Tuesday, April 22

Greetings from the land of Ohio ballclubs and broken-down airplanes: beautiful Goodyear, Ariz.! I’m Anthony Castrovince of MLB.com, bridging the transition from Mandy Bell, who is movin’ on up to do big things in youth baseball content for MLB, to our new Guardians beat reporter, who will be announced very soon. I covered the Cleveland club from 2006-2010. But today we’re not going to talk about the past (such as the Jason Michaels/David Dellucci left-field platoon or Mike Rouse’s chances of cracking the Opening Day roster). We’re going to talk about a huge piece of the Guardians’ future.

Australia is a grounding place for Travis Bazzana. He goes to his native country during the holidays to decompress. To walk along the beach. To take the family dog -- a border collie/Labrador mix named Rebel -- to the park. To relax after the long baseball year.

But Bazzana’s trip home this offseason was a little different, because this was his first time Down Under since he had been taken over everybody else in the MLB Draft after a standout career at Oregon State University. And the weight of being Australia’s first baseball player selected in the first round -- let alone No. 1 overall -- hit the 22-year-old Bazzana when he was asked to speak at a gathering of players and fans of the Sydney Blue Sox, the Australian Baseball League team he played for from 2018 to 2021.

“People came out to see me, to get autographs, to listen to me speak,” Bazzana says. “It was special to see the impact and know that young players there have someone to look up to.”

Here in his first professional Spring Training, where he’s working out among the big leaguers as a member of the Guardians’ “depth camp” roster, Bazzana is not put on such a pedestal. Sure, he might be carrying the lofty “1-1” label and ranked as the No. 10 prospect in the game per MLB Pipeline. But on the back fields, fielding fungoes and taking batting practice off a machine, he’s just another player getting his reps in.

“It’s a learning game,” he says, “but it comes back to having the right respect for yourself, for others in the game and carrying yourself with energy and intention.”

If Bazzana sounds like a thoughtful young man, it’s because he is. This reporter caught up with him at Single-A Lake County last summer, shortly after the Draft, with the intention of writing a feature story. It instead became a straight Q&A because there was really nothing I needed to add to Bazzana’s thorough responses about his mental preparation and pregame routine.

The Guardians’ chief decision-makers were similarly blown away by their pre-Draft meeting with Bazzana. In a pool that did not feature a runaway No. 1 in the mold of a Bryce Harper or Stephen Strasburg, Bazzana asserted himself not just with his play but his process.

So here’s our first look at that process in Spring Training. Make no mistake that just because the Guards have a host of more immediate options to sort through for their second-base opening doesn’t mean you won’t see Bazzana in Cactus League play.

“It’ll be fun for everybody,” manager Stephen Vogt said. “Anytime you’re a 1-1, you know there’s going to be eyes on you. But he doesn’t seem to let that affect him. He’s a very curious learner, he’s highly motivated to be great, and he’s a sponge.”

Bazzana learned a lot from the two months he spent at Lake County last summer. He struggled with the adjustment at first but soon caught on to help the Captains win the Midwest League crown. He finished with a .238/.369/.396 slash in 27 games.

“While I still had an enjoyable first month, I was scrapping,” he said. “When I stepped in the box, I didn’t have it. That’s just the truth. What I learned was you’re always going to be put in different environments in baseball. You might get traded or sign with a new team. There’s so many different things that are external. So you have to come back to the things you can control. Once I got my feet under me and got back to the routines I trusted, I played more freely and everything came along.”

It will be fascinating to see how quickly it comes along in 2025. With the way prospects move in today’s game, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that the Guards’ No. 1 pick from 2024 joins their big league club by the end of 2025.

That would be a big deal not just for this organization but all of Australian baseball.

“When I play freely and am playing with that edge of wanting to win and playing for the guy next to me, good things happen,” Bazzana said. “I’m not saying this in an arrogant way, but, if I’m doing that, there’s not going to be much stopping me. … If I can do that every day, it’s not going to take long.”

Preparing for your fantasy league? Or just want to size up the Guardians’ competition? Our projected Opening Day lineups and rotations for every team should help. Be sure to keep hitting refresh all spring.

Old pal Terry Francona (who, by the way, looks tanned and rested) is  setting some big goals for the Reds’ star shortstop Elly De La Cruz.

Speaking of Elly, he’s one of 12 players on the rise entering ’25.

While we’re on the subject of the future faces of the Guards, you are hereby advised to pay particular attention to left-hander Doug Nikhazy in this camp. The 6-foot, 210-pound lefty was added to the 40-man roster over the winter, but his first exposure to the big leaguers actually came last fall.

“He came up and threw against us in the layoff [between the regular season and the ALDS against the Tigers],” Vogt said. “He’s a driven, fiery, feisty young guy. I mean, just competitive.”

Nikhazy split his 2024 season between Double-A Akron and Triple-A Columbus, compiling a 2.98 ERA with a 1.09 WHIP after significantly reducing his walk rate. The Guardians’ rotation picture is very much in flux, and Nikhazy could push himself into the picture this year. He also has the arsenal and temperament to potentially be a bullpen option.

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