Way Too Early Roster Previews: Sacramento River Cats

Photo Credit: Sacramento River Cats

Rogers Hornsby famously/supposedly said: “People ask me what I do in the winter. I’ll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.”

Perhaps Hornsby was just training his batting eye by following the progress of various snowflakes that floated by his window — although, living in Texas most of his life, that might have been something of a strain. Still, the training technique of staring out the window worked well, seeing as how his .358 lifetime batting average is sixth best all time, and his 170 wRC+ is tied with Mickey Mantle (and just 1 point behind Lou Gehrig) for 11th.

Anyhoo, one or two feet of snow dropped in the low mountains west of me this weekend, which must mean that winter has come. And what this Roger does when winter arrives is think about what the coming year’s affiliate rosters might look like.

Which means that the time has come for my annual “way too early” roster previews! And it is, definitively, way too early! So much is left unknown about the inventory of players, come April. Will the Giants somehow find a way to sign both Juan Soto and Aaron Judge (presumably a scenario involving a time heist), while trading for Francisco Tatis, Jr., thus pushing Heliot Ramos back to Sacramento? Could happen! You don’t know!

More likely, they’ll sign a whole bunch more minor league free agents (two new arms arrived just last week — you’ll meet them later in this post), waive a few players who haven’t made the hoped-for progress, potentially both lose and gain players in the minor league portion of the Rule 5 draft, and maybe even swing a big trade or two. Wouldn’t that be exciting? The offseason has barely begun, and many names will come and go before we arrive at Opening Day.

But the unknown is no curative for my impatient curiosity. Rosterbate we must, and rosterbate we will! And, because the affiliate structure is a holistic system, we must build in order. I’m going to start from the top, which is the place most likely to be impacted by the winter’s moves, and build downwards so we can see where the various roster pressures are likely to be along the way.

So today, we take a look at the ever-changing roster (or maybe not, in the post-churn Posey Era) of the 2025 Sacramento River Cats.