MLB Spring Training: Teams Gear Up for 2025 Season

Major League Baseball is back. Well, at least it’s coming soon…the 113-day wait is almost over with Spring Training games starting this week.

Although Spring Training doesn’t officially start the season, players will be playing full-length games that fans can attend and stream online.

Teams are separated into 2 leagues by the state they play in, the Cactus League and Grapefruit League. The Cactus League resides in Arizona and the Grapefruit League will play in Florida.

The Cactus League includes the following teams:

The Arizona Diamondbacks, Athletics, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Guardians, Colorado Rockies, Kansas City Royals, Los Angeles Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers, Milwaukee Brewers, San Diego Padres, San Francisco Giants, Seattle Mariners, and Texas Rangers.

The Grapefruit League includes the following teams:

The Atlanta Braves, Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, Detroit Tigers, Houston Astros, Miami Marlins, Minnesota Twins, New York Mets, New York Yankees, Philadelphia Phillies, Pittsburg Pirates, St. Louis Cardinals, Tampa Bay Rays, Toronto Blue Jays, and Washington Nationals.

Reporting dates vary for each position, with pitchers and catchers reporting first. This year, the earliest a player could arrive was Tuesday, February 11th. The only exceptions were the Cubs and the Dodgers, who could arrive on Sunday, February 9th due to their season starting earlier in the Tokyo Series.

The first full workouts happen Monday, February, 17th for most teams this season. Full workouts don’t only those who are predicted to be on the 40-man roster, but also some minor leaguers in hopes of getting offered a spot on the roster and preparing for their minor league season.

Spring Training statistics don’t count toward a team or player's official records or stats. Spring Training is simply to get these players back in the groove of playing games and to try and get ahead of the curve based on what they see from the other teams they play.

One perk of Spring Training is the content posted by the sports teams and news outlets on social media. Since Media Day takes place during Spring Training, the content tends to be full of player personality before the stress of the season kicks in. Fans get to see what their favorite players are like or get to know new players their favorite team has acquired during the trading period.

The first Spring Training game will be in Phoenix, Arizona. The Cubs and the Dodgers will face each other at 3:05 pm EST on February 20th.

Similar to the first Spring Training game, the last Spring Training game will include the Dodgers, but they will be playing the Angels in Anaheim, California for a short exhibition series.

The last day of games concludes just in time for the regular season, which starts on Thursday, March 27th. The first game of the regular season will be the Yankees playing the Brewers at Yankee Stadium at 3:05 EST.