Chris Holman welcomes back Zac Clark, General Manager, Lansing Lugnuts, Lansing, MI.
Watch Zac and Chris discuss Lansing Lugnuts updates for 2025, MSU rivalry, Sacramento Athletics news & how baseball boosts Mid-Michigan’s economy. 
#Lugnuts in the YouTube video shared below:
There were several questions Chris had for Zac in this conversation:
Athletics affiliation is at an interesting time, tell us about Sacramento?
So Zach your season is just underway, remind Michigan about the Crosstown Rivalry with MSU?
What sort of economic impact for Mid-Michigan should we expect from this season?
What are the other sneak previews you can give for 2025?
Can you speak to your ties with local companies like LAFCU, Jackson, and the associated philanthropy that comes out of this?
LANSING, Mich. – The Lansing Lugnuts’ 2025 roster will have local fans shouting the Michigan State rallying cry of “Go Green! Go White!” for a different reason: The Nuts will be led by Athletics hitting prospects Rodney Green and Tommy White, topping a roster with five Top 30 A’s prospects and 16 beloved returning Nuts.
The 29th year of Lugnuts baseball, led by new manager Darryl Kennedy, begins with the Crosstown Showdown against Michigan State at 6:05 p.m. on Tuesday, April 1, at Jackson® Field™ before the Nuts open the Midwest League season on the road at Fort Wayne on Friday, April 4.
Top Prospects: While first-rounder Nick Kurtz opens the season in Double-A, the 2025 Lugnuts boast the A’s next four selections in the 2024 draft. The 40th overall pick, third baseman Tommy White, was nicknamed Tommy Tanks for his prodigious blasts at Louisiana State, slugging 75 total home runs and driving in 249 runs across three college seasons. Southpaw Gage Jump was rated California’s No. 1 pitching prospect coming out of high school, attended UCLA, transferred to LSU, and was drafted 73rd overall as a compensatory pick; he makes his professional debut this season in the Lansing starting rotation. Shortstop Joshua Kuroda-Grauer, drafted in the third round, batted .428 at Rutgers last season to rank second in the nation and earn the honor of Big Ten Player of the Year. And outfielder Rodney Green, the A’s fourth-round selection in 2024, swatted 34 home runs and stole 45 bases during his three years at Cal, becoming the latest in the Lugnuts’ line of remarkable power-speed outfield prospects alongside Lawrence Butler (2021-22), Denzel Clarke (2022), Colby Thomas (2023) and Henry Bolte (2024).
MLB Pipeline ranks White the A’s No. 8 prospect (and top third base prospect), Kuroda-Grauer at No. 11, Jump at No. 15 and Green at No. 21.
A fifth highly-regarded prospect on the Lugnuts is also the youngest player on the roster: 19-year-old Steven Echavarria is rated the No. 4 pitching prospect in the system and the No. 13 prospect overall. The right-hander was named New Jersey’s Gatorade High School Baseball Player of the Year in 2023 after posting a 0.28 ERA with 80 strikeouts in 50 innings. He was drafted by the A’s in the third round of the 2023 draft, signing away from a commitment to Florida, and spent all of last season with Single-A Stockton.
Catchers: Both Cole Conn and CJ Rodriguez return. Vandy product Rodriguez enters his third season in Lansing, improving his runs, walks, batting average and OBP from 2023 to 2024. Switch-hitting Conn, a product of Illinois-Chicago, threw out 34% of attempted base-stealers while committing only one passed ball in 2024 following a mid-season promotion from Stockton. Nick Schwartz, an undrafted free agent from Southern New Hampshire, makes his Lansing debut.
Infielders: In addition to third baseman White and shortstop Kuroda-Grauer, the Lugnuts bring back T.J. Schofield-Sam, Sahid Valenzuela and Casey Yamauchi, who all saw action for the club in 2023 and 2024. Darlyn Montero, a 22-year-old switch-hitter who is 18-for-18 in steals with 40 extra-base hits the last two years, makes his Midwest League debut.
Outfielders: Four familiar faces join Green in the outfield in Jonny Butler, Jared Dickey, Clark Elliott and Nate Nankil. Butler, the longest tenured Lugnut, has accumulated 200 hits over parts of four different seasons in Lansing; he is 74 games away from topping Yuber Rodriguez’s record for most games played with the Nuts. Dickey was acquired via trade from the Kansas City Royals in a three-player package for Lucas Erceg at the 2024 deadline, homering against his former teammates in Quad Cities during a late-summer road trip. Elliott is a former Michigan Wolverine who launched three homers against the Michigan State Spartans during a 2022 game played at Jackson® Field™. And Nankil’s bat roared the loudest in 2024, posting a sizzling .356 batting average in 28 games following a promotion from Stockton.
Starting Pitchers: Lansing’s 2025 rotation will be led by Jump, Echavarria, a pair of returning Nuts in Jake Garland and Grant Judkins – who combined with Colton Johnson in 2024 to toss the franchise’s fourth ever no-hitter – and a pair of 6-foot-6 right-handers in Kyle Robinson and Yunior Tur. Robinson, like Jump, will be making his professional debut; he was drafted in the 11th round in 2024 from Texas Tech, the first pick of the third day of the draft. Tur was signed as an international free agent from Cuba in 2023.
Relief Pitchers: Five relievers have prior Midwest League experience, namely Mark Adamiak, Hunter Breault, Garrett Irvin, Blaze Pontes and Yehizon Sanchez. The newcomers comprise Corey Avant, Jake Christianson, Henry Gómez, Jake Pfennigs and Tom Reisinger. Avant was selected by the A’s in the ninth round from Wingate in 2023, where he struck out 108 batters in 68 innings between 2022 and 2023. Christianson was signed as Minor League free agent after spending his first three pro seasons with the Rays, posting a 3.74 ERA in 31 relief appearances for Bowling Green in 2024. Gómez was acquired as a Rule 5 pick in December from the Cardinals’ organization after spending the last two seasons in the Florida State League. The 6-foot-7 Pfennigs was drafted in the 13th round in 2022 from Oregon State, where he gave up only seven home runs in 144 career college innings. Lastly, Reisinger was taken in the tenth round in 2023 from East Stroudsburg University where he whiffed 199 batters in 148 2/3 innings.
Single game tickets are on sale at the Jackson® Field™ box office, available for purchase at (517) 485-4500 or online at milb.com/lansing.
And here was the interview with Lugnuts GM Zac Clark at the end of last season last autumn:
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Lansing Lugnuts Baseball
Jackson® Field™ – 505 E. Michigan Ave. Lansing, MI 48912
Phone: 517.485.4500 | Fax: 517.485.4518
