One of the best parts about Spring Training is getting an early look at the Statcast data for MLB stars, breakout candidates, top prospects and elite international players making the jump to the Major Leagues.
Not every ballpark in Florida and Arizona is currently equipped with Statcast tracking, but we still see plenty of interesting numbers from around the league that show us who might on the verge of big things in the upcoming season.
Let's take a look at whose numbers have jumped off the page in 2024. Here are 12 Statcast standouts from Spring Training so far.
1) Elly De La Cruz, Reds -- 111.7 mph, 470-foot HR
The Reds phenom reminded us of the ridiculous things he can do on a baseball field with a 470-foot blast on Saturday. That's longer than any home run he hit in the big leagues as a rookie in 2023 (although De La Cruz's 119.2 mph, 467-foot homer on Sept. 26 came close). Cue the hype train for the 22-year-old's big breakout in 2024.
2) Spencer Jones, Yankees -- 109.2 mph, 470-foot HR
Jones, who's MLB's No. 84 prospect entering 2024, delivered a 470-footer of his own for the Bronx Bombers. The Yankees already have two of the most likely players in baseball to crush that long of a home run in Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Judge. Their upcoming 22-year-old lefty slugger, who stands 6-foot-6 and 235 pounds, apparently has Judgian power himself.
3) Jung Hoo Lee, Giants -- 99.7 mph double, 109.7 mph HR in same game
The Giants' marquee addition this offseason is giving us a preview of the bat that made him the 2022 Korean Baseball Organization MVP. Lee's swing is built to line doubles into the gap, like he did leading off the game for San Francisco on Thursday. But he also can rip the ball out of the park, like he did on his 109.7 mph, 18-degree, 418-foot line-drive home run in his next at-bat.
4) Tarik Skubal, Tigers -- 97 mph avg. fastball velocity/99.6 mph max
Skubal is a trendy dark-horse Cy Young pick in the AL thanks to his dominant run down the stretch last season. His early spring performance is only making those picks look even better. The left-hander added significant velo in 2023, when he averaged just under 96 mph on his fastballs and topped out at 99.2 mph. He's already above those marks in Spring Training.
5) Eury Pérez, Marlins -- 98.0 mph avg. fastball velocity/99.9 mph max
Pérez was electric when he debuted for Miami last season. He'll only be 21 in 2024, and his stuff is already overpowering hitters in the Grapefruit League. Pérez is regularly flirting with triple digits, including a 99.6 mph strike he pumped in to Mets slugger Pete Alonso and a 99.3 mph strikeout he got against the Cardinals' Dylan Carlson.
6) Chris Sale, Braves -- 14.5 inches avg. slider break/20 inches max
Sale looks like he's gotten the sweep back on his signature slider. Last year, the left-hander wasn't getting as much break on his slider as he used to -- he averaged "only" 11 inches, compared to the 14-15 he averaged in his most dominant seasons with the Red Sox. Well, he's back to that level in Spring Training with the Braves, and Sale even got a strikeout in his spring debut on a slider that broke 20 inches.
7) Hurston Waldrep, Braves -- splitter with 87.3 mph avg. velo/574 rpm avg. spin rate
People were raving about Waldrep's splitter after MLB's No. 90 prospect mowed down the Blue Jays lineup with it on Saturday. The 22-year-old right-hander fires that splitter in the upper 80s, but with a very low spin rate that creates the "tumbling" action that makes hitters swing over the top of it. If he were in the Majors, Waldrep would be throwing the lowest-spin splitter in the league, and the only one close to his in both velo and spin would be Félix Bautista's (88.6 mph/904 rpm). That's an incredible comp.
8) Bryce Warrecker, Yankees -- sweeper with 21.6 inches avg. break
Warrecker's sweeper looks absolutely disgusting. The Yankees pitching prospect threw three of them in his first Grapefruit League outing, and here's how that went: 17 inches of sweep for a called strike … 22 inches of sweep for a second strike … 26 inches of sweep for a K. Not even the sweepiest sweepers in the Majors average as much break as the 22-year-old 20th-round Draft pick from 2023.
9) Evan Carter, Rangers -- 29.9 ft/sec sprint speed on infield single
The No. 5 prospect in baseball and the breakout postseason star for the World Series champs is off to a flying start to Spring Training. We saw Carter's five-tool talent on full display last October, and it's good to see the same tools on display again as the 21-year-old enters his first full season. Carter showed his speed in Texas' springtime World Series rematch against the D-backs last Tuesday, when he beat out an infield hit with a 29.9 ft/sec sprint speed, right on the border of the elite 30-plus ft/sec range. Carter is also doing things like lining base hits off the otherwise unhittable Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
10) Harry Ford, Mariners -- CS with 1.87 second pop time
Ford is MLB's No. 38 prospect and the No. 4 catching prospect, and his arm is one of his best tools. The 21-year-old will be a valuable counter to the run-happy environment across baseball if he keeps making throws like this. Ford caught Rockies prospect Sterlin Thompson stealing with a 1.87 second pop time on Friday. The MLB average pop time to second base is 2.00 seconds. And that's just one of Ford's caught stealings this spring.
11) James Wood, Nationals -- 109.7, 111.6 mph HRs
Wood has already crushed three home runs in Spring Training but only two with Statcast tracking. Those two were rockets, including a 111.6 mph opposite-field shot off Cardinals veteran Kyle Gibson on Thursday. We know Wood has big-time power -- that's the standout tool for the No. 14 prospect in baseball -- and it's been fun to see it in action already from the 6-foot-6 lefty-swinging outfielder.
12) Nate Pearson, Blue Jays -- splitter K at 87 mph/577 rpm/16 inches of run
Spring Training is always a testing ground for new pitches. The splitter is one of the biggest pitches to watch in 2024. And that brings us to Pearson: The fireballing reliever revealed a new splitter in his Grapefruit League debut, and it looked nasty.
Pearson struck out David Dahl with the one splitter he threw, and that high-velo, low-spin splitter had some serious fade to it.