While the AAA Louisville Bats got their 2026 regular season underway last week just like the big league Cincinnati Reds, the lower minors affiliates will begin their campaigns later this week. With that on the docket, the rosters for the respective Opening Days for the High-A Dayton Dragons (Thursday evening against the Lansing Lugnuts) and AA Chattanooga Lookouts (Friday against the Columbus Clingstones) have been finalized.
The Lookouts will feature top prospects like Cam Collier, Leo Balcazar,
and Carlos Jorge among their position player ranks as well as former 1st round picks like Austin Hendrick and Jay Allen II. The pitching staff will be spearheaded by Jose Acuna (who returns after firing 71.2 IP of 3.64 ERA ball there last year) as well as veteran Kevin Abel, while Jose Montero (3.93 ERA in 103.0 IP with High-A Dayton in 2025) will also make the jump up a level into the rotation.
The Lookouts revealed their entire roster this morning, which you can see below.
Meanwhile, top prospect and catcher of the future Alfredo Duno will headline the roster of the Dayton Dragons, as the Reds pointed out on Twitter earlier in the day.
Dayton’s roster is largely comprised of players who spent considerable time with the club last year, though Duno is clearly the exception to that rule. He destroyed Florida State League pitching as a 19 year old in 2025 (.287/.430/.518 with 18 HR and a 95/91 BB/K ratio) before heading off to the Peoria Javelinas of the Arizona Fall League and showing out there, too.
What’s similarly interesting about Dayton’s roster, though, is who isn’t on it. Top prospect Tyson Lewis will apparently not be making the jump up a level to begin 2026 after he hit .268/.347/.417 there in 144 PA to finish 2025, his strikeout problems (51 in that time) likely something he’ll be asked to work on a bit first. Similarly, former NCAA dinger champ Mason Neville will not begin with Dayton after hitting .247/.333/.442 in 90 PA with Daytona last year, his own K-rate (34.4%) also a pretty glaring issue, while Arnaldo Lantigua will also seemingly stick around Daytona after 129 PA with them in his age-19 season.
The same is apparently true for Sheng-En Lin, who threw 16.2 IP for Daytona last year and is still focusing on pitching only after having been a two-way player prior to 2025.
The Daytona Tortugas have not yet released their roster, so we’ll need to wait for confirmation from them at some point later this week. It’s also worth pointing out that a number of names we otherwise would have seen on these rosters will begin the year on the minor league 60-day IL, with notable pitchers like Luke Holman and Carson Spiers there alongside infielder Ricky Cabrera.
