforts.

Phillips put up an impressive 2.7 WAR in 1957, but lost his starting job to Billy Goodman in 1958. Regaining the role in 1959, Phillips had a modest season but hit .300 for the White Sox in the 1959 World Series.

1948
White Sox GM Les O’Connor sent pitcher Eddie Lopat to the Yankees for three players. 

Lopat was a soft-tossing, off-speed pitcher who won 50 games in four years with the Sox, twice having an ERA off less than 3.00. He would quickly develop into one of the aces on the Yankees dynasty of the 1950s, winning 113 games in seven-and-a-half years. He also went 4-1 in World Series play.

Of the players the Sox got in return, only pitcher Bill Wight had any success on the South Side, winning 34 games in three seasons.

It wasn’t really a lost deal, though. Another one of the players acquired, catcher Aaron Robinson, would be sent in November 1948 to the Tigers for a youngster named … Billy Pierce. Pierce would win 186 games in a White Sox uniform from 1950-61, fourth-most in franchise history.

1966
Future White Sox (oh, OK, Mets) pitcher Tom Seaver, who had been taken in the first round (but just No. 20 overall) by Atlanta in the January draft, signed for $40,000. However, because Seaver’s USC season had already begun, the righthander was not allowed to turn pro (MLB and the NCAA understood such poaching would play havoc with college rosters). Because USC then made Seaver ineligible to play (having signed with the pros), baseball commissioner William Eckert set up a special drawing to place Seaver with a team; any team willing to match at least the original $40,000 bonus could throw their names into a hat, and Cleveland, Philadelphia and the Mets did so. Floundering New York won the drawing — yes, literally having their name picked from a hat — and the ascendance of the New York Mets began.

Eighteen years later, the White Sox defied custom and selected the future Hall-of-Famer as free agent compensation, resulting in almost two full, successful, swan-song seasons for Seaver on his way to Cooperstown.

1978
Perfect game defensive hero Dewayne Wise was born in Columbia, S.C.

Forever a part-time player, Wise was called up to the White Sox in 2008 and was a standout in the ALDS loss to Tampa Bay, slashing .286/.375/.857 over three games. He achieved his White Sox immortality, however, by securing an impossible catch in his first play as a defensive replacement in the ninth inning of Mark Buehrle’s 2009 perfect game.

2019
A backstop who had a relatively rare two stints with the White Sox, John Romano, died in Naples, Fla.

Signed by the White Sox at age 19, Romano moved up from D-ball to the majors over four seasons, making his debut on Sept. 12, 1958 vs. the Yankees. “Honey” was a part-timer behind incumbent starter Sherm Lollar, and without apparent playing time ahead the Sox sent Romano to Cleveland as part of the ill-fated Norm Cash deal to re-acquire Minnie Miñoso after the 1959 pennant.

After five seasons in Cleveland, Romano came back to the White Sox as part of a three-team deal that also netted Tommy John and Tommie Agee. The catcher had two solid seasons as a White Sox starter in 1965 and 1966 before getting traded to St. Louis, where 24 games for the Cardinals in 1967 would end his MLB career.

Sebastian Walcott underwent successful internal brace surgery on his elbow last week, per the beats.

This is good news, as Walcott’s damaged UCL did not need the full Tommy John replacement surgery, which would involve a longer recovery time than the internal brace surgery. With what the Rangers are indicating is an expected 5 to 6 month recovery time, Walcott should be able to resume playing before the minor league season is over, though I anticipate he’ll be limited to DH duties upon his immediate return.

Walcott, who doesn’t turn 20 until next month, was a consensus top 10-20 prospect in MLB prior to the injury. Walcott slashed .255/.355/.386 as one of the youngest players at AA Frisco in 2025. While primarily a shortstop so far in his professional career, Walcott profiles as a likely third baseman or right fielder in the majors, assuming that there are no long-term effects from the elbow surgery.