This was a boring spring training wrapped around an exciting World Baseball Classic.
Camps opened with the worry that we were at the onset of a hamate bone injury epidemic, but Francisco Lindor and Arizona’s Corbin Carroll made it back for Opening Day with time to spare, Baltimore’s Jackson Holliday is not far behind and it turned out the hysteria about this injury running wild was overstated.
As opposed to most springs, the injury bug generally was not as huge a storyline, though the Braves’ rotation was overwhelmed by injury, the Blue Jays took on some setbacks of significance and the Twins lost a key trade candidate in Pablo López for the season when he needed Tommy John surgery. Mainly, though, teams — including the two New York squads — are getting to the starting line healthy.
The controversies in spring mostly revolved around the WBC — how much Tigers ace Tarik Skubal should have pitched, whether American manager Mark DeRosa knew the rules of the tournament, how much passion the U.S. team did (or didn’t) display and the non-handshake between Mariners teammates Randy Arozarena on the Mexican club and Cal Raleigh for the Americans.
