Dayton Dragons 2026 Team Preview: Part 2--The First Basemen

Later today on the backfields of the Cincinnati Reds spring training complex in Goodyear, Arizona, the Dayton Dragons will begin their spring training schedule when they battle a workout group of Milwaukee Brewers minor league players, the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers.

Many of the Reds minor league players have already gotten an opportunity to appear in Major League spring training games this season. In fact, on Sunday, two potential 2026 Dragons players who were profiled in our catcher preview last week, Alfredo Duno and Ryan McCrystal, blasted home runs for the Reds against big league competition, as did shortstop Tyson Lewis, who will be discussed next week in our fourth Dragons positional preview.

Minor League spring training games begin today and will continue in Arizona through March 29 as the rosters begin to take shape for each of the Reds four full-season farm clubs (Triple-A Louisville, Double-A Chattanooga, High-A Dayon, and Single-A Daytona).

The Dragons annual home “Opening Night” game is set for Tuesday, April 7 against the Lake County Captains at 7:05 pm at Day Air Ballpark. The Dragons will officially open their season on the road a few days earlier, on April 2 against the Lansing Lugnuts in Lansing, Michigan.

This is part two of an eight-part series previewing the 2026 Dragons. 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 March 31. Spring training variables including performance, injuries, trades, and additional player acquisitions will impact the roster accordingly.

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

The First Basemen

Click links on each name for career stats and player information.

Candidates: Ryan McCrystal, Jack Moss, Carter Graham

Ryan McCrystal is primarily a catcher but, with top catching prospect Alfredo Duno as his teammate in Daytona last season, McCrystal spent about half his games at first base. Duno and McCrystal are expected to be teammates with the Dragons in 2026, so McCrystal again might be utilized at first base. McCrystal in 2025 between Dayton and Daytona batted a solid .289 with a .418 slugging percentage. He was profiled in detail in the catcher preview last week.

Jack Moss endured an injury-shorted 2025 season, sidelined for more than two months due to a thumb injury, but when he did play, he hit like a batting champion. The start of Moss’ season was delayed until late June after the injury that he suffered towards the end of spring training. He appeared in 31 games (110 plate appearances) with the Dragons and batted .337 in an admittedly small sample size. To put that number in perspective, note that the Midwest League leader in batting average in 2025 hit .307 and the Dragons club record is .324.

Moss hit in every situation imaginable in 2025. He hit for a high average at home and on the road, in day games and night games. He hit .340 with runners on base and .393 with runners in scoring position. He even hit .300 with an 0-2 count. The one element that Moss did not bring in 2025 to the Dragons, or in 2024 with Single-A Daytona, was the home run ball. In 142 career games as a professional, Moss has never hit a home run. He has the strength and power at 6’4, 211 lbs., but his style of hitting features line drives up the middle and toward the gaps. Moss is well aware that a first baseman is expected to hit home runs, and he works on the art of turning on and driving pitches every day, but the results have yet to come. Moss did belt a home run last season against Dragons pitcher Brian Edgington in a simulated game when Edgington was about to return from an injury, but he has not yet connected on that first home run in an official game. Moss’ offensive game resembles some first basemen from an earlier era like Rod Carew, Hal Morris, and to some extent, Mark Grace. Moss’ .337 batting average provides hope that power results will eventually arrive for him.

Moss was an 11^th round draft pick by the Reds in 2023 out of Texas A&M. He originally came out of Cherry Creek High School in Greenwood Village, Colorado, where he was selected as the Colorado Player of the Year in 2020 as a senior. He was highly-regarded as a pro prospect coming out of high school, ranked by Baseball America on their list of the top 300 college/high school players entering the draft in 2020, but he instead elected to enroll at Arizona State University. He played one season for the Sun Devils in 2021, seeing plenty of playing time as a freshman and batting .299 with six home runs in 48 games. He transferred to Texas A&M after his freshman year and went on to play two seasons there in 2022 and ’23. He had an outstanding sophomore season in 2022, starting all 64 games for the Aggies, and batting a robust .380 with six home runs and a fine .957 OPS. He led the Southeastern Conference in hits and missed winning the conference batting title by just three points. He had a particularly strong post-season as he earned SEC All-Tournament honors and then hit .643 in the College Station Regional to earn the MVP of the tourney. He helped Texas A&M to the College World Series, where they finished tied for third. As a junior in 2023, Moss improved his on-base percentage but could not quite duplicate his other numbers, finishing the year by batting .355 with four home runs in 65 games. He was again named to the SEC All-Tournament team as well as the All-Regional team. Moss, in his three years of college baseball, hit a combined .352 with 16 home runs in 177 games.

Carter Graham has split each of the last two seasons between the Dragons and Single-A Daytona, beginning both the 2024 and ’25 seasons in the Florida State League before earning a promotion to the Gem City. He can also play third base.

Graham is a hustling, hard-nosed player who runs the bases effectively due to excellent instincts, and he brings great intangibles to the team. With the Dragons in 2025, he progressed considerably from what he did here in 2024, improving his batting average from .188 to .248. Over the last two full seasons between Dayton and Daytona, he has hit 17 home runs in 184 games and stole 20 bases. He earned the Midwest League Player of the Week award for the Dragons last August. He is the type of player who is always going to bring a little more to the table than his numbers would seem to indicate.

Graham was the Reds eighth round draft pick in 2023 out of Stanford University. Graham is a Los Angeles native who played high school baseball at Chaminade College Prep in West Hills, California, where he was the school’s Male Athlete of the Year all four years. He went on to Stanford and played three seasons in Palo Alto. Graham’s best year came in 2022 as a sophomore, when he was named by Baseball America as a Second Team All-American and led the PAC 12 in home runs with 22, fourth most in a season in Stanford history. He also finished second in the conference in RBI while batting .331 in 64 games. He led Stanford to the College World Series. Graham had another good season as a junior in 2023, batting .315 with 15 home runs in 64 games.

Another name to know at first base is Ty Doucette, the Reds 10th round draft pick in 2025 out of Rutgers. The Reds generally prefer not to force a draft pick to start his pro career as high on the organizational ladder as the Dragons in the Midwest League (except for elite prospects like Chase Burns and Rhett Lowder). Still, they have had to do it several times due to need at a particular position, and the results have been mixed. Ideally, each player will spend some time in Daytona, a level lower, before arriving in Dayton, and perhaps even before he gets to Daytona, play with the Reds club in the Arizona Complex League, two levels below the Dragons. With plenty of options at first base, Doucette might be expected to play first base at Daytona, at least to start the season. He did not play a single game after signing with the Reds last summer. He did, however, play in numerous unofficial workout games against teams with other organizations following the conclusion of the Arizona Complex League season, and multiple observers have commented on how Doucette truly sparkled at the plate in those games, hitting with power and authority, rising high above the competition. Doucette hit well in the Big Ten at Rutgers last spring, batting .350 with 13 home runs in 57 games with the same college program that has produced former Dragons Todd Frazier and Brian O’Grady.

John Michael Faile is one more name at the first base position. Faile might have been the Dragons most valuable player in 2025, though no official team award is given. He did lead the Dragons team in home runs (13) and RBI (56) while batting .233, seven points above the team average. Faile will turn 26 years old on May 11 and after spending part of 2024 and all of 2025 with the Dragons, he likely will get an opportunity with Double-A Chattanooga in 2026. Faile is a great story, an undrafted player who set the NCAA Division II career record in both home runs and RBI and then spent a year in independent ball before finally getting an opportunity in the Reds organization. It is possible that he could return to Dayton but the odds would point towards the next step on the ladder for the likeable native of the state of South Carolina.

Next up: Second Basemen

Part 1: Catchers: https://www.milb.com/dayton/news/dayton-dragons-2026-team-preview-part-1-the-catchers