Miami Palms Blog

 The Palms have a last preseason set of games at home against the Atlanta Braves before the season starts, but Spring Training is over, and the season is nearly here. It's hard to correlate results in the spring to how they will go in the regular season, but some players that had good springs see themselves on the roster, including rookie Matt Koch and reliever Braden Shipley.  The opening day starter is scheduled to be Jarod Lantz, while the Palms also are unexpected to make many modifications to the opening day lineup, with a healthy regular starting lineup, with even the bench coming into the season unfazed.  This is a good way to enter a season, and the team certainly hopes to carry that energy forward. Here's to a great season!

 Opening day looms closer and closer, and the Palms are set with their 25 man unit. There aren't many surprises as to who made the team, but a prospective opening day lineup (barring injury or other issues) seems to be floating around out there. It is seen below. RF Frank Sohn C Yasmani Grandal 1b Pat Grant 2b Jaspero Gonzalez DH Edwin Encarnacion 3b Chris Korb CF Travis Jankowski LF Nick Markakis SS Yairo Munoz The Palms will start at home against the Boston Red Sox on March 28th.

 The Palms came into the offseason looking to shore up their pitching rotation, the catching spot and short stop. Finding starting and relief pitchers took some effort, but was patched up on in free agency via many different avenues. They grabbed Yasmani Grandal an Wellington Castillo to function as backstops, but the short stop position left many questions unanswered. Yairo Munoz is a natural shortstop but he has played around the diamond in his career. Brock Holt is also an accomplished utility man. Instead of regular short stop, it seems like the Palms might platoon there. They called up Matt Koch, and he is expected to fill in at times there too. It was announced this week, though, that Munoz is expected to get the majority of the playing time at short. The free agent acquisition from St. Louis has acquitted himself nicely this spring, and the Palms hope a full season out of the youngster is a low priced revelation.

The Palms are grinding through Spring Training, but they have made at least one decision for opening day in Boston a couple weeks from now. Jarod Lantz will be the opening day starter for the second year in a row, thanks to his sustained success and status as a home grown player. Manny Parra will start the second game of the season, with Dylan Bundy, Erick Fedde and Blake Johnston filling out the rotation for at least the first several starts.