2026 FCL Cardinals Preview
Credit: MLB
With the four full-season affiliates up and running with their respective seasons, the next team to debut will be the Florida Complex League team, starting its 56-game campaign this Saturday, May 2nd, at 9:00 AM Central Time vs. the FCL Marlins on the backfields of the Roger Dean Complex. The FCL is the first stateside stop for many of the Cardinals’ top international prospects, with Rainiel Rodriguez, Luis Gastelum, Joshua Baez, and Yairo Padilla being recent players who have come through the complex league. Combine this with new draftees sometimes getting their start with the complex team, and it makes for a really interesting mix of young players trying to make it to full-season ball. This season, the Cardinals have brought over a 14-player international class from their Dominican Academy, which is expected to be one of the stronger groups in recent memory, including top 2024 signing pitcher Branneli Franco and top 2025 signing outfielder Royelny Strop, along with top performers like infielders Sebastian Dos Santos, Miguel Hernandez, Edward Guribe, and Jesus Garcia. I’ll preview these players and more as we get ready for the season.
Infielders
2B/SS Sebastian Dos Santos
When discussing top performers coming stateside, the conversation has to start with Sebastian Dos Santos, who posted a 158 WRC+ last season in the DSL, which ranked 9th among all DSL players and 2nd among all Cardinals minor leaguers, just behind breakout star Rainiel Rodriguez. Last season in the DSL, Dos Santos showed impressive plate discipline, walking more than he struck out (17.5% K-rate vs. 18.1% BB-rate), while showing more power than expected from his slender 6’0” frame, hitting 4 homers (3rd among DSL Cardinals) and a .258 ISO. Some questions about Dos Santos’ true power and defensive home still remain, though from the limited video I watched, he looks more suited for a role at 2B than SS. Dos Santos will be 18 years old the entire FCL season, and seeing if he can launch his 2025 success into a stateside breakout similar to Rodriguez will be an interesting follow this season.
SS Miguel Hernandez
Hernandez was overshadowed a bit by his fellow middle infielder in Dos Santos, though his potential might match or even exceed that of Dos Santos if he can maximize his skillset. Hernandez slashed .281/.408/.444 on his way to a 124 WRC+ with 5 homers, which was tied for the team lead, and 15 stolen bases, which ranked 3rd among DSL Cardinals. Hernandez has a sweet righty swing that is geared toward both loft and pull-side power, having a 40.2% fly-ball rate along with an extreme 68.4% pull rate, allowing him to get to his pull-side power better than most young prospects. Hernandez has a bit more swing and miss in his game, with a 20.7% K-rate to a 14.8% BB-rate, though this is somewhat expected given his batting profile. From the early reports when he signed and the video I have watched, he looks much more likely to stick at SS compared to Dos Santos, regularly making plays with good range and solid hands. I think the most apparent example of how high the Cardinals are on Hernandez came in the fact that they gave him an at-bat in spring training — he walked vs. an MLB arm. He was the only new stateside player to do so, and even Rainiel Rodriguez didn’t get an at-bat in spring training last year after coming over. Hernandez is still 17 years old and only turns 18 in early June, meaning he will play the entire first month of the season as a 17-year-old. One of my personal breakout picks, I expect him to have a big year.
3B Edward Guribe
A 2025 DSL All-Star, Edward Guribe looks to be one of the biggest power threats on this season’s FCL team. Guribe tied Hernandez for the DSL team lead with 5 homers in 2025 and has seemed to put on even more muscle and strength on his 6’1” frame this offseason. Guribe made major progress in terms of swing and miss between 2024 and 2025 in the DSL, cutting his strikeout rate from 29.9% to 17.0%, as well as increasing his fly-ball rate from 26.7% to 49% between his two DSL seasons. Guribe has shown well this spring with multiple homers and the ability to hit up-in-the-zone fastballs, including a homer off Marlins #5 prospect Kevin Defrank on an upper-90s fastball. Guribe has some of the highest power potential among young Cardinals prospects, and if he can get to it consistently, he could profile as one of the stronger corner infield bats in the system.
UTL Cristofer Lebron
In terms of improvement, very few made as big of gains between 2024 and 2025 as Cristofer Lebron did. Lebron’s WRC+ improved from 55 to 121, one of the largest jumps in the DSL, which was fueled by a significant increase in power, going from a .052 ISO to a .151 ISO between seasons. This also showed up in the underlying stats, as according to Baseball America, Lebron had the 8th highest jump in 90th EV among all minor leaguers, going from 96.6 to 102.3 mph. Another interesting switch that Lebron made in 2025 was converting to a utility player, as Lebron played 34 games in the outfield in 2025 for the first time in his career, to go along with 12 games at his natural position of 2B. While Lebron isn’t the flashiest name of the group, he could be an interesting player to watch to see if the improvements stick stateside.
C Juan Rujano
Ranked 66th by Baseball America in the 2025 international class, Rujano has the potential to be another Panamanian catcher coming through the Cardinals system, following in the footsteps of Ivan Herrera and Leo Bernal. When he was signed, Rujano was known as a power-hitting catcher with a good arm, though his 6’3” frame made him a little clunky behind the plate. While I haven’t seen much video of him behind the plate, the Cardinals obviously liked him enough to invite him for early spring training, where he trained a few extra weeks alongside the catchers before the rest of the stateside players reported for spring training. Rujano hit 3 homers and had a 121 WRC+ in his first season in the DSL and will look to continue to build on that this season.
Outfielders
OF Royelny Strop
The top name in the Cardinals’ 2025 class is coming stateside after an up-and-down 2025 DSL campaign that involved some injuries during the middle of the season. While the overall numbers for Strop aren’t anything that signal a top prospect, after coming back from injury, he was much better, posting a .286/.397/.490 slash line, good for a 129 WRC+, including the final game of the DSL season, where Strop went 4-for-6 and hit for the cycle, which included his first professional homer. He parlayed this late-season success into a strong instructs league, which allowed him to get the call to come stateside in 2026. Similar to Hernandez, Strop is one of the youngest players coming stateside, being 17 years old until June 4th, meaning he will play the first month of the season as one of the youngest players in the FCL. Seeing if Strop can parlay his late-season success into a successful stateside transition will be one of the bigger storylines this FCL season.
OF Kenly Hunter
The Cardinals’ second-highest-paid player in the 2025 class was Nicaraguan outfielder Kenly Hunter, who was known for his bat-to-ball skills and speed when the Cardinals signed him. That came to fruition in 2025, as Hunter slashed .314/.442/.400 for a 131 WRC+ with 6 doubles, 9 triples, and a team-leading 25 stolen bases. Hunter’s contact ability showed immediately with an 11.6% K-rate to a 13.9% BB-rate, along with a team-leading 83.8% contact rate according to Fangraphs. Hunter also got high praise for his ability to play a plus-plus center field given his speed and is one of the safer profiles this season for the FCL Cardinals, where he will likely be hitting leadoff with his tremendous on-base ability. The next step for Hunter is getting into more power, which he has already shown this spring, reportedly already hitting a homer, something he didn’t do in 2025. If Hunter can find a bit more power, he could easily climb up top-30 lists quickly and may very well find his way to Palm Beach later this season.
OF Yaxson Lucena
Yaxson Lucena may be the most underrated prospect on this list. In his second season in the DSL, the Venezuelan put up a very impressive .299/.442/.469 slash line for a 141 WRC+ with 3 homers and 10 doubles. A traditional corner outfielder, Lucena had improvement in his plate discipline in 2025, having a 10.5% K-rate to a 15.8% BB-rate. Combine this with a .170 ISO showing solid power, and you have an interesting prospect who could have a legit breakout this season.
Pitchers
RHP Branneli Franco
The Cardinals’ top name in the 2024 class, Franco is the top name coming stateside in 2026 after a very successful 2025 campaign in which he pitched 16.1 innings to a 3.31 ERA with a 22.9% strikeout rate and a very impressive 7.1% BB-rate. Franco features power stuff with a high-90s fastball, which averages around 96 mph with the ability to touch 98-99 mph, and a changeup-slider combination, both of which average in the upper 80s or lower 90s. While Franco didn’t have outstanding strikeout numbers compared to some of his pitching peers on this list, he does have some of the best command I have seen from a pitcher his age, especially with his quality of stuff, as he limited batters to a .200 batting average against. Franco has continued to look good this spring, with the stuff ticking up even more and the strikeouts continuing to rise. He could be in store for a huge 2026 season.
RHP Jesus Garcia
One of the top performers in the 2025 DSL season, Jesus Garcia posted an electric 2.78 ERA across 22.2 innings with a very impressive 32.3% K-rate to a 7.5% BB-rate. Garcia features a fastball with plus movement from a lower ¾ arm slot, with the ability to touch the mid-90s. Off the fastball, he throws a hard high-80s changeup and a mid-80s slider, both of which he commands well from the video I watched. An older prospect, already being 20 as he makes his stateside debut, Garcia could move up the system quicker in a reliever role than if he were in a starter’s role. If he continues his success to start the FCL season, don’t be surprised if he makes his way to Palm Beach when promotions start happening midseason.
RHP Xavier Cruz
One of the more interesting pitchers to watch on this team, Cruz has come to my attention after he seems to have found a bit more velocity this spring. Cruz posted a solid 4.32 ERA across 25 innings in the DSL last season with a 27% K-rate but a worrying 17.1% BB-rate. Cruz featured a 92-93 mph fastball last season, though with some additional muscle, he has seemingly gained some velocity into the mid-90s range this spring. Off the fastball, Cruz has good spin capacity, throwing a really sharp high-70s curveball and a shorter high-80s slider, both of which look like solid pitches from the video I have watched. Last year, Cruz had some way to go when it came to filling out his 6’3” frame, though higher velocity this spring could indicate that he has begun to do so. If Cruz can continue to refine and work on his command, he has the arsenal and velocity to get hitters out as he moves up the ladder.
RHP Alan Reyes
The most surprising return to the FCL was that of Alan Reyes, who I thought for sure would be part of the Palm Beach roster after posting a 1.52 ERA between the complex and Palm Beach last season with 52 strikeouts in 47.1 innings pitched. Reyes features a mid-90s fastball from a low 5.1 release height, getting decent specs on the pitch, but his calling card is a mid-80s changeup, which gets plus-plus movement, and the pitch generated a 45.5% whiff rate last season at Palm Beach. After posting a 0.70 ERA across 25.2 innings with the FCL Cardinals last season, I thought there wasn’t much to prove with Reyes at this level anymore, but apparently, the Cardinals see it differently, as they will have the 22-year-old repeat the level to at least start the season. However, I don’t expect him to be on the backfields for very long if his stuff stays with similar effectiveness as last season.