Dayton Dragons 2025 Team Preview, Part 8: Relief Pitchers

Sports stats

MWL Dayton Dragons

Dayton Dragons 2025 Team Preview, Part 8: Relief Pitchers

March 28, 2025 - Midwest League (MWL)
Dayton Dragons News Release


Dayton Dragons pitcher Brody Jessee
Dayton Dragons pitcher Brody Jessee
(Dayton Dragons)

The Dayton Dragons are closing in on the start of their Midwest League season. The Dragons will officially open their 132-game championship chase on the road four days prior to their home opener, when they battle the West Michigan Whitecaps in Grand Rapids, Michigan at 6:35 pm on April 4. The Dragons annual home "Opening Night" game is Tuesday, April 8 against the Fort Wayne TinCaps at 7:05 pm, the first of 66 home games at Day Air Ballpark in the heart of the Water Street District in 2025.

The competition for roster spots in Goodyear, Arizona is wrapping up. Final decisions on the Dragons 30-player roster will be made by the Cincinnati Reds before the club arrives in Dayton on Monday night, March 31.

This is the finale to an eight-part positional preview of the candidates for the Dragons 2025 roster. Players listed here are candidates for positions on the Dragons season-opening roster.

This preview is an unofficial projection of possible roster candidates. Minor League rosters are not established until April 1. Spring training variables including performance, injuries, trades, and additional player acquisitions will impact the roster accordingly.

For Dragons season ticket or group ticket information, go to daytondragons.com/tickets or call (937) 228-2287.

The Relief Pitchers

Candidates: Cody Adcock, Brody Jessee, Joseph Menefee, Easton Sikorski, Dylan Simmons, Graham Osman, Juan Martinez, Nick Sando, Jonah Hurney, Jimmy Romano.

The bullpen looks like an asset for the Dragons heading into the 2025 season. The first five names on this list spent all or significant amounts of the 2024 season with the Dragons, and all of them offered reasons to believe they can be effective in 2025 in Dayton. The next four all pitched well in Daytona, and the last name on the list, Romano, was a 2024 draft pick after a good season at Duke University.

Cody Adcock was selected by the Reds in the 13 th round in 2023 out of the University of Arkansas. In 2024, he started the season with Single-A Daytona and made 19 relief appearances (3.60 ERA, five saves, .205 opponent's batting average, 42 strikeouts in 35 innings). He was promoted to the Dragons and pitched in nine games (4.60 ERA, .217 opponent's batting average). Outside of one bad outing, Adcock's ERA with the Dragons was very good at 2.40.

Brody Jessee was a 10 th round draft pick in 2022 out of Gonzaga and is a native of Anchorage, Alaska. Jessee spent the entire 2024 season with the Dragons (8-3 with a 6.11 ERA in 32 games as a reliever). Jessee struggled during the early parts of the 2024 season but finished strong, posting an ERA of 0.98 over the final month of the campaign as he allowed just two earned runs in 18.1 innings. His ERA over the entire second half was a respectable 3.44 with an opponent's batting average of .194.

Joseph Menefee, a left-hander, was a 20 th round draft pick in 2022 out of Texas A&M. He made 20 relief appearances with the Dragons in 2024 (3.68 ERA, 59 strikeouts in 36.2 innings, opponent's batting average of .189). Menefee has an excellent split-fingered fastball that can be almost unhittable when he commands the pitch. He missed the last part of the 2024 season due to injury.

Easton Sikorski was a 17 th round draft pick in 2022 out of Western Michigan University, where he was a teammate of former Dragons outfielder Blake Dunn. Sikorski spent most of 2024 with the Dragons (3.90 ERA). Sikorski is another reliever who had a good finish in Dayton last season, posting an ERA in August and September of 1.27 (21.1 IP, 3 ER, .178 opponent's batting average). He had two big outings in the final home series of the season against West Michigan as the Dragons were fighting for a playoff berth. He gave the club scoreless relief in both games (both were Dragons wins) over a combined four innings. Sikorski is a reliever who is capable of working three or even four innings in an outing.

Dylan Simmons was a 15 th round draft pick in 2023 out of the University of Pittsburgh. He previously played three seasons at Florida State and was a two-way player with the Seminoles before converting to full-time pitcher. Simmons began the 2024 season at Single-A Daytona (18 relief appearances, 4.34 ERA) and was promoted to the Dragons during the second half. He pitched in nine games for the Dragons out of the bullpen (4.09 ERA, .205 opponent's batting average). Simmons played a key role in the Dragons biggest win of the season, tossing three and two-thirds innings of shutout relief as Dayton erased a late three-run deficit to take a walk-off win over West Michigan on August 31. The win gave the Dragons a commanding lead over West Michigan in the playoff race with only seven games to play.

Graham Osman, a left-hander, was a 10 th round draft pick out of Long Beach State in 2023. He previously played at Arizona State for three seasons. Osman started the 2024 season with the Dragons and struggled before being transferred to Daytona. He pitched much better for the Tortugas and then returned to the Dragons late in the season. At Daytona, Osman made 16 appearances including two starts (4-3, 3.47 ERA, .208 opponent's batting average, 56 strikeouts in 49.1 innings). Osman had nine appearances with the Dragons covering 16.2 innings and had an ERA of 7.56.

Juan Martinez was used both as a starter and reliever with Daytona in 2024 and could fill a similar role with the Dragons in 2025. Martinez threw 39 innings at Daytona last year with a 3.89 ERA that was driven up when he allowed six earned runs in his last outing (his ERA had been under 3.00 basically all season until that game). His best game came May 16 when he fired five no-hit innings as a starter and struck out five. He is a native of Venezuela. He would become the third player named Juan Martinez to play for the Dragons since 2016 and is unrelated to the other two.

Nick Sando, a left-hander, went undrafted out of college and was signed by the Reds as a free agent following the 2023 draft. He played at Santa Clara in the West Coast Conference and had his best season as a junior in 2022, posting a 2.81 ERA in 20 games, notching 79 strikeouts in 51 innings. He struggled as a senior in 2023 and was passed over in the draft. The Reds assigned him to Daytona in 2024 and he had a good season, going 6-2 with a 3.24 ERA (.198 opponent's batting average; 77 strikeouts in 67 innings).

Jonah Hurney, a 5'8" left-hander, was a college teammate of former Dragon Cade Hunter at Virginia Tech. Like Sando, Hurney had his best season in 2022 (6-1, 2.70 ERA in 25 relief appearances) but struggled in 2023 and was not drafted. The Reds signed him as a free agent and sent him to Daytona in 2024, where he made 28 relief appearances (4-1, 3.40 ERA, seven saves). He is a native of Hawaii.

Jimmy Romano has made a quick climb to become a candidate for the Dragons pitching staff after being drafted by the Reds in 2024 in the 16 th round out of Duke University. Romano was a two-way player early in his college career and was still seeing time as an infielder as late as the summer of 2023 in the New England Collegiate Baseball League, a college wood bat summer league. He did not become a full-time pitcher until 2024 so he could be poised to make a jump in performance. His ERA as a reliever at Duke in 2024 was a respectable 3.91.

We took a look at several candidates for the Dragons starting rotation earlier this week in this preview. Two additional names to consider are Luke Hayden and Brian Edgington.

Luke Hayden was the Reds eighth round draft pick in 2024 out of Indiana State. He is a hard-thrower with a fastball that reaches 97 mph and a good slider. Hayden spent two years at Indiana University before transferring to Indiana State in 2024, where he enjoyed his best season at the college level, going 7-2 with a 3.81 ERA.

Brian Edgington is a candidate to join the pitching staff at Double-A Chattanooga but could return to the Dragons. Edgington was signed by the Reds as a non-drafted free agent out of the University of Virginia in 2023. He opened the '24 season at Daytona and made 15 starts (3.52 ERA). He was promoted to the Dragons in the second half and made eight starts with Dayton, posting a 5.40 ERA. Edgington was regarded highly enough that he was chosen to start the Dragons second playoff game last September at Lake County, working five innings and allowing just two runs to the eventual Midwest League champions.

This concludes the Dragons eight-part team preview for 2025. The official roster will be announced once it is finalized within the next few days.

Check out the Dayton Dragons Statistics




Images from this story

Dayton Dragons pitcher Brody Jessee
Dayton Dragons pitcher Brody Jessee
   



Midwest League Stories from March 28, 2025


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

Other Recent Dayton Dragons Stories



Sports Statistics from the Stats Crew
OurSports Central