ARLINGTON, TX—Easing back into shape after a long offseason, frail, emaciated Major League Baseball players confirmed Wednesday that they were still a few weeks away from regaining the strength necessary to lift a single baseball. “It’s going to take a lot of work, but we should be able to pick up the ball without dislocating anything by mid-April,” said pallid Texas Rangers shortstop Corey Seager, who had shriveled down to 85 pounds in the months since the World Series and, alongside several of his teammates, groaned as he bent at the knees and tried to lift a regulation baseball a few inches off the ground, ultimately failing and falling to the ground in pain. “This happens every year—the atrophy sets in almost immediately after the final game of the season, and all you can do is try to preserve enough body fat to make it through the winter. We should really be starting small with a cotton ball and gradually working our way up—[Ezequiel] Duran’s arm broke clean off from the brittleness of his bones. It’s crazy to think we used to be able to throw something this heavy hundreds of feet, but coach will help us get there again. Right now, I’m more focused on strengthening my lungs to be able to take in a single breath of air without them collapsing. No one likes to spend spring training in the iron lung.” At press time, Rangers manager Bruce Bochy was seen crushing sunflower seeds into a paste so his players’ malnourished bodies could more easily digest them.