The white paper MLB published this winter after its deep dive into the root causes of the pitcher injury epidemic found that spring training is more hazardous to pitching health than the regular season.

This story was excerpted from Daniel Kramer’s Mariners Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

To be honest, the first several games of Spring Training are exciting simply because live baseball is being played again for the first time in months. But once that initial wave of euphoria dissipates,