JUPITER, Fla. • A little after 9 a.m. local time Thursday, about 10 days and 23 hours before the Cardinals’ first full-squad workout of spring training, a car curled in front of the gate leading to the team’s parking lot and out unfolded a 6-foot-3 first baseman.
As an Arizona resident playing for Arizona’s team, spring training had always been in Goldschmidt’s backyard, so he didn’t report to camp as much as commute to it. It wouldn’t have been unusual to use the Diamondbacks’ facility in December, let alone early February. With a new team comes a new state for spring training, and still Goldschmidt was greeted on his first day in Cardinals’ red by something he expected: He wasn’t the only early bird getting his work.