Starting pitcher Chase Burns, the Cincinnati Reds\u2019 top minor-league prospect, will begin the Midwest League season with the Dayton Dragons.<\/p>\n
The Reds made Burns the No. 2 pick in last summer\u2019s draft. He will be the third second overall pick to play for the Dragons, joining Hunter Greene and Nick Senzel.<\/p>\n
Burns throws a fastball as hard as 102 mph, but some scouts grade his slider as his best pitch. He played his final college season at Wake Forest after two seasons at Tennessee. Burns was a first-team All-American and the ACC Pitcher of the Year in 2024, going 10-1 with a 2.70 ERA. He set the school record for strikeouts and led the nation with 191 in 100 innings. In six of Burns\u2019 16 starts, he struck out at least 14 batters.<\/p>\n
Two other rated prospects who pitched in Low-A Daytona last year will join Burns in the starting rotation. Adam Serwinowski, 20, is ranked the Reds\u2019 No. 12 prospect by MLB Pipeline, and Luke Hayden, 22, is ranked No. 30.<\/p>\n
Rated position players are led by third baseman Ricardo Cabrera, rated No, 10. Cabrera, 20, played at Daytona last year. Center fielder Carlos Jorge, No. 21, shortstop Leo Balcazar, No. 23, and catcher Connor Burns, No. 25, are three of 17 players returning to the Dragons.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/69a5c67599818.image.png\")
<\/p>\n
Other returning players are second baseman Victor Acosta, catcher Logan Tanner, catcher\/first baseman John Michael Faile, utilitymen Trey Faltine and Johnny Ascanio and pitchers Cody Adcock, Gabriel Aguilera, Brian Edgington, Brody Jessee, Nestor Lorant, Joseph Menefee, Graham Osman, Easton Sikorski and Dylan Simmons.<\/p>\n
Lorant pitched most of 2024 at Daytona and was the Reds Minor League Pitcher of the Year and the Florida State League Pitcher of the Year. Lorant posted a 1.44 ERA that ranked first in Minor League Baseball among pitchers with a minimum 80 innings at the time of his promotion to Dayton late in the season.<\/p>\n
Notable new additions to the Dragons include outfielder Ariel Almonte, who hit 20 home runs in 2024 with Daytona to rank second in the Florida State League. Outfielder Myles Smith was a Reds 2024 draft choice after earning Big West Conference Player of the Year honors with UC-Irvine. Other outfielders are Yerlin Confidan and Anthony Stephan.<\/p>\n
The Dragons will open their 25th season in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Friday night, in the start of a three-game series against the West Michigan Whitecaps. The Dragons\u2019 home opener at Day Air Ballpark is Tuesday, April 8, against the Fort Wayne TinCaps at 7:05 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Starting pitcher Chase Burns, the Cincinnati Reds\u2019 top minor-league prospect, will begin the Midwest League season with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2276],"tags":[5,1889,36923,36921,2291,4,1586,36920,83723],"class_list":{"0":"post-654914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb-draft","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-dayton-dragons","10":"tag-ddnhomepage","11":"tag-hjnhomepage","12":"tag-major-league-baseball-draft","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-mlb-draft","15":"tag-snshomepage","16":"tag-verticals-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116325177211207267","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}