After months of waiting and offseason maneuvering, Major League Baseball’s Spring Training gets going in earnest this weekend with teams taking the field for Grapefruit and Cactus League games in Florida and Arizona respectively. The first pitch of Spring Training was thrown on Thursday when the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs faced off for the first game.
It’s still a little less than a month until MLB’s regular season gets going at the Tokyo Dome in Japan when the Dodgers and Cubs meet again in the season’s first series on March 18 and 19. But the next few weeks in Florida and Arizona are still chock full of storylines.
Here are five things to watch as Spring Training gets into gear.
Juan Soto trades Yankee pinstripes for Mets blue-and-orange
The offseason’s most intense drama saw one of the game’s most impressive young players trade the Bronx for Queens as Juan Soto signed the biggest contract in American sports history to become a New York Metropolitan.
Soto helped lead the New York Yankees to the World Series in 2024 and finally reached free agency after the season, igniting a long-awaited bidding war. A year after Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani set the bar with a 12-year, $700 million contract, it was clear Soto was looking for something even bigger – and well-deserved, given that he has over 200 home runs, almost 600 career RBIs and a .285 batting average… oh, and he’s still only 26.
The Mets’ billionaire owner Steve Cohen made that dream a reality. Soto’s contract, reportedly for 15 years and a whopping $765 million, makes him the highest-paid player in US sports and likely guarantees that he’ll finish his career as a Met. It also shifted the power dynamic in New York baseball as the Mets showed their ability to flex financial muscle that the Yankees couldn’t match for one of the first times ever in the cross-town rivalry.
Soto will play his first games as a Met as the team kicks off its Spring Training schedule this weekend, giving Mets fans their first look at a lineup that puts the lefty slugger alongside shortstop Francisco Lindor, first baseman Pete Alonso, catcher Francisco Álvarez, and outfielders Brandon Nimmo and Starling Marte. After pushing the star-laden Dodgers to six games in last year’s National League Championship Series, it’ll be a preview of a year where the Mets seem to be World Series or bust.
The defending champion Dodgers seem to only get stronger
The Los Angeles Dodgers are a juggernaut. And they’re only getting stronger.
The defending World Series champions added Roki Sasaki, the Japanese pitcher who was arguably the second biggest free agent prize this year after Soto, to a rotation that ended up being patchwork toward the end of the 2024 playoffs thanks to injuries to multiple starters.
Sasaki will be added to a rotation that includes Yoshinubu Yamamoto – the Japanese star who was the big acquisition for the Dodgers’ rotation ahead of the 2024 season and proved to be worth every penny – and returning stars Clayton Kershaw, Tyler Glasnow, and, later in the season, Ohtani.
The two-way star tore the UCL in his elbow in 2023 and was forced to become the team’s designated hitter in 2024. Focusing on just his hitting, Ohtani put together an unprecedented 50-50 season with 54 home runs and 59 stolen bases to win his third career MVP award. He might not return to the mound to face opposing hitters until May, but the Dodgers will hope to have the fully operational Ohtani Death Star when he does.
The most significant departures from the World Series team are second baseman Gavin Lux – who was traded to the Cincinnati Reds in January – and pitchers Walker Buehler and Jack Flaherty, who signed for the Boston Red Sox and Detroit Tigers respectively. Outfield slugger Teoscar Hernández and fan favorite Kiké Hernández both signed deals to return. First baseman Freddie Freeman is healthy once again after he powered through an ankle injury to a World Series MVP-winning performance in October.
All this to say that there will be quite a scene to watch for Dodgers fans visiting Camelback Ranch in Arizona over the next month.
Teams across the league looking to make the jump into contention
The best thing about Spring Training is that every team has newly sprung hope of playing baseball when temperatures dip back down in the fall.
For fans in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Boston, Minnesota, Arizona, Washington, DC, Chicago’s north side and Texas, the 2025 season represents an opportunity for their teams to jump into the race for the playoffs as they’ve either made major free agent acquisitions or are hoping young stars mature into game changers who can lead their franchises to the playoffs.
The Arizona Diamondbacks (starting pitcher Corbin Burnes, first baseman Josh Naylor), Boston Red Sox (starting pitcher Walker Buehler, third baseman Alex Bregman), Chicago Cubs (outfielder Kyle Tucker, closer Ryan Pressley) and Texas Rangers (outfielder Joc Pederson) all made major free agent signings or trade acquisitions that they are hoping will put their squads back into contention for a major October push. All those teams were disappointed not to make the playoffs last year and used the offseason to retool their squads.
The Pittsburgh Pirates, Cincinnati Reds, and Washington Nationals didn’t make any headline-grabbing moves during the offseason but are hopeful that their years-long rebuilding processes bear fruit in 2025. All of the teams are bursting with potential in young stars – starting pitcher Paul Skenes in Pittsburgh, Elly De La Cruz in Cincy, and James Woods in Washington – who are aiming to make major strides in the coming year. But one question still lingers prominently: can teams that don’t spend mega-dollars compete throughout the whole season as money is flying around the major leagues like never before?
The Yankees reload without Soto
Speaking of money – the New York Yankees made the most of theirs this summer, even if they missed out on resigning Soto.
The reigning American League champions signed first baseman Paul Goldschmidt and starting pitcher Max Fried and acquired outfielder Cody Bellinger and reliever Devin Williams in trades in the weeks following Soto signing with the Mets. They were moves aimed at shoring up weak spots that were revealed in the World Series showdown with the Dodgers in October when relief pitching and lineup depth proved the difference as Los Angeles rolled the Yankees early in the series and then rallied in the decisive Game 5.
With Gerrit Cole anchoring the rotation and home run king Aaron Judge returned to his place as the most feared hitter in the Yankee lineup, the Bronx Bombers are expected to be the pacesetters in the AL East again this year. Fresh blood from outfielder Jasson Domínguez and a full year of infielder Jazz Chisholm Jr., who provided a jolt of energy and life after being acquired at the trade deadline last year, will be a big help as well.
But with the Baltimore Orioles looking to make the most of their contention window with their team of young stars and the major moves this offseason by the Red Sox, there is plenty of talent in the division to keep the Yankees looking in the rear-view mirror.
The Houston Astros face a daunting new era
The Astros’ run as the dominant force in the American League over the last decade ended emphatically last year when they were bounced in the playoffs by the Detroit Tigers at home in the wild-card round.
The offseason saw an exodus of some of the team’s stalwarts. As mentioned above, Kyle Tucker and Alex Bregman left town for Chicago and Boston. Justin Verlander, who returned to the team in 2023 after a brief sojourn with the Mets, signed with the San Francisco Giants after barely featuring down the stretch in 2024 thanks to injuries. Closer Pressly was traded to the Cubs.
The only major addition to the roster was Christian Walker, expected to be the team’s new first baseman.
Altogether, it was an offseason that signaled the end of an era for a franchise that had gone to four World Series since 2017, won two of them and made it to the AL Championship Series every year between 2017 and 2023. Some stalwarts remain – Jose Altuve is still the second baseman, Yordan Álvarez is still the most feared hitter in the lineup and Framber Valdez remains the team’s ace on the mound.
But even with those talents, it might time for the Astros to face the music: rebuilding comes for every franchise at some point, no matter how much recent success the team has enjoyed.
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