Kuzul

When Chicago Cubs slugger Kyle Schwarber tore his ACL and LCL on April 7 after colliding in the outfield with Dexter Fowler, it wouldn’t have been a surprise if a few fans reached for a defibrillator.

Hysteria consumed parts of a tortured Cubdom on social media, with some fans panicked that the promising Cubs’ 2016 season was trashed. But that was just an overly emotional reaction.

Chicago quickly plugged the hole in its lineup, has remained one of baseball’s upper-echelon offenses and looks just as likely to end its 108-year World Series drought as it did prior to the Schwarber injury.

Disclaimer: Of course, the Cubs are worse without Schwarber from a talent standpoint. Losing a player of his caliber would hurt any team. It would be illogical to suggest otherwise.

But great organizations don’t allow injuries to derail a hopeful season.

Schwarber is more of a luxury than a necessity on this loaded Cubs roster. His loss doesn’t make them less of a contender to win the division. Winning is what counts—not the totality of talent on the roster by season’s end.

The Cubs only need to look to recent history to see that a key injury isn’t insurmountable, as just last year the St. Louis Cardinals lost ace Adam Wainwright for most of the campaign but still won the National League Central.

Chicago is in an even better position to lose Schwarber than St. Louis was when it lost its ace, as it can lose the 23-year-old without noticing it statistically. Heading into Monday night’s game, the Cubs were second in MLB with 71 runs scored, 14 behind the Cardinals. Chicago beat St. Louis 5-0 at Busch Stadium and closed the gap between the teams. The San Francisco Giants slipped into second in runs scored with 77, but the runs are still abundant.

The hallmark of the Cubs is their depth.

Top to bottom, this lineup can hurt any team. Shortstop Addison Russell hit the go-ahead home run in the eighth inning of the Cubs’ home opener against the Cincinnati Reds. He was the team’s No. 7 hitter that night.

Monday, it was Fowler, the leadoff hitter, who smashed a home run in the sixth inning to break a scoreless tie. The 30-year-old has been a key piece in the early going, as he’s hitting .378/.500/.711 with three home runs, 10 RBI and 10 runs scored.

Outfielder Matt Szczur has also provided some punch in 11 games, hitting .357/.471/.643.

Yet even as players try to fill Schwarber’s void, the focus is on this offense’s untapped potential.

Right fielder Jason Heyward (.188), second baseman Ben Zobrist (.217), first baseman Anthony Rizzo (.174) and third baseman Kris Bryant (.250) have all performed terribly at the plate this season. They are supposed to be the Cubs’ best offensive players—and likely will be by the end of the campaign.

But even as they struggle, Chicago continues to score, which speaks to the quality depth on the roster.

This team is built like Game of Thrones. You may have thought the show would take a nosedive after the “Red Wedding” (non-Thrones watchers, Google “Red Wedding Game of Thrones”) when so many popular characters were killed off. But the show remained highly rated as new, interesting characters were introduced.

Schwarber went out, and promising prospect Jorge Soler assumed a bigger role.

When the Cubs signed Heyward and re-signed Fowler this offseason, Chicago relegated Soler to the bench as the fourth outfielder. After Schwarber was hurt, he reclaimed his starting spot.

Yes, Soler has started slow. His numbers dipped to .216/.311/.378 on Monday. But given the small sample size, the expectation is that Soler will return to the .262/.324/.399 hitter he was last season.

And at times, he could be the player who set an MLB record last year by reaching base safely in his first nine postseason plate appearances.

The team also recently welcomed back Javier Baez, a once highly rated shortstop prospect, who will be turned into a super-utility player to try to maximize his number of at-bats. The hole left by Schwarber will allow Baez to see starts in the outfield, and he’s been spelling Zobrist at second base thus far.

The Cubs activated him from the 15-day DL on April 15 after a short rehab assignment in Triple-A Iowa, and he has made an immediate impact in eight at-bats.

After singling in the ninth inning Monday in a pinch-hit appearance, Baez saw his numbers jump to .500/.500/.625 over three games. He will need to prove he can consistently play at a high level, but in the time Schwarber has missed, Baez has been a spark plug.

There’s even more talent for manager Joe Maddon and president Theo Epstein to use.

Catcher Willson Contreras, the sport’s No. 48 prospect, according to MLB.com, is expected to make his debut this season. He provides the Cubs insurance should catchers Miguel Montero or David Ross get hurt.

Schwarber, who will have surgery on his knee this week, according to Maddon (via Mark Gonzales of the Chicago Tribune), was expected to mostly play left field but also was the third catcher on the roster.

No team travels on a straight road to the playoffs. But it appears every turn leads to October for the Cubs. Emotions have settled in Chicago as the Cubs have maintained their offensive power in Schwarber’s absence.

At times this season, he will be missed. Maddon may wish he had that left-handed power to use.

But as long as the Cubs offense still plays well, it won’t matter.

No one cares who’s credited with the RBI or scores the runs. The Cubs have a roster full of players who can do both.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Talk baseball with Seth by following him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

We saw a lot of old and new during Week 2 of this baseball season, but little in between.

MLB’s youngest grabbed this week’s headlines, whether it was Bryce Harper reaffirming his status as the face of baseball or rookies Trevor Story, Jeremy Hazelbaker and Kenta Maeda continuing stellar freshman campaigns.

The old came in the form of discussion over Pablo Sandoval’s weight—a storyline that has followed the third baseman at every stop in his MLB career. Fan safety again was in the spotlight, a question that is getting old and one that desperately needs an answer.

Then, there was also a storyline that fused the two: The old, rundown Cubs clubhouse morphed into a futuristic, new locale for its players that looks like an athlete’s version of Disneyland.

Begin Slideshow

Johnny Cueto’s tenure with the San Francisco Giants had begun in earnest just a few hours prior with his 2016 debut, a start against the Milwaukee Brewers at Miller Park in which the right-handed pitcher guided his team to a 2-1 win.

As is customary in every winning clubhouse around baseball, music was blaring as a caucus of media members surrounded Cueto’s locker. The awaiting contingent eyeballed Cueto near the visiting team’s cafeteria. A reciprocal gesture acknowledged he was coming.

Cueto walked into the center of the circling reporters and then bobbed his head toward a Giants staffer, indicating he would like the music turned off, knowing it could pose problems for the upcoming Q&A session.

It might seem like a benign request—or one players might think is self-promoting if they didn’t otherwise know Cueto. But his willingness to kill the music, typically reserved for a more senior member of the organization, speaks to his comfort in the San Francisco clubhouse.

His play that night validated what the Giants thought when they signed him this offseason: Cueto is capable of carrying the team on any given night.

“I felt comfortable with my teammates from day one since I signed the new contract,” Cueto said through a translator.

“It’s normal in me. I felt very comfortable from day one. I’m going to be here for a very long time based on the contract that I signed. So that’s just my personality.”

Cueto has two wins in as many starts for the Giants—both of which went seven innings. He allowed six hits and just one earned run in his season debut, but he needed the Giants to come through offensively after allowing the Los Angeles Dodgers five runs in the first inning of his second start on April 10. And they did.

Of course, two games, including a particularly bad start to his second, won’t earn Cueto exalted status in the Giants clubhouse. And if the team were living in baseball’s version of Siberia, there would still be questions about Cueto’s capability as a starter.

But this organization knew Cueto and ace Madison Bumgarner could form one of baseball’s best starting pitching tandems long before he donned an orange and black jersey.

From 2011 to 2014 with the Cincinnati Reds, Cueto had a cumulative ERA of 2.48. In the three seasons he has pitched at least 200 innings, the 30-year-old has had a WAR of at least 4.1, according to FanGraphs.

Belief in Cueto is grounded in his history of success, his 4.35 ERA in a 13-start stint with the Kansas City Royals last year notwithstanding (though it should be noted his WAR last season was 4.1).

Giants manager Bruce Bochy is so convinced of his capabilities that, early in Cueto’s first start, he made a move specifically because he knew who was on the mound.

With the score tied at 1-1 in the bottom of the third inning, one out and the Brewers‘ Jonathan Villar on third, Bochy brought his infield in. As a result, when right fielder Domingo Santana grounded to San Francisco shortstop Brandon Crawford, the Giants were able to throw Villar out at home. That saved what would have been the go-ahead run.

Typically, such a move wouldn’t be made so early in the game, especially with a Giants offense capable of scoring in bunches. The Giants currently lead all of MLB with 50 runs scored.

Limiting an opponent from generating big innings is typically the strategy for teams heavy on offense. 

The conventional theory: Early in the game, conceding a run to get an out—by playing the infield at normal depth—likely doesn’t matter. Also, bringing in the infield risks a soft single and the potential start of a big inning.

Bochy thought differently with Cueto on the mound.

“I thought it would be a tight ballgame,” Bochy said. “But, worst case, I have confidence in Johnny to get out of it.

“He just keeps a calmness about him in traffic, and he showed it tonight. He doesn’t panic.”

The team’s comfort with Cueto may stem from his even-keeled personality. But the pitcher’s confidence in his team lies in his willingness to work quickly.

In both of his starts, Cueto, as he has with his other MLB teams, worked very quickly in between pitches. That’s an indication that he is comfortable with Giants catcher Buster Posey, rarely disagreeing with a sign. Otherwise, we would see drawn-out pitching sequences.

His first start lasted only two hours, 29 minutes. Despite the high run total, his second start lasted 3:07.

It’s like two actors with great chemistry. They don’t need many takes to get a scene right. While it is a small sample size, if there were chemistry issues between Cueto and Posey, we would see them early.

“I just enjoy the pace that he works at, really quickly, and I think anybody on defense appreciates that, whether you’re catching or in the field,” Posey said.

“From the start of spring training, he kind of came in with a plan. He didn’t feel like he needed to come in and impress anybody.”

But that’s what he has done, nonetheless.

The four other starters—Bumgarner, fellow offseason signee Jeff Samardzija, Jake Peavy and Matt Cain—pitch every fifth day regardless of who is in the rotation.

Obviously, they never play with one another.

But Cueto’s experience gives the other pitchers a sounding board—someone who has knowledge on how to pitch to different lineups in different situations.

Remember, this is a guy, despite an overall disappointing tenure with the Royals, who pitched a complete-game two-hitter in Game 2 of the World Series last year.

“It helps everyone out, and aside from just having guys that have been around and can pitch and have been very successful, just being able to talk to each other in the clubhouse,” Bumgarner said. “When you got guys with a lot of experience and a lot of success, chances are they’ve faced adversity and had problems here and there and been successful.”

There aren’t many guarantees in baseball. And Cueto isn’t one of them. But already he has proved how great he can be for a team eyeing the World Series.

No question: A big season from Cueto could get it there.

San Francisco is hoping its right-hander has to turn down that music many more times.

All quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise specified.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Talk baseball with Seth by following him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

If you haven’t heard of the Texas Rangers’ Rougned Odor, you will soon. Consider this your advance notice on baseball’s next great second baseman.

People have saddled Odor with great expectations since he skipped rookie ball and went straight to Single-A at 17 years old. He made his MLB debut in 2014 and hit a disappointing .259. Last season, he hit only two points better.

But the belief in Texas is that in 2016, Odor will leap closer to becoming the All-Star second baseman the organization expects. Just ask Michael Young, a Rangers special assistant who played in Texas for 12 seasons, including seven All-Star campaigns.

When asked on SportsDayDFW’s Ballzy podcast about what could stop Odor this season, Young offered this:

Maybe the Zika virus? Nothing. I mean this guy is an absolutely… I think he’s just a fantastic player. I think the sky is the limit. He has every skill you could possibly ask for. You combine that with his work ethic, his mentality, his approach to the game, his aggressiveness, the obvious enthusiasm he has for the game and the sky really is the limit. I think the biggest thing — and this isn‘t a knock, this is just an experience thing — he’s a very young left-handed hitter. … I’m a huge fan of this kid, have been since day one and I expect him to really build on what he did after his recall last year.

Traditionally, a player’s third season is when he makes the biggest jump.

Young’s average went from .262 in his second full season to .306 in 2003. For the next four seasons (2004-07), Young hit at least .313.

Los Angeles Dodgers second baseman Chase Utley, who spent the first 12 seasons of his career with the Philadelphia Phillies, saw a similar jump in his third year when he hit .291. That was 25 points up from his second season.

Generally, there is a two-year adjustment to major league pitching.

There are some, like Robinson Cano and Jose Altuve, who made an instant impact as rookies. Even in Altuve’s third full year, he saw his average jump from .283 to .341.

But at 20, Odor was younger than all of those players when he made his debut.

Young argued in the same interview with Ballzy that a young hitter just needs more time to see top-flight big league pitching.

And this spring, Odor proved he had learned through his struggles. He hit .349/.349/.698 with a team-leading four home runs to go with 11 RBI.

So far this season, Odor has struggled at the plate with only one hit in 10 at-bats, but he has still managed to score three of Texas’ 10 runs. Plus, three games isn’t a large enough sample size to judge whether he has improved.

His struggles through three games may be, in part, due to him moving throughout the lineup. With his speed, Odor is a natural top-of-the-order hitter.

Odor’s performance in the spring is a greater indication of where he is as a player.

The power he showed this spring, however, caused the Rangers to hit him fifth for a game and seventh for two more. A player doesn’t prepare the same, from a scouting standpoint, regardless of where he is hitting in the lineup.

Different spots see a different number of breaking balls.

Even as he’s struggled at the plate, though, Odor has proved to be a toolsy player. He contributes heavily on defense. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News reported Odor made several impressive defensive plays in the Rangers’ first three games.

Odor turned 22 on Feb. 3. Remember: He is playing in his third major league season at an age when some enter the draft.

There’s still time—plenty of it.

Loaded with talent apparent to both the Rangers and observers this spring, Odor can be expected to become baseball’s next great second baseman.

And as far as this promising, young Ranger is concerned, consider yourself introduced.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Talk baseball with Seth by following him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Get used to the ear-to-ear grin Los Angeles Dodgers starting pitcher Kenta Maeda flashed for almost the entirety of his major league debut against the San Diego Padres on Wednesday.

We saw it before his second at-bat in the fourth inning. A late arrival to the on-deck circle prompted a Little League-like jog to the batter’s box. He beamed as he took his stance.

His lips widened even further moments later when he smashed a home run off opposing starter Andrew Cashner.

That homer came before Maeda gave up his first major league run. In fact, we’re still waiting for it after the Japanese rookie allowed five hits and no runs in six innings of work.

By the way, he also smiled when manager Dave Roberts told him his night was done.

“I was a little nervous at first,” Maeda told Andy McCullough of the Los Angeles Times. “But my teammates scored four runs for me. That really relaxed me a lot.”

Maeda’s debut was just the latest installment in an opening series in which the Dodgers have looked as good as any team in baseball. Not only did Los Angeles sweep the Padres, but it held San Diego scoreless in all 27 innings.

Sure, the streak has come against the Padres, who are likely to be one of baseball’s worst offensive teams. But it’s difficult to shut out any major league club over the course of three games.

The Dodgers take that streak, a franchise record to begin a season, into a four-game set with the division rival San Francisco Giants that opens on Thursday in the Bay Area.

But among a litany of positive developments in the Dodgers’ first series of the season, Maeda’s ace-like performance should draw the most applause. Prior to Opening Day, there were concerns about Maeda. He doesn’t have an overpowering fastball. That much was confirmed as the right-hander flirted with the low 90s all night.

But his complement of breaking pitches, which twist and turn like a roller coaster, preliminarily answered any questions about whether he had top-of-the-rotation stuff. Of course, he will have to consistently play to that level over several more starts.

As debuts go, however, the Dodgers couldn’t have asked for a much better outing.

And Wednesday’s performance put distance between the Dodgers and the memory of Zack Greinke, who spent three seasons in Los Angeles before signing with the Arizona Diamondbacks this offseason.

Ace Clayton Kershaw and Greinke had formed one of baseball’s best pitching duos, and Los Angeles had the money to sign Greinke. It has more cash than any MLB team, thanks to a multi-billion dollar television deal. But the Dodgers decided not to increase their offer for Greinke, allowing him to go to Arizona.

That left questions about who might fill the void.

But after Wednesday’s performance, one that saw Maeda allow only one baserunner through the first three innings, concerns over who will complement Kershaw could begin to dissipate.

After putting runners on the corners with one out in the fourth inning, Maeda induced two straight outs to pitch out of his most threatening jam of the night.

The Dodgers still have to overcome a litany of injuries to their starting rotation. Brandon McCarthy (recovering from Tommy John surgery) and Brett Anderson (herniated disc surgery) are on the 60-day disable list. Hyun-Jin Ryu is out after undergoing surgery on his left shoulder.

Further performances like Wednesday’s by Maeda would help alleviate some concern while the Dodgers await the return of some of their starters.

While Wednesday night was about Maeda, the Dodgers have been baseball’s headliner this week. The entire team seems to be clicking. A season ago, hamstring issues limited Yasiel Puig to just 79 games. Questions about his commitment and attitude also followed him, underscored in this piece by Bleacher Report’s Scott Miller.

But through three games this season, Puig is hitting .600/.692/1.300. He has four RBI, a homer and two triples—just one shy of his triples total in 2015. Wednesday, he was on the steps of the dugout and enthusiastically cheering on his teammates. That should help abate any questions about commitment or clubhouse chemistry for the time being.

Three games is a small sample. Puig will need to prove he is a more committed teammate over the course of the next couple of months. But he seems to be on the right path, given his performance and demeanor these last three outings.

Rookie shortstop Corey Seager has been immune to the hype that follows baseball’s No. 1 prospect. He is hitting .357 with two RBI for a Dodgers team that has scored 25 runs in three games.

The team’s offensive performance has overshadowed its defense.

The Dodgers have committed only one error in 2016. That came Wednesday when Maeda overthrew first base on a bunt single by Padres third baseman Yangervis Solarte in the second inning.

“They didn’t really stress him at all,” Roberts said of Maeda pitching with runners on base, per McCullough.

So far, that’s all that hasn’t gone as planned for the Dodgers. Apparently, Maeda isn’t the only player who should be smiling.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Talk baseball with Seth by following him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Perhaps Jose Bautista sounded the alarm in spring training when, not shockingly, he told reporters he would not offer the Toronto Blue Jays a hometown discount.

Toronto is not Bautista’s hometown. For the record, that’s Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Nor has anyone purported him to be such a lover of Canadian bacon that he would take less money to remain a Blue Jay.

Nonetheless, Bautista offered coupon-clippers this: “Doesn’t exist, not in my world.”

Baustista was a big part, but not nearly the sum, of the Blue Jays offense in 2015, MLB’s best. But for a Toronto fanbase jonesing for a perennial contender since the organization won back-to-back World Series titles in 1992 and 1993, Bautista underscored an ugly reality.

This is a do-or-die year for this offensive juggernaut.

Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion and reigning AL MVP Josh Donaldson combined to form one of the greatest power-hitting trios in baseball history last season. Yet by the end of this season, they could go the way of the Beatles—breaking up for the sake of financial gain.

Donaldson won’t become a free agent until after the 2018 season, but Encarnacion will join Bautista in free agency this winter. Like his teammate, he will assuredly seek a big payday after finishing a team-friendly deal.

The Blue Jays likely won’t be able to sign all three to long-term contracts. If one of the three departs, their offense won’t be nearly as potent.

Last season, they were only the fourth trio in MLB history to each hit at least 39 home runs in a season. Donaldson hit 41, Bautista 40 and Encarnacion 39.

The Blue Jays were the second team in history to have three players each hit at least 20 homers after the All-Star break, according to Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet, courtesy of the aforementioned trio. Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez and Moises Alou did the same for the 2004 Chicago Cubs.

Of Toronto’s MLB-best 891 runs in 2015, Donaldson, Bautista and Encarnacion drove in 348, accounting for 39.1 percent of the Blue Jays’ run production. They hit a combined 120 of the team’s MLB-best 232 home runs.

This scenario is kind of like the hit 1990s drama Beverly Hills, 90210.

The show revolved around the home of the Walsh family. When the producers knew they had to write the last of the Walshes, Brandon (played by Jason Priestley, who elected to leave), off the show, the producers had to know the decade-long hit wouldn’t survive. It remained on the air for another season and a half, with the Walsh house a central location. But it seemed disingenuous without a Walsh actually living in it. The show took a strange arc and awkwardly ended.

This is all to say Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins should be able to relate to Beverly Hills, 90210 creator Aaron Spelling. Atkins’ Walshes are Bautista, Encarnacion and Donaldson.

Toronto is a hit now, but it may not be by this time next season.

The Rogers Centre may look the same aesthetically if any of the three leave. But the otherworldly power numbers are what has been buzzworthy about watching a game there.

Given the rare history of the trio’s 2015 performance, recreating that kind of power is nearly impossible.

“I’m happy where I’m at today and try not to put too much stock into a lot of stuff,” Donaldson told MLB.com’s Richard Justice during spring training. “I’ve got an opportunity to play the game I love and cherish. So I’m never going to take that for granted. There’s still a lot of unfinished business to do. But at the same time, with what we did last season, it makes everybody else’s goals in here a lot more believable.”

Bautista, Donaldson and Encarnacion each play to a level that commands at least $20 million annually. In 2016, however, they are making $14 million, $11.65 million and $10 million, respectively, according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts.

It makes sense for the Blue Jays to try to re-sign Bautista and Encarnacion this winter. But if they had unlimited funds, there would be no fear of either player leaving Toronto for a bigger contract. That’s not the case.

The Blue Jays do have Russell Martin and Troy Tulowitzki signed to long-term deals. Both are solid hitters and get on base. Each has had a season in which his on-base percentage broke .400. But neither has elite power.

With either player hitting in the power spots in the lineup, the way in which Toronto scores runs would drastically change. That is if the team didn’t altogether see a drop in its scoring.

Some organizations, given the Blue Jays’ circumstances, might look to their minor league system for replacements. But Toronto’s farm system is drier than a seminar on crude oil prices.

In Baseball America’s latest ranking of minor league systems, Toronto sits 24th. But even in examining the Blue Jays system as its own entity, there isn’t much offensive help on the brink of major league stardom.

Only two of Toronto’s top five prospects are position players, according to MLB.com’s rankings. Outfielder Anthony Alford is due to be promoted to the majors next season. But the organization’s next-best position player prospect, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., isn’t expected to make his major league debut until 2020.

Toronto’s situation is similar to what other great teams around the league undergo. Stars eventually leave, either via retirement or free agency, and teams must retool their rosters.

With that scenario nearing for a Blue Jays team that has World Series aspirations, the future is now.

This roster is down to its final out.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

The New York Yankees bullpen had a biblical feel to it at the start of spring training. We knew it was general manager Brian Cashman’s creation, but it seemed as if a higher power put it together.

In reality, it was a serious off-field problem and a failed trade with the Los Angeles Dodgers that allowed the Yankees and Cashman to pull off an offseason trade that brought flame-throwing left-handed closer Aroldis Chapman to the Bronx. He joined Andrew Miller and Dellin Betances to form a three-headed monster that had the potential to be one of the best relief trios baseball has seen.

They looked unhittable on paper. Now, less than a week away from Opening Day, the Yankees bullpen just looks paper-thin.

First, Major League Baseball suspended Chapman, set to be the team’s closer, for 30 games after an alleged domestic violence incident. Then on Wednesday, the team announced that after throwing only one pitch in the bottom of the seventh inning of a game against the Atlanta Braves at Disney World, Miller suffered a chip fracture in his right non-throwing wrist when a line drive hit him.

Let’s call the Chapman suspension the result of his own alleged behavior. What happened to Miller was daggone bad luck.

The Yankees stated, per Mark Feinsand of the New York Daily News, that there was no timetable for Miller’s return and that he would see a hand specialist to “determine the next course of action.”

It’s so unlikely that he’ll be ready for Opening Day that I’ll let Miller drill me with a fastball if I’m wrong. But Superman couldn’t heal from a wrist fracture in less than a week. And clearly after suffering the injury, Miller doesn’t have superhuman strength.

Until then the bullpen is left without a closer. Betances is a career setup guy. Nine of his 10 career saves came last season. With New York’s bullpen at full strength, the plan was for Betances to be a seventh- or eighth-inning guy.

Having both Miller, who had 36 saves last year as the Yankees closer, and Chapman, who has eclipsed 30 saves the past four seasons, had a dual purpose.

Primarily it would have allowed the Yankees to throw a closer at opponents for six outs. Miller, who would finish games on nearly every other major league team, would pitch the eighth inning. Chapman would close. And on days when Chapman needed rest, Miller could close. Or one could fill in should the other become hurt.

Or in Chapman’s case, suspended.

One line drive decimated that plan.

Even after Miller’s injury, though, there’s still evidence that the baseball higher-ups love pinstripes. Any day of the week, the left-handed Miller would prefer an injury occur on his right side.

With his right wrist in a cast, Miller will still be able to work his pitching arm in some capacity. To what degree won’t be understood until more information is released.

Other than that, Wednesday’s news did nothing to reassure the Yankees.

“Anytime you get a line drive, right away I don’t think it’s going to feel good,” Betances said, per Feinsand. “I’m sure right away you’re going to think everything is bad, but when he was in here talking to me, he was all right.”

Until Miller or Chapman returns, whichever comes first, insurance runs will be important to the Yankees.

The less experienced Chasen Shreve will become the team’s left-handed specialist. With Miller out, expect Luis Cessa, Johnny Barbato and Kirby Yates to all make the Opening Day roster.

All three have little major league experience. Yates has pitched parts of the last two seasons in Tampa Bay but has only one save. He posted a 7.97 ERA in 20 games in 2015.

Prior to Miller’s injury, the three pitchers were competing for two remaining bullpen spots. But neither of the three figured to pitch in the high-leverage situations reserved for Betances, Miller and Chapman.

Given that the remaining Yankees relievers are baseball neophytes, Betances is the only choice to close for now.

The good news: Of the 30 games that Chapman will miss to start the season, only nine come against teams that made the playoffs last season.

The Yankees’ bad luck is coming at a good time in their schedule.

With Miller’s injury, though, it’s as if New York had awoken from a dream. Its bullpen was the envy of every executive in baseball.

When the pieces are healthy, it is among baseball’s best. It might even push to be one of the best ever. Chapman and Miller had 69 combined saves in 2015, and Betances is regarded as one of the game’s elite setup men. Both Chapman and Betances have fastballs that have clocked in at over 100 miles per hour.

But for at least the duration of Miller’s recovery, the Yankees relievers might look ordinary if they don’t struggle altogether.

So as New York awaits a timetable on Miller’s return, this bullpen may just want to ask for a little more help from above.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

For a baseball player, MLB spring training is like hand measurements and 40-yard-dash times at the NFL combine. It’s a necessary function of the evaluation process but guarantees nothing about a guy’s future prospects when games get serious.

Likewise, the performance of a team or player in spring training doesn’t indicate anything about how the regular season may end. There have been teams that looked great in the spring but flopped during the season and vice versa.

Spring training is more like a glorified health club than anything that represents high-leverage competition. It’s a means to achieve better performance when the season actually starts. The baseball world is still waiting for a player to earn the moniker “Mr. March.”

But what spring training does provide us is a blueprint for how teams may achieve their playoff goals. Injuries, breakout performances and drama can all indicate—positively and negatively—what action a team may take to chase a division crown.

We won’t come out of this year’s spring training with an idea of who might win the World Series or a division title. However, what may have been a clearer playoff picture when spring began now resembles more of an abstract painting.

Spring training hasn’t told us where the road to the playoffs may turn. But it has given us an indication as to where those turns lie.

Begin Slideshow

Tommy John surgery has become as much a brand name as Band-Aid, Kleenex or Coke. We accept the once-experimental surgery as a surefire remedy to fix a pitcher’s arm.

So it’s understandable why after a year off and having undergone Tommy John surgery, Yu Darvish is facing high expectations from the Rangers. After all, the Rangers won the American League West in 2015 without Darvish, who flashed ace-like stuff in 2013 and 2014 with ERAs of 2.83 and 3.06, respectively.

Now pairing him with Cole Hamels, another ace, makes Darvish the juggernaut in the American League playoff picture.

Darvish is on a standard 14-month recovery from the surgery, which wouldn’t put him in the Rangers lineup until mid-May or June—depending on how many minor league starts he needed to stretch out. Literally, each week in the recovery from Tommy John surgery is planned out because so many pitchers undergo the procedure each year.

But that process has also restricted Darvish from facing any batters during spring training—he has only thrown bullpen sessions and very carefully increased his pitch count.

A Dallas Morning News blog post from Evan Grant says that pitching coach Doug Brocail told him that Darvish would need to throw between 50 and 55 pitches before throwing to a batter.

Darvish’s latest bullpen session went 31 pitches, according to the post.

But Darvish’s start date really doesn’t matter. Whether mid-May or June, when he finally returns to the Rangers, it will be as if a team loaded with playoff-caliber talent had pulled off a blockbuster trade.

Of course, the Rangers would rather have Darvish on Opening Day. Still, given the situation, no other playoff contender will add a player of Darvish’s caliber that early in the year.

It could certainly help to spark Texas regardless of where the team sits in the standings upon his return.

When news first broke in spring training of last season that Darvish had torn a ligament in his elbow and would need surgery, many dismissed the Rangers’ playoff chances. But as it ended up, Texas won the American League West—helped by a midseason trade for Hamels.

Now the team adds another pitcher with ace-like stuff.

The Astros are rightfully the favorite to win the division with a group of talented position players and arguably the division’s best pitcher in Dallas Keuchel. But the Rangers have the division’s best starting pitching tandem in Hamels and Darvish.

Darvish is more than just a “Robin,” though.

The American League West is loaded with talented aces—Oakland’s Sonny Gray, Seattle’s Felix Hernandez and the aforementioned Keuchel and Hamels. But Darvish’s past seasons have earned him the right to be mentioned among them.

Like each of his four division counterparts, Darvish too has posted an ERA in the coveted twos. There’s no caveat needed. This statement doesn’t need to be hedged: The Rangers have two aces on their staff.

Never has there been a time in the American League where pitching has been more important.

Regardless of whether teams added to their starting rotations or bullpens, we saw an emphasis this offseason on playoff contenders adding depth to their pitching staffs. It was an offseason in which the pitching contracts were much higher than that of hitters.

Just look at the seven-year, $217 million contract David Price signed with Boston at 30 years old, while Jason Heyward—said to be the prize among position fielders this offseason—signed an eight-year deal worth $184 million at only 26 years old.

Pitching matters. We saw the Red Sox add Price, but also dynamic closer Craig Kimbrel. The Yankees traded for Aroldis Chapman, which gives them one of baseball’s best bullpens. The Orioles signed starter Yovani Gallardo.

Obviously, Darvish was not a free agent this offseason. But he can have the same impact as a quasi addition.

Predicting Darvish’s impact on the 2016 Rangers is as easy as looking at his past performance. Sure, he had a complicated surgery with a long recovery. But so many have successfully returned from Tommy John surgery.

Kerry Wood and John Smoltz had the surgery and pitched successfully as relievers. Tim Hudson also underwent the procedure and continued to be a solid starter for the Braves.

A little Googling reveals that David Wells also had Tommy John surgery as a minor leaguer. And that was in 1985! The procedure and its recovery methods have advanced in the 30 years since.

The Rangers are staking their season in that history.

For Darvish, he may return to the Rangers with a newly constructed arm. But it’s the player of old whose right arm will certainly be felt throughout the American League playoff race.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

If the Los Angeles Dodgers head toward disaster this season, left-handed starter Scott Kazmir won’t be driving the car.

Kazmir is like the guy sitting in the back seat on a long road trip. He has no influence on whether or not you get lost and can only make the ride better by cracking jokes. All he can do is make the Dodgers better.

All of this is to say there’s no need for panic about Kazmir’s disastrous spring thus far (9.39 ERA, decreased velocity). Though he has progressed after two poor starts, according to a report from the Orange County Register‘s Bill Plunkett, it’s unclear whether he will be the shutdown pitcher of old either.

If the offseason signing of Kazmir does bomb, the Dodgers have a backup plan sitting in their minor league system. His name is Julio Urias.

No pitcher in minor league baseball is more exciting than Urias, who, according to MLB.com, has accelerated through the minor league levels faster than any other prospect despite being just 19 years old. The site predicts he will make his major league debut this season.

The Dodgers have handled him with kid gloves. And in this instance, that cliche has never made more sense. This kid has only been able to buy tickets to an R-rated movie for two years.

But age doesn’t determine a player’s ascent. Development does.

From the MLB.com scouting report on Urias:

Not only is Urias the top left-handed pitching prospect in the Minor Leagues, he’s also the most precocious phenom in the game. The youngest pitcher in full-season ball in 2014, he dominated in the hitter-friendly California League as a 17-year old.

[…]

Though Urias needs to develop more consistent control and command — no surprise given his age — he has advanced feel for pitching. He shows an aptitude for altering his arm angle and varying the speed of his pitches. Los Angeles is trying to manage his innings and the expectations for him but may not be able to keep him in the Minors much longer.

His call-up is imminent. A Kazmir flop might simply motivate the Dodgers.

Even at his best, Kazmir is a stand-in for Urias, who should be firmly in the Dodgers rotation in 2017. That’s likely why Kazmir received an opt-out after this season in the three-year, $48 million deal he signed this offseason.

If Kazmir opts out, it means he had a solid season. And if he pitches poorly, it would be as if the team lost him a season early. With Urias nearly ready, it wouldn’t matter much.

Sure, for most teams—heck, for some countries even—eating $48 million wouldn’t be as easy as moving on to a star prospect. But Los Angeles has so much money it could wrap Dodger Dogs in $10 bills and still outspend every team in free agency.

Injuries have decimated the Dodgers rotation. Brett Anderson will be out three to five months recovering from back surgery, according to ESPN.com’s Doug Padilla. Hyun-Jin Ryu is recovering from shoulder surgery, and Alex Wood is just now coming back from a forearm issue.

But money aside, if Kazmir’s velocity continues to drop and he continues to struggle with his command, the Dodgers would have to make a move to stay in the race.

They could make a trade, but with a player like Urias and a deep crop of minor league pitchers that will follow, there is no reason to deplete one of baseball’s best farm systems to add an arm.

Urias was sent to minor league camp last week after struggling in spring training. However, that could have been due to what the Los Angeles Times‘ Andy McCullough deemed a “minor leg issue.”

“He’s been in camp before, but the way his body has matured, his head, I hear he’s a lot more comfortable from people who were here last year,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of Urias. “Just his bullpens have been good, his work’s been good.”

This isn’t a plea to rush Urias‘ development. Obviously, given last week’s reassignment, he won’t be on the major league roster on Opening Day—or probably even in the opening month.

No verdict will be reached on Kazmir after the first month of the season. He will have only started about five games by then. But come June, if Kazmir continues to struggle, Urias easily may have rounded out his development by making those final few tweaks with his command that were alluded to in the MLB.com report.

The Dodgers are running out of arms. They have few options left. Sure, they could look to the trade market.

Given Urias‘ talent, though, it would be hard to find a better option.

Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @SethGruen.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com