FT. MYERS, Fla. — The teams interested in acquiring right-hander Rick Porcello continue to wonder if the Tigers actually will trade him.

The Rangers and Padres are the teams most active on Porcello, according to major-league sources. The Orioles also have scouted Porcello, but the Red Sox – another team with potential interest – are not currently pursuing him, sources say.

The Tigers, rather than move Porcello, might prefer to keep him and retain depth in their rotation. They then could make lefty Drew Smyly a long reliever or starter at Triple A.

One thing is clear: The Tigers will not trade Porcello unless they receive a strong return.

The Padres made an “aggressive” offer for Porcello last week, only to be rejected, according to a source.

Talks with the Rangers do not appear to be at an advanced stage, but the names of two Texas prospects - shortstop Leury Garcia and right-hander Nicholas Tepesch – apparently are on the Tigers’ wish list. The Tigers also would want a third player added to that package, but the Rangers would be reluctant to move even Tepesch in a Porcello deal, sources say.

The Red Sox, seeking to add rotation depth, could satisfy the Tigers’ desire for late-inning relief help by offering right-hander Andrew Bailey. The salaries of the two pitchers nearly line up – Porcello will earn $5.1 million this season, Bailey $4.1 million. The Sox, however, are reluctant to compromise the depth of their bullpen, which is one of the team’s strengths.

The Tigers, who also seek to add a right-handed hitting outfielder, have discussed re-acquiring Casper Wells from the Mariners, according to a source. The Orioles could offer Nolan Reimold in addition to a reliever, but are not inclined to move on Porcello, preferring to go with their younger starting pitchers instead, a source said.

Financial motives could drive a Porcello trade even more than the Tigers’ lack of a proven closer, given the recent progress of rookie right-hander Bruce Rondon in Grapefruit League games.

Porcello is under club control for three more seasons, and likely will earn in the range of $22 million during that period, depending upon how he performs.

Critics of Porcello point to his low strikeout rate and his ERA-plus, which has been below-average the past two seasons. But many of his numbers – strikeout rate, walk rate, home-run rate, fielding-independent pitching (FIP) – are trending in the right direction. And because Porcello is a groundball pitcher, his performance likely would improve if he pitched in front of a better infield defense than the Tigers’.

— Ken Rosenthal and Jon Paul Morosi

The Cleveland Indians continue to discuss contract extensions with left fielder Michael Brantley and second baseman Jason Kipnis. But for Brantley, at least, the landscape has changed.

Brantley, who turns 26 on May 15, moved from center field to left after the Indians signed free agent Michael Bourn to a four-year, $48 million contract.

The Indians began talking to Brantley began before they signed Bourn. Brantley’s long-term value almost certainly is lower in left than it is in center, potentially complicating negotiations.

Brantley becomes eligible for arbitration next season, Kipnis the year after. In each case, the Indians would want to buy out the player’s three arbitration years, then multiple years of free agency. That probably would mean a deal of at least five years for Brantley and at least six for Kipnis.

If Brantley declined to sign an extension, he would become a free agent entering his age 30 season.

— Ken Rosenthal

Nolan Arenado is that rarest of rookies — one who might make an Opening Day roster without regard to service-time considerations.

The Colorado Rockies likely will wait another 7-10 days before deciding whether Arenado will be their starting third baseman. But the team is giving the idea serious consideration, according to major-league sources

“It’s a tough call,” one club official said.

Chris Nelson, the team’s incumbent third baseman, batted .344 with an .881 OPS in 180 at-bats after the All-Star Game. But Nelson, 27, lacks an established track record, and the Rockies might simply decide it is Arenado’s time.

For Arenado and surging rookies such as Boston outfielder Jackie Bradley Jr. and Minnesota outfielder Aaron Hicks, the final weeks of spring training will be critical as they face pitchers sharpening their repertoires in advance of Opening Day.

Teams generally hold off on promoting rookies immediately in order to delay their eligibility for salary arbitration and free agency. But the Rockies are willing to make an exception for Arenado, who is batting .276 with a 1.069 OPS in 29 at-bats this spring.

Arenado is a gifted defender, and should fit well in an offense that the Rockies expect to be quite productive. Nelson probably isn’t strong enough defensively at second and short to be an effective utility man, and he is out of options, which could lead to a trade.

The Rockies want to add one more veteran starting pitcher, and Nelson isn’t their only potentially expendable part. The team wants to move catcher Ramon Hernandez, and will assume part of his $3.2 million salary to make a deal, sources say.

Hernandez, who turns 37 on May 20, is expendable because the Rockies are likely to name Yorvit Torrealba the backup to Wilin Rosario, with infielder/catcher Jordan Pacheco giving the team another option.

GLENDALE, Ariz. — Apparently, carrying baseball’s highest payroll doesn’t guarantee a worry-free camp.

For a team that’s supposed to win the World Series, the Dodgers have an uncommonly high number of questions at this stage of spring training.

Two urgent topics: Will Carl Crawford be ready for Opening Day? And how about Zack Greinke?

“We have to see,” Dodgers manager Don Mattingly said Thursday. “Carl’s feeling better. We’ve still got some time. If Carl was a guy that we just said, ‘Turn it loose. You can play every day, all you want, hit all you want,’ the chances would be really good, because he’d be ready.

“But in the situation that we’re only going to allow him so much per day takes it back a little bit. Carl’s still optimistic. Until somebody says he cannot do it, then we’re going to be optimistic also. We’re just pleased he’s moving forward.”

Crawford, who was shut down recently because of nerve irritation in his surgically repaired left elbow, took at-bats in a minor-league game Thursday.

Greinke hasn’t pitched in a Cactus League game since March 1 due to inflammation in his right (throwing) elbow. Greinke isn’t scheduled to resume bullpen sessions until next week at the earliest.

With Opening Day barely more than two weeks away, Greinke must return to game action very soon in order to be on track for a regular-season start by the beginning of April. The Dodgers also could slot Greinke as the “fifth starter,” so to speak, and not schedule him to pitch until April 11 against San Diego.    

Of Greinke’s status, Mattingly said, “We’ll see where it goes, see how he feels. We’re not going to force anything. We’ve got different scenarios we’ve looked at, that we don’t need to guess at right now — at least publicly.”

The Dodgers’ entire rotation remains in a state of flux. They began the spring with eight starting pitchers: ace Clayton Kershaw, Greinke, Chad Billingsley, Josh Beckett, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Ted Lilly, Aaron Harang and Chris Capuano. It’s possible that one or two could be traded, with Harang and Capuano the most obvious candidates. But because Billingsley and Lilly battled injuries last year — along with Greinke’s new elbow concern — the Dodgers could be forced to delay any trades.

Asked how many starters are certain at this point, Mattingly said, “I don’t think we know. It’s hard to say any of them are really set. I think we have some ideas about what’s going on, different plans. But right now, we’re just trying to figure out how to use them all.”

The Dodgers’ uncertainty is hardly limited to the pitching staff. All-Star center fielder Matt Kemp is hitting only .105 this spring, coming off left shoulder surgery. (Mattingly said his at-bats have been “OK.”) Hanley Ramirez is expected to be the Dodgers’ everyday shortstop but has been playing third base for the Dominican Republic during the World Baseball Classic.

Outfielder Yasiel Puig has been one of the Dodgers’ most impressive position players this spring, with a .988 OPS, but Mattingly said it’s probably not “realistic” for the 22-year-old Cuban defector to make the Opening Day roster.

“Not really, in my mind, if we’re going to be realistic,” Mattingly said when asked about Puig’s chances to make the team. “It’s probably not the best thing for him. He may not agree with that, but I don’t realistically think that’s the best thing for the organization, with a guy who’s had the (low number of minor-league) at-bats he has. But he’s played well. He’s done a lot of good things. We see a lot of things that tell us he’s still young.

“Like we’ve said with a lot of guys, they tell you when they’re ready. If he’s ready, wherever he ends up (in the minor leagues), he’s going to tear it up. If he doesn’t, that tells you he’s maybe not quite ready.”

Puig looms as an intriguing call-up possibility during the season, particularly if Kemp or Crawford is sidelined again due to injury.

— Jon Paul Morosi

Kyle Lohse went through this as a free agent once before. Five years ago on Thursday, he signed a one-year, $4.25 million contract with the St. Louis Cardinals.

This time, Lohse is taking even longer to find a new team.

Lohse, 34, is working out both near his home in Arizona and at a facility operated by his agent, Scott Boras — the Boras Sports Training Institute in Aliso Viejo, Calif. He is facing hitters at the institute, and threw 85 pitches in his most recent outing, Boras said.

The Texas Rangers remain in contact with Lohse, according to major-league sources. Boras said only that multiple teams are interested.

“He’s doing his workouts, and we’ve continued talking with a number of teams,” Boras said. "A lot of teams are evaluating their existing situations, but have called and have interest in Kyle.”

Lohse’s market is slow in part because he is subject to draft-pick compensation, but executives also cite his high asking price — a three-year deal with a “big” average salary, according to one exec.

The Rangers, though, continue to make sense for Lohse on a couple of levels.

Two of their starting pitchers, left-hander Martin Perez and righty Colby Lewis, are expected to be out until early May with injuries. Another of their starters, righty Alexi Ogando, is converting from the bullpen to the rotation.

The Rangers also are in better position than most clubs to forfeit a draft pick for Lohse. They select 24^th – a relatively low position – and gained the 30^th choice when they lost free-agent outfielder Josh Hamilton to the Angels.

Draft-pick compensation for Lohse would be eliminated if he waited to sign until after the draft, which takes place between June 6 and 8.

Boras continues to express confidence that the pitcher will sign before then.

— Ken Rosenthal

MIAMI – For all that is now quantifiable in baseball, there are still some things that cannot be measured. The effect of St. Louis Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina on a pitching staff is one of them.

‘Now that I get to watch him a little bit, he’s the best,” said former major-league first baseman Carlos Delgado, Team Puerto Rico’s hitting coach in the World Baseball Classic.

“He’ll go to a pitcher and tell him, ‘Make a pitch. I’ll block it. It’s on me.’ He’ll take that responsibility,” Delgado said.  “When you’ve got a younger guy on the mound, and he’s a little hesitant about bouncing a breaking ball to put a hitter away, and you’ve got the best catcher in the game that goes to the mound and says, ‘Finish your pitch. Don’t worry about it. I’ll do it. I’ll block it.’ . . . it gives pitchers that confidence that they can finish their pitches.

“They don’t even have to think. Throw what he puts down. Trust him. It takes a lot of weight off them.”

Puerto Rico allowed only seven runs in three games in the first round of the tournament, and their opponents included two powerhouses, Venezuela and the Dominican Republic. Even Tuesday night, in a 7-1 loss to Team USA in the opener of the second round, Puerto Rico stayed close before the U.S. scored three runs in the eighth inning.

So, how do you quantify any of this?

Molina ranked eighth in the majors with a 3.60 catcher’s ERA last season, but the flaw in that statistic, as noted by sabermetricians, is selection bias; a catcher’s ERA is largely contingent on the quality of his pitchers.

Team Puerto Rico’s pitching staff in the WBC is mostly young and less than major-league caliber. The Cardinals, too, are going with younger pitchers this season; they’ve lost Chris Carpenter to injury and almost certainly will lose free agent Kyle Lohse. But the Molina advantage allows his teams to take such chances.

You can’t quite measure it. But it’s there.

-Ken Rosenthal

Reds left-hander Aroldis Chapman is destined to remain a closer, at least in the opinion of one rival scout who saw him start a minor-league game on Monday.

“I hope they do start him, but they’re crazy if they do,” said the scout, who works for another National League club. “It’s Joba Chamberlain all over again.

“His velocity dropped off in the second inning. He couldn’t get his off-speed stuff over the plate consistently. No question in my mind, he’s the closer.”

The Reds, for the second straight spring, are auditioning Chapman as a starter. But manager Dusty Baker and pitching coach Bryan Price prefer him to remain the closer, according to Hal McCoy of Fox Sports Ohio.

Chapman topped out at 93 mph on Monday and consistently threw 91, the scout said. His average reading as a reliever last season was 98.2 mph, according to Fangraphs.com.

Right-hander Mike Leake pitched in the same game, starting for Class AA Pensacola while Chapman started for Class AAA Louisville. Leake, according to the scout, was at 88-92 mph, and threw four pitches for strikes.

Both Chapman and Leake pitched three scoreless innings.

-Ken Rosenthal

Welcome to the Nationals, Denard Span, and enjoy your new corner outfielders, Bryce Harper in left and Jayson Werth in right.

“They got their own sign language out there,” Span, the Nationals’ new center fielder, said Monday morning. “I’m trying to pick up on it, just the communication part of it, what they like to do, what they like to say to each other.”

Sign language?

“Jayson Werth, it's like he plays charades out there,” Span continued. “He’s out there, giving me all different types of hand signals. I think the last game we played with each other, I looked at him like, ‘What are you doing?’ He just started laughing.

“I think he was just playing with me. Somebody was on the mound, he was looking at his watch, going like this (raising his hands above his head). I got back to the dugout and said, ‘What the heck were you trying to tell me?’ And he said, ‘Man, this guy is a human rain delay.’ I’m just like, ‘You’ve got to give me some note cards or something, so I can know what is going on.’”

Werth, smiling, said that he is only trying to welcome Span, whom the Nationals acquired from the Twins last Nov. 29 for pitching prospect Alex Meyer.

“This is a pretty loose club. I don’t think he’s ever played on a team as loose as this,” Werth said. “I’m just messing with him a little bit. But that’s part of it. You get to learn each other. You’ve got to start somewhere.”

Actually, there is a method to Werth’s madness.

Outfielders stand too far away from each other to communicate verbally, so Werth said that he indeed used hand signals to relay messages to his previous center fielders, Shane Victorino with the Phillies and Harper with the Nationals.

“When I had Victorino in center, he’s a mess,” Werth said. “He has so much energy. For him to stand still or not talk or not communicate . . .

“Bryce, I had to lead Bryce around like a little puppy dog for half the year (in 2012). And he figured it out. Now Denard seems like he knows what he’s doing. I don’t have to position him every pitch.”

Still, it’s spring training. And Werth is a little bored.

Outfielders, as Werth noted, “are a long way from the action.” And Grapefruit League exhibitions, particularly in the early spring, can get monotonous.

During the season, Werth said that his signals are on point. But for now, he is keeping things fresh and fun while trying to engage Span.

Span, according to Werth, doesn’t talk at all in the outfield. Harper, according to Span, does not engage in Werth-like antics.

“All three of us are on the same page. But you know Jayson. He does some different things,” Span said, smiling.

Span should stay alert. Werth doesn’t plan to stop.

“Denard looks at me and just shakes his head half the time,” Werth said. “I laugh, and I look over at Bryce, and he’s laughing. We’re having a good time out there.”

-Ken Rosenthal

ORLANDO – When I visited the Kansas City Royals’ camp last month, right-hander James Shields surprised me by pulling a glove out of his locker that had the inscription, “Bossman Jr.”

Bossman Jr.? That’s B.J. Upton’s nickname (Upton’s father, Manny, is Bossman). What the heck was Shields’ doing with Upton’s glove?

“I break in all his gloves for him,” Shields said, smiling. “I texted him the other day: ‘What are you going to do without me?’”

The glove story dates back to when Shields and Upton were minor leaguers with the Tampa Bay Rays. Shields, 31, and Upton, 28, both were drafted by the Rays, and played together at Double A and Triple A.

Now, for the first time, they are in different organizations.

Upton signed a five-year, $75.25 million free-agent contract with the Atlanta Braves on Nov. 29, and the Rays traded Shields to the Royals 10 days later.

“Every year when I came in, I would take my gloves out of my lockers and give them straight to him,” Upton recalled. “He would give them back to me a week before the season started. I kind of miss him right now.”

Shields joked that he had an ulterior motive for taking such good care of Upton’s gloves, saying, “That way, I knew he was going to catch it.”

As for the glove in his locker, Shields said he had kept one of Upton’s discards to use as his “shagging glove” with the Royals.

“We went golfing this off-season,” Shields said. “He was like, ‘What am I going to do without you? I’m going to have send gloves to your clubhouse so you can break ‘em in.’ I said, ‘I’ll break ‘em in after the second road trip of the year when I face you.’”

It’s true: The Braves host the Royals on April 16-17.

-Ken Rosenthal

Luca Panerati is slated to start for Team Italy on Saturday night against Team USA, in a game that could eliminate the Americans from the World Baseball Classic.

A brief bio: Panerati was born in Grossetto, Italy. He pitched in the Cincinnati farm system from 2008 until 2011, when he was released. The 23-year-old left-hander spent last season in his homeland, pitching for Bologna of the Italian Baseball League, and has contemplated the possibility of playing in Japan.

Panerati’s role model in this itinerant pitching life?

Naturally, R.A. Dickey.

“I was reading R.A. Dickey’s book,” Panerati said Friday, as he stood on the field before Italy’s 14-4 triumph over Canada. “It’s a crazy story. That really made me realize if you get released by a team, it doesn’t mean you don’t belong. You decide when it’s over – just you.

“Nobody can tell you that you can’t pitch. Nobody can tell you that you can’t run. Nobody can tell you that you can’t hit. It’s just you. You’ve got to believe in yourself. You have to be confident in what you’re doing. It’s a small edge between being confident and cocky. If you keep it to yourself, it helps a lot.”

Dickey’s personal and professional journey to last year’s National League Cy Young Award has become familiar to baseball fans throughout the world, but his signature knuckleball was less effective than usual in Friday’s loss to Mexico.

Panerati said he would love to meet Dickey during the tournament.

“I would say (to him that) he has an amazing story, and it was a great idea to tell everybody,” Panerati said. “I don’t think everybody has perseverance he had, completely changing his life, pretty much, from a conventional pitcher to the knuckleball.

“It’s not just about baseball. It’s about a life revolving around baseball, how his family supports him. It would be awesome to meet him and say congratulations that he made it and won the Cy Young Award last year.”

-- Jon Paul Morosi