In the home stretch. Two more weeks until opening day.
There don’t seem to be may surprises in Surprise. Nobody is coming out of nowhere to turn heads. No dark horse is emerging. No Austin Bibens-Dirkx stories.
Clayton Blackburn could have been that story. He has had the ignominy of being called up to the major leagues twice in his career only to never make it into a game. He started off the spring looking like he could turn some heads but reality and injury damped that enthusiasm.
Destin Hood seems to be making a name for himself. Maybe not big enough to make the jump to the major league team, but he is holding out faint hope. Hood’s been around the block, though. To begin with, he’s 27. He appeared in 25 games for the Marlins in 2016. Nothing spectacular. So this is probably a case of a good Triple-A player having a good spring facing Triple-A pitching.
It hasn’t been a spring of surprises. Mostly one of sorting the pitching. Who goes where? Who will stay?
The Rangers have two more weeks of shuffling the deck. And that’s about the best metaphor I can come up with for spring training. It’s as thrilling as watching someone shuffle cards.