It is March. That means there is Madness (more on that later), and that means there is reason for hope within every baseball club.

At every camp in Florida and Arizona there is optimism that this season will go better than expected. The Marlins, who will assuredly be awful, can envision Sandy Alcantara dominating and arms like Thomas White shooting through the system to join the ace. The Rockies, who will assuredly be awful, can envision Brenton Doyle taking a leap to both All-Star and leader for a team that surprises. In all 30 spring training locales, there is legitimate reason for belief.

Yes, even within the Yankees’.

Don’t miss Greg Joyce’s text messages from spring training — he’s giving Sports+ subscribers the inside buzz on the Yankees.

The most crushing camp in recent memory has seen the loss of Gerrit Cole for the season, top prospect Chase Hampton for the season, Giancarlo Stanton for an indefinite amount of time, Luis Gil for months, DJ LeMahieu for at least a while and a lengthy list of relievers for varying amounts of time. (On Sunday, Clarke Schmidt was scratched from his scheduled start, adding to the list of pitching woes.)