Cleveland Sports Forum

Cleveland Guardians Make Roster Moves With 4 Players

Tommy Wild

Partner

The Cleveland Guardians cut their Spring Training roster to 44 players following recent moves.

The Cleveland Guardians continue to cut down their big-league Spring Training roster as Opening Day gets closer and closer. The organization made a series of roster moves on Sunday, involving four of its players.

Optioned To Triple-A: Johnathan Rodriguez

Johnathan Rodriguez was optioned to Triple-A on Sunday and will start the season at the Minor League level.

The outfielder came into Spring Training with a big opportunity to make an impact, and possibly even make his way onto the Opening Day roster. Cleveland only has four right-handed hitters on its 40-man, including J-Rod, and they still need more balance in the lineup.

Rodriguez didn’t have a bad Spring Training. He did log six hits in 22 at-bats, for a batting average of .273. However, none of those were extra base hits, which is really what the Guardians need out of a player with his skillset if he's going to occupy a spot on the Major League roster.

Rodriguez remains an option in the outfield at the big-league level, but there are other players who will get some run before him.

The Guardians reassigned two catchers, Kody Huff and Cooper Ingle, to Minor League camp as part of their roster moves on Sunday.

With Bo Naylor competing in the World Baseball Classic, the Guardians needed some more depth behind the plate. But Bo is back in Goodyear, so reassigning this pair to keep them working makes the most sense.

As for Ingle, even though his time at big-league camp is over, he impressed quite a few people during his stint, including manager Stephen Vogt.

“What we're seeing from Coop is, obviously, we know this kid can hit, and he works extremely hard at that, but we've seen growth behind the plate this spring,” said Cleveland’s skipper late last week.

“Just from his work, in practice, the things he's diving in with Sandy while he was here… this kid's super athletic, and he did a great job last year, taking a step forward in his game planning. Were hoping he continues that down that path. We're very excited for Cooper's future.”

Dayan Frias recently re-joined the Guardians after spending the last few weeks with Team Colombia in the World Baseball Classic. He’ll continue to get his spring work in with the Minor League group.

After all of these moves, Cleveland's Spring Training roster is now down to 44 players.

<

I guess this means that Fairchild has a good shot at breaking camp with the Guardians after his homer today.

<

Bo's breakout? Why a toe tap could power Naylor in '26

GOODYEAR, Ariz. -- By putting his front foot down, Bo Naylor began to put his best foot forward offensively this past season.

Amid an up-and-down 2025 season, Naylor worked thoroughly on his hitting mechanics, with an effort of simplifying his lower half to help get his best swing off more consistently. And though his final numbers weren’t what he would have hoped, he enjoyed a strong finish that inspired confidence in what his ‘26 could bring.

“I think Bo's just scratching the surface of the hitter he can be,” manager Stephen Vogt said earlier this spring. “Everybody develops at a different clip. … I think he's putting himself into a position to have a big breakout year."

Literally and figuratively. Naylor pivoted from a leg kick to a toe tap in August. In September, he was one of the Guardians’ top hitters as they surged to the AL Central title.

“We don't get to the playoffs without Bo Naylor at the plate last year,” Vogt said.

Naylor endured a tough first few months of 2025; he had a .623 OPS before the All-Star break. Along the way, he and the Guardians’ hitting team were methodically working on adjustments. Hitting is extremely hard as it is; a lot of it is mental and having a good plan when you get into the batter’s box.

Naylor felt good about that side of things last season. The work he needed to do was physical, as far as getting his body in the right spots to execute his plan.

“That was kind of the missing piece,” Naylor said. “September, I think that was a good indication of strides in the right direction of being in the right positions and actually being able to go out there and execute the plan that we had gone into the at-bat with.”

Naylor was a few weeks into using a toe tap when September rolled around; he first implemented it on Aug. 15. In 91 games before that point, he slashed .174/.278/.360 with a 12.4 percent walk rate, a 24.8 percent strikeout rate, an 80 wRC+ and a 35.9 percent hard-hit rate.

In 19 games in September, Naylor slashed .290/.324/.548 with a 5.8 percent walk rate, an 18.8 strikeout rate, a 136 wRC+ and a 48.1 percent hard-hit rate. More recently, he hit .353 (6-for-17) with one homer in four games representing Canada at the World Baseball Classic.

“The mechanical change he made last year was huge for him,” Guardians hitting coach Grant Fink said. “He had struggled in the past at finding consistency of being on one leg. When he got that front foot down, it just gave him comfort in being able to move more aggressively without feeling like he was out of control.”

Fink noted Naylor doubled down on that work this offseason and worked hard on his path in the batter’s box. The toe tap was new to Naylor last season, but not to him as a player. He said he used one as a two-strike approach while he was in high school, but went away from it in pro ball.

Given his experience with it, it was a relatively seamless adjustment.

“I was able to kind of get back to those feels,” Naylor said, “and get comfortable with it a lot earlier than I think I would have if I didn't have a little bit of background with it before.”

Naylor is entering his third full big league season. Since his MLB debut on Oct. 1, 2022, he’s logged a .670 OPS in 1,041 plate appearances. But development is never linear in baseball, and we’ve seen flashes of what Naylor can do, including in September.

Naylor building on his September and taking a big step this season would be huge for the Guardians. They brought back largely the same position player core as 2025, when they had a poor season collectively at the plate.

That means the Guardians need Naylor and others to take a step this year.

“With him as well as a lot of people, it's just about consistency,” Fink said. “You saw these flashes through periods of time where you're like, ‘Man, this kid can really hit.’ I think this is the first time in his life -- and he'd even tell you this -- that he left the offseason knowing that his lower half was in a place that he wanted it to be.

“He wasn't searching anymore. He had something he's confident in, and now he could just go double down on that and come back confident in that. That's a superpower right there, just being confident in what you're doing and not having to double think things."

Tim Stebbins covers the Guardians for MLB.com.

<