How the starting right fielder position battle is going so far during Spring Training

The Darkhorse: Michael Toglia

Toglia is a former first round pick coming with tons of pedigree and upside. Fans want to see the Rockies hit on a first-round pick and create a superstar. After seeing Toglia's struggles, a lot of fans were worrying that the Rockies selected yet another high strikeout bat that couldn't hack it at the major league level.

Toglia has dominated in the minor leagues but was awful in his short stints in 2022 and 2023. Combined he has 272 plate appearances, with just six home runs and he is running a career strikeout rate of nearly 35%. His career wRC+ is just 41, and coming into Spring Training, he looked like he would be on the outside looking in, needing more work at Triple-A to control the strikeouts.

This spring has been a very good one for Toglia. The former top prospect is hitting .318 with two home runs, and though the strikeout rate is still high (32%), he looks a little more comfortable at the plate. He has put up an insane 172 wRC+, and yeah, I know, it's just 10 games, but he is hitting the ball hard! Toglia is a surprisingly good defender in right field and if he keeps this up throughout Spring Training, we could see him steal the starting job from Sean Bouchard.