There will be no Mac Williamson or Jarrett Parker on the roster to open the season as both were optioned to AAA-Sacramento. A flurry of cuts saw the likes of Gorkys Hernandez, Braulio Lara, and Conor Gillaspie headed for the minor-league camp. No surprises, really, the Giants big-league roster is a tough one to latch on to. There's a good chance Trevor Brown will be the Opening Day backup backstop as Andrew Susac will likely start the season on the DL. (SIR sez Brown is her new fave FNG.) The youngster from UCLA was awarded the "Barney Nugent" as the top performer this spring.
The Giants are going with 13 pitchers instead of a fifth outfielder. Gregor Blanco remains the only real jardinero off the bench, the other two spots will be infielders Kelby Tomlinson and Ehire Adrianza. Blanco will of course see much more playing time than most bench-warmers, he's versatile enough to cover all the spots and the three starters (Pagan, Span, and Pence) are coming off injury-marred seasons. El Tiburón had his best year with the bat in 2015 and his fourth straight 2-fWAR season with the Giants.
Right-hander Cory Gearrin is the new face in the bullpen other than lefty Josh Osich. Gearrin is a former Braves prospect and had Tommy John surgery in 2014. We saw a little of the side-armer in September. Osich has big shoes to fill with the departure of Jeremy Affeldt. The former Oregon State Beavers multi-sport star had TJS in 2010. He's never lacked for big-league stuff, the questions have all been about command and continued health. Osich made 35 appearances (120 TBF in 28-2/3 IP) after his call-up in July.
We'll be in Sacramento at Raley Field on Wednesday night for the Giants-River Cats exhibition. I'm excited, I've been told it's an excellent venue for baseball. Not to mention the tickets were a hot item--thanks to my man JC for pulling off that coup! I want to get a Sactown cap. Which one do you like? I hope to have pictures and a post afterwards.
GO GIANTS!
--M.C.
12 comments:
how about some AAA Rosterbation prior to the Giants/RiverCats game
So we got El Tiburon and also Shark? That's confusing.
Call me old-fashioned, but I have a really hard time with 13-man pitching staffs. Back in the day, somehow, 10 was the norm, & 9 was not unheard of (see 1972 World Champion Oakland A's, for example). Of course, that was when 4-man starting rotations were normal. So, OK, now that there's a 5-man rotation, & they average fewer innings per start, I can understand 11 or 12-man staffs. But, 13 ... really? Leaving a grand total of 4 pinch-hitters / position players? Too many pitchers.
And, when are we going to be out of options on Adrianza? Is he on some special type of contract?
Gorkys down to the minors? I hope that he hits 3 HR's against the big club, when you guys see him!
I think the Giants understand the limitations of a 13-man staff. They have been quoted about learning from the lesson from last season. However, sometimes circumstances dictate the Giants have to do something against what they have said and what fans want. Like, they understood the value of OBP, but there are not a lot of them in free agency back in the Grissom days, so they made do.
The public reason is some of the starters are not fully stretched out, but I think the real reason is because they want to keep Guerrin in their system. However, he's out of options and they would have to pass him through waivers to send him down. Right now, teams are ready to snatch players like him, but by waiting a few weeks into the season, maybe a month, by then, teams are not as willing to pick up a waiver claim. Or, as the saying goes, problems like this sometimes work themselves out (i.e. injury or poor performance).
Also, depending on how the starting rotation is doing, it could be Guerrin or Heston going down. If the starters are mostly going long (6-7 IP or more), they might send Heston down instead since long relief would not be as needed, someone could fill innings when one SP is short, while the others go longer. Plus, there's Bumgarner as PH, as per the bench situation.
Giants have been out of options on Adrianza for 3 seasons (including this one) now. They like him that much (though have played waiver roulette with him twice to clear 40-man space). And I like him that much. He has shown a good bat in the minors when he was closer in age to the league (high BB/low K) and he plays good defense at SS, which means he should be OK or better at the rest of infield. I think he can be the Blanco of infield, but won't know for certain if disaster hits and someone is injured. Hopefully he's finally getting a hang of hitting when sitting on the bench so much, or maybe Bochy will use him more often to give the starters some rest.
Gorkys sound like a Blanco type, I think the Giants are going to stash him in minors in 2016, and prep him to take over Blanco's role in 2017, and this is assuming Blanco leaves for more $$$ with another team, I don't see how the Giants are going to keep him as backup for the money he should make as starter for another team. I think he provides depth should we need someone who can start in CF (meaning Span, Pagan, Blanco goes down) and probably gets taste of majors in September if 40-man space.
13, 12, 11, 10, who gives a fuck? 1972, I was in the 8th grade. Might as well be B.C. Got to move with the times. Just win ballgames, man. I trust Bochy. He knows more about baseball than all of us combined.
And Blanco is The White Shark, obviously. El Tiburon Blanco. Samardzija is The Shark. I can handle it.
I hope I get to see MC when he's in town.
Matt threw 90 pitches yesterday.
Amen to that M.C., Amen to that, Bochy is the bomb!
Some good words on Cain: http://www.csnbayarea.com/giants/giants-righetti-offers-strong-words-matt-cains-progress
90 pitches! Yes! I feel good about Matty, he's never been about the velocity, though that obviously helps any pitcher, this is what he's been working for all through his career: to become a pitcher who can get batters out no matter what velocity he got. So it is exciting in that aspect, because I expect him to prove the haters and doubters wrong, and kick the Naysayers out of town with some strong pitching.
If he can deliver 180-200 innings with OK to good results, that's great out of the #5 rotation slot, and would be a good stepping stone to 2017 and building on that. Even if he was a bit inconsistent but give us quantity of innings, like a Zito, even that would be a good contribution, as it saves the bullpen. And if he can return to old Matty, I expect another downtown parade after the World Series. (Yes, I went there! And I'll double down with a back-to-back then! :^)
I'm getting psyched for the game tonight at Raley Field. I figure very few regulars will take the field (last night was just Panik and Duffy) but it should still be very educational. My big hope was that a regular starter might take the mound but they had MadBum get his work done in a controlled game yesterday so that doesn't even seem likely. Oh well, it will be worth it just to get a closeup look at Christian Arroyo. He looks 15 until he gets in the box. Dude can hit. Maybe he is a future LF??
I'm not surprised at the 13 pitchers. We seem to always opt for an extra relief pitcher rather than any kind of quality PH and I agree with that attitude. First of all, we don't have any good hitting bench players (except a couple guys that need to play everyday in AAA and our backup catcher when he gets healthy). Secondly, the early season schedule lends itself to needing an extra arm; most starters will be lucky to see the sixth inning even if they do well.
My gut tells me that our bullpen may be the weak link. It feels like we are counting too much on Osich and Lopez. Both of those guys have to be great or we have a HUGE hole. I also think Romo has to be used differently; his days of 8 th inning work are numbered. I fear he doesn't get lefties out any more. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe Strickland fills his role tremendously. I can't wait to see
On MLB TV, I tuned in for a half inning of the Giants' v. Royals game last night. The Giants had already sent all of their MLB Roster, including Coaches, but not Bochy, up to Sacramento, but KC was playing the normal lineup, including Yordano Ventura pitching. The game took place at the Royals' ballpark in Surprise, AZ, & the Royals' TV guys were calling the game. This guy, who has a lifetime grand total of 5 minor league HR's:
http://www.milb.com/player/index.jsp?player_id=596103#/career/R/hitting/2015/ALL
hit what the announcers called 'the longest HR they had every seen at this ballpark'. It was a mighty impressive, towering blast to CF. Lorenzo Cain took about a half a step back, then just watched. And, then, Ricky Oropesa hit an equally impressive line shot HR to RF (also off of Ventura). It got out of the park in about half a second.
I'm already excited about September call-ups! Hope that we have a big lead by then, so that these guys can play!
Go Giants!!!
My understanding is that most except for Panik and Duffy will play in Sacramento. Though can't contract for this, per Twitter, since the River Cats just signed affiliate contract to 2020, Giants would have gigantic balls not to play most regulars, said beat writers. Should be good game! But don't know if Arroyo there, he's slated for AA I think.
Here is the evidence (see 2 comments above):
http://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2016/3/30/11331484/sf-giants-austin-slater-home-run
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