2025 MLB Risers And Fallers: Opening Day Edition

Major League Baseball has now played two of its 2,430 games this season with the Tokyo Series complete, which means all we really have are Spring Training stats to evaluate who we need for our fantasy baseball squads. With Opening Day upon us, who has been some of the more interesting risers and fallers?

In the aggregate, Spring Training stats are mostly meaningless, but things like playing time, usage, and lineup spots can be useful information. Players who are buzzy and end up with tremendous or terrible springs are also hard to ignore.

This piece will look at some MLB fantasy assets that have seen their fantasy value rise and fall through the six weeks of Spring Training games with an eye to what they will once games start to matter. ADP reflects NFBC draft position since March 1.

Spring Training Risers

Jonathan India (2B), Kansas City Royals – ADP: 223.2

Jonathan India’s stock has soared since his arrival in Kansas City and the confirmation that he will lead off this season. India hit .388/.475/.592 with 19 hits and six walks in 55 plate appearances this spring, and he looks like an amazing table-setter ahead of Bobby Witt Jr. and Vinnie Pasquantino. India’s normal role will be DH, but he will also slide over to play second base when the Royals face a left-handed pitcher.

Last year was mostly a disappointment for India, although he did hit 15 homers and steal 13 bases to go along with a 12.6% walk rate. But other encouraging signs are there. His strikeout rate has fallen for four straight years. He is just 28, so squarely in his prime, and he is healthy after missing more than 40 games in two of the last four seasons.

Ivan Herrera (C), St. Louis Cardinals – ADP: 207.9

Now that Willson Contreras is moving primarily to a 1B/DH role, it looks like Ivan Herrera will be in line to play in about 110-120 games in 2025. That’s a very encouraging sign for a catcher who hit .301/.372/.428 in 72 games in 2024, and added five homers and five steals. If Herrera becomes a catcher who hits .275 with 15 home runs and 10 steals, he will skyrocket to the top five at the position next season.

Herrera has improved his contact rate in each stage of his MLB journey, and now makes an elite 86.5% of contact on pitches he swings at in the zone. His expected batting average and expected slugging percentage were both over the 90th percentile, according to Statcast and last year his max exit velocity was a career-high 112.4 miles per hour. The tools are all here, and now that the opportunity is around to match it, the sky is the limit for the 24-year-old Cardinals’ backstop.

Garrett Crochet (SP), Boston Red Sox – ADP: 26.8

Could there possibly be a hotter pitcher heading into Opening Day? I certainly can’t think of one. Across 15 2/3 innings, Crochet has allowed one earned run (0.57 ERA) and struck out 30 batters, with just a .228 batting average allowed. He has not allowed a home run and appears primed to be the Boston Red Sox ace in 2025.

It’s no surprise, then, that his ADP (currently at 26.8) is up significantly over the last four weeks. Fantasy managers were intrigued by what he did with the White Sox in 2024 (209 strikeouts in 146 innings), but now they are reaching into the second round at the prospect of more innings and a competent offense behind him.

At just 26 years old, this is a pitcher entering his prime and appears to be a lock for more than 10 wins and at least 200 strikeouts as long as he stays healthy. Is a draft spot at the beginning of the third round too high? If he reaches his potential, we might be drafting him in the first round next year.

Spring Training Fallers

Anthony Volpe (SS), New York Yankees – ADP: 144.7

The realization that the Yankees are likely to bat catcher Austin Wells at leadoff hurts all prospects for Anthony Volpe. It likely bumps him down to the bottom third of the order on many days, depending on where rookie Jasson Dominguez ends up. Volpe also did not do much to help his case by hitting just .208 with a .263 on-base percentage in camp this year. He did steal four bases and hit four home runs, but also struck out 27% of the time.

After debuting with 21 home runs in 2023, Volpe saw a severe drop in power, down to just 12 home runs in 2024. Some of that might have been due to injury, but his zone swing percentage dropped by almost four percentage points, so he needs to get back to going after the right pitches. When the dust settled, Volpe landed in the fringe starting shortstop, more likely Middle Infield range. After some signs of regression in 2024, he is in “prove it to me” mode for 2025.

Willy Adames (SS), San Francisco Giants – ADP: 87.8

If ever there is a poster boy for the contract-year season, Willy Adames is it. Adames had a career year in 2024, and he was able to turn that into a seven-year, $182 million contract with the San Francisco Giants. What he may quickly learn, however, is that hitting in San Francisco will not at all be like hitting in Milwaukee.

After setting career highs with 32 home runs and 21 stolen bases, the 29-year-old Adames is going to see severe drop-offs in both categories, and he is being drafted as such. Considering the home runs, according to Statcast, American Family Field was the sixth-friendliest for hitting home runs over the last three seasons. Oracle Park ranks last in that time for home runs, a full 22 percent below the league average, based on the past three years of data.

We also have to think about his steals from 2024. Looking past the fact that Adames never had more than eight steals in a season before he stole 21 last year, the Giants’ team strategy on running is not nearly the same as Milwaukee’s. The Brewers ranked second in the majors with 217 steals in 2024. The Giants were 29th, with just 68 on the season. Only Minnesota had fewer.

David Bednar (RP), Pittsburgh Pirates – ADP: 194.2

Closer David Bednar was removed from the ninth-inning role in late August in 2024, and Pirates’ manager Derek Shelton has been hesitant to come out and give it to him again. He also hasn’t come out and give anyone like Colin Holderman the role either, so this may be a see-how-it-goes situation to start the year with Bednar and Holderman both getting chances.

Drafters then reacted appropriately, dropping him down to almost pick 200 in the past four weeks of drafts. Despite 23 saves in 2024, Bednar’s ERA ballooned up to 5.77, and he lost 1.5 strikeouts per nine innings as well. His walk rate expanded to more than four free passes per nine innings, and he gave up more fly balls than ever before. He may still luck into 20 saves this season, but there is absolutely no guarantee.