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[San Francisco Giants]

Sean Hjelle optioned

So long, Sweet Slenderman.

The beat writers are out at Sutter Health Park ahead of today’s exhibition game between the San Francisco Giants and the Sacramento River Cats, and they’ve got news. Maria Guardado reports that the team has optioned Sean Hjelle to Triple-A ahead of the game.

I assumed he was a lock to make the Opening Day roster, thanks to his performance last year and due to the team’s recent optioning of Tristan Beck. When Keaton Winn was optioned yesterday, his spot seemed even more certain. But the good news is that the Giants aren’t really predictable — at least, I’m definitely still predicting with the previous regime in mind.

Alex Pavlovic notes that “Landen Roupp can fill a similar role [to Hjelle’s in 2024] if he’s not in the rotation,” and goodness, if the last few days have taught me anything, it’s that the consensus around these parts is that LANDEN ROUPP WILL PITCH OUT OF THE BULLPEN, no matter how much he starts in Spring Training.

So, with all that in mind, let’s take a look at the pitching situation with just four days until Opening Day:

SP Logan Webb
SP Robbie Ray
SP Justin Verlander
SP Jordan Hicks
SP HAYDEN BIRDSONG

LR Landen Roupp or Spencer Bivens

CL Ryan Walker
SU Tyler Rogers
SU Camilo Doval
MR Erik Miller
MR Randy Rodriguez
MR Lou Trivino
MR Joel Peguero

That’s 14 dudes for (what I assume will be) 13 spots, which means something’s got to give. Neither Trivino nor Peguero are on the 40-man roster, but as we’ve discussed throughout the week, the Giants will have room to add both (by moving both Tom Murphy & Jerar Encarnacion to the 60-day IL). Roupp, Bivens, and Rodriguez are all optionable.

It’s not a strict matter of “Who will get the final spot” because there are a few permutations that exist given the roster flexibility. Since I’ve been wrong about so much in predicting the Spring Training roster, I’ll simply point out the following:

• Roupp has been high on the org’s list for a long time.
• Peguero is still on a minor league deal and doesn’t have an opt out.
• Bob Melvin gets some say in roster decisions and has been championing Trivino all camp.
• Bivens has been used for multiple innings throughout camp and performed well.
• Rodriguez has gotten better as camp has gone on.

So, make of all that as you will.

In other news, Kyle Harrison, who was optioned down to Triple-A yesterday and was expected to start for the River Cats in tonight’s exhibition, was scratched. It’s been a tough spring for him.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...isco-giants-roster-moves-spring-training-2025

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Monday BP: Giants announce Sam Huff as backup catcher

Photo by Jeff Dean/Getty Images

Officially official.

Ever since Tom Murphy suffered an injury as Spring Training was getting started, it’s felt like the San Francisco Giants viewed Sam Huff as the new backup catcher. And on Sunday, they made that official. Before their tune-up game against their own AAA squad, Giants manager Bob Melvin announced that Huff — claimed off of waivers this offseason after the Texas Rangers waived him — would break camp with the team as Patrick Bailey’s backup.

It’s certainly not surprising news. Huff is on the 40-man roster, was a top-100 prospect in very recent memory, and has had a sensational Cactus League showing.

With Huff winning the job, the other very talented catcher in camp — veteran Max Stassi — will head to AAA Sacramento. Stassi eschewed the first of three opt outs guaranteed to him due to has veteran status, and apparently that was never in question. According to Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle, Stassi “has known the plan for a while and is fine with it.” A product of Sacramento suburb Yuba City, Stassi is comfortable with the River Cats, and has a good chance to join the Giants roster at some point this season. His next opt-out date is May 1.

As for Huff, he’ll likely get a decent amount of time to prove that he deserves the job, as Murphy doesn’t appear to be anywhere near a return to the field. And with just two games remaining before Thursday’s season-opener, the roster is coming into even closer focus.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2025/3/24/24392650/giants-backup-catcher-sam-huff-max-stassi

 

[San Francisco Giants]

The 2025 Hopes & Dreams List

Rick Scuteri-Imagn Images

It’s time to open ourselves up for disappointment.

My love for the San Francisco Giants means that at least once a year I put myself in a position to be humiliated by them by getting my hopes up and wishing big things for them.

This is that moment.

Now, IN NO WAY is this a prediction thread, because I’m terrible at positive predictions regarding the Giants. It’s so much easier to predict failure — because that’s mostly what baseball (and life) is — but it’s even easier to dream big about one’s favorite team after they’ve had a great Spring Training. And if you’re a Giants fan, that result plus the switch in leadership personality from an anxious, malfunctioning artificial intelligence to Buster Posey has the effect of making anything seem possible.

As someone who doesn’t contemplate hope or dream anymore, I had to go and look up the difference between these two words. Turns out, it’s meaningful for a baseball discussion: “hope” means the speaker believes their statement is possible. “Wish” expresses an outcome the speaker doesn’t believe is possible right now. For example: I hope the Giants have a winning season. I wish the Giants would make the postseason.

For the purposes of this post, though, I’m calling a wish a dream, because a Hopes & Dreams List sounds better than a Hopes & Wishes List. I feel good about that because of that old Disney lyric, “A dream is a wish your heart makes.” And goodness, does my heart wish a lot of things for a baseball team I have absolutely no control over.

Hope​

The Spring Training results transfer over to the regular season for the most part​

It’s not like I’m expecting the team’s .760 winning percentage (19-6) from the Cactus League to translate 100% to the regular season (123 wins), but I hope that a decent chunk of their success manages to stand tall against major league competition. The opposite has happened before: the 1984 Giants were 18-9 in Spring Training and went on to lose 96 games in the regular season.

Landen Roupp’s spring carries over​

Whether he’s the fifth starter or a long reliever, the organization has been hyped about the guy since at least last Spring Training. Injuries have hobbled his career, but this seems to be the moment for the 26-year old righty. He still has a lot to prove, but he’s on track to do so.

Hayden Birdsong is That Guy​

There have been very few days in the offseason where I haven’t thought of Birdsong at least in passing. l don’t see him as the next Lincecum or Bumgarner... but Matt Cain? The Prodigal Son era of Ryan Vogelsong’s Giants career? He could wind up starting the season in Triple-A, sure, or make the team as a reliever rather than in the rotation — but in any case, I hope the inklings of awesomeness we got from him last season blossom in 2025. I know ink doesn’t blossom, but that’s how excitable Birdsong makes me — I’ll confuse a gosh danged metaphor in the blink of an eye.

Logan Webb stays healthy​

I just think it’s tough to pencil in a pitcher for 200+ innings every season. Now, the hope here isn’t that he hits 200 innings, it’s that he stays (relatively) healthy and is able to pitch when the team needs him most.

Ryan Walker regresses to an awesome mean​

It’s stayed ringing in my ears for months and months Roger Munter’s quasi-warning about reliever usage. He (author of the vital There R Giants prospects site) has mentioned here and elsewhere that the stage was set for Camilo Doval’s fall from grace in 2024 by extreme usage in 2023. Walker pitched 80 innings in 2024 and a great many of them were high leverage. It was a 19-inning jump from 2023, too. FanGraphs statted him out as a 2-win player. Baseball Reference saw a 3-win player. So, a step back could mean going to a 1-win or 2-win player, depending on who’s looking at it; but if he’s as awesome as he’s seemed the past two seasons — maybe it won’t be that bad?

The roster is Melvin-proof​

This is where discussions of bullpen usage really matter. I am not really a fan of Bob Melvin as a manager, but I don’t think he’s a disaster, either. That’s an incredible compliment to pay an MLB manager, I think. To simplify the matter, I’ll just say that Dusty Baker had Barry Bonds and Bruce Bochy had some of the most dominant pitching in the franchise’s history, but also Buster Posey, Brandon Crawford, Pablo Sandoval, and sometimes Brandon Belt. Talent makes managing a whole lot easier, and so as long as Melvin doesn’t try to insert himself as the story or make panic moves as he enters a potential lame duck (recall that his deal for 2026 is an option for the team) the Giants will be in good shape if the spring training vibes carry over to actual regular season results. That might feel like more of a wish than a hope, but there it is.

The Giants win at least 82 games​

Maybe I could’ve just said, “I hope the Giants don’t suck this year,” but because I — and the rest of us — love the team, a spirited 78-84 record might be considered a “didn’t suck!” season and so I feel it necessary to make a distinction by placing a win total on the year.

Depending on how one considers the team’s 81-81 season in 2022, in the entire history of the franchise, the Giants have never had more than four straight losing seasons. If they have another one here in 2025, that would make it four straight if you consider .500 to not be “winning.” On the one hand, this being — at worst — the fourth consecutive losing season wouldn’t be cause for alarm, but on the other hand, I don’t want them to mess around with that streak. Buster Posey has been a part of some losing Giants teams, but it’d be a bit of a bummer if his first as an executive was one.

Heliot Ramos and Tyler Fitzgerald don’t crater​

Ramos was a 2-WAR player in 2024 and Fitzgerald was a 3-WAR player. I hope neither of them fall below 1.5.

Willy Adames and Matt Chapman are the anchors​

Chapman doesn’t have to repeat his stellar 5.5 fWAR campaign from 2024, but a step back to a 4-WAR player while Adames repeats Chapman’s 2024 (and his own) in that 5-win range is my broad hope. If they both wind up being 4-win players? That’d be fine, too. If we assume that Bailey’s defense will also propel him into the 4-win player range again, that’d give the Giants three such players. They haven’t had three 4+-fWAR position players on the same team in a season since 2015, when Posey (6.8 fWAR), Matt Duffy (4.4), Brandon Crawford (4.3), Brandon Belt (3.9), and Joe Panik (3.8) were making us believe the good times would never end.

Wilmer Flores torments major league pitching again​

While this is another one of those “Spring Training stats carrying over”-level hopes, it’s born of the fact that he hasn’t been a bad hitter for a long time. If he’s healthy at all or even for a good chunk of the season, he can help the Giants’ lineup very much. Recall that in 2023, he basically was the lineup.

Bryce Eldridge is a luxury​

Now, we all want to see this prospect become a dangerous left-handed power threat in the lineup, but my hope is that his development happens in the shadows of the big league team’s success. The best case scenario is that he’s an add-on that fuels a run of success already in progress. If he’s a desperation three from the other basket as the buzzer sounds at halftime, well, it probably means the Giants aren’t doing all that great.

Jung Hoo Lee is a necessity​

Of all the options for the label, I think Jung Hoo Lee is the obvious choice to be “the straw that stirs the drink.” Because we can’t predict baseball, that might not wind up being the case, of course, but I hope that if the Giants’ lineup is performing well, it’s because he’s an important part of it. A tough guy who’s hard to strike out and can get hits off tough pitches is a critical part of any lineup — a guy who can destabilize the confidence of an opponent’s battery might help crack open the big inning more often.

Dream​

Kyle Harrison regains his velocity​

The bloom might be off the rose for the 23-year old, but there’s still plenty of time to work on his mechanics and reinvent himself. If he can adapt to Eno Sarris’s advice (posted yesterday to Bluesky: “A high spin efficiency low slot guy who doesn’t pronate well and lost velo... needs to study Sean Manaea and Andrew Heaney to figure something out”), perhaps there’s a way he can become an important player for the Giants (as either a rostered player or a trade piece) down the road. I believe the beat writers who’ve told us for years now that he, too, has That Dawg in him. It’d be nice to see it on the field again.

At least one Giant hits 30 home runs this year​

It’s actually not a big deal. Because of their ballpark, the Giants will never be a consistently great or even good offensive team. Dingers may dazzle, but pitching and defense wins championships. But! Just to see if it’s possible in a post-Bonds era? Why not dream about it? If Chapman, Adames, and Ramos all hit in 25-28 home runs, nobody’s going to complain about another year without a 30-home run guy.

Erik Miller is enough​

He could strike out Shohei Ohtani in every appearance, but my rational mind tells me that at some point having only one left-handed reliever will be bad for the Giants. Then again, FanGraphs wrote back in 2023 about the observable phenomena of a decline in left-handed relief pitching overall, the result of the roster limitations and batter minimum rules. So, maybe this is less of a dream on my part and more of an acceptance of evolving reality. Still... those walks... his inning totals year over year. Nah, it’ll all work out. If not with him specifically, then the strategy itself.

A zombie form of the Giants-Dodgers rivalry appears​

The official Giants-Dodgers rivalry ended at some point in the last few years — arguably, when the Dodgers won the 2021 Division Series — and it feels like conventional wisdom now that the teams are in different leagues. Perhaps even playing different sports. While Buster Posey is trying to bring the Giants back to Major League Baseball, the truth is that the Dodgers have ascended to a different plane. His aura won’t be enough to close the gap.

Compounding matters is that it appears the Dodgers will surpass the Giants in the all-time head to head series. That series is comprised of 2,580 games (2,585 if you included the NLDS) going back to 1890. Heading into this season, it’s 1,284-1,279-17 in favor of the Giants, 1,286-1,282-17 if you include that NLDS.

Since the turn of the century, the Dodgers have led the rivalry 235-211 in the regular season, but in terms of a running tally... the Dodgers have never led it. NEVER. Okay, to be most accurate. They’ve never ended a season ahead in W-L record. Maybe at some point over 130 or so years they’ve gone ahead at one point, but the Giants have always ended the season with the lead. Another 4-9 showing leaves the season series tied. Can the Giants go 5-8 against the presumptively best team in the league? Probably not, but that’s not what this dream is getting after exactly. The rivalry feels dead. Oracle Park belongs to Dodgers fans. I dream of this series mattering again.

But enough about my hopes & dreams. What are yours for the Giants in 2025?

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...d-dreams-for-the-san-francisco-giants-in-2025

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Tuesday BP: Which World Series championship was your favorite?

Welcome to the hardest decision you’ll ever have to make.

Good morning, baseball fans!

We are so close to regular season San Francisco Giants baseball that I can practically smell the freshly cut grass and garlic fries. My brain is happy. Which means that naturally, I have chosen violence for today’s question.

The Giants have won the World Series thrice since moving to San Francisco. Three generations of my family were born after that, and were fully grown adults before we saw the first one. Then we got two more in the span of five years. It’s still wild to think about.

Today, I’m forcing you all to pick a favorite. That’s right, no rankings. No “well this one had this, but this one had that, I can’t choose!” No. You have to choose!

Which is hard as hell. Obviously 2010 was huge. It was the first. I cried. You cried. Our parents cried. Hard to beat on pure emotion alone. The joy, the celebrations that lasted until the team’s plane touched down back in San Francisco the next morning, the parade. Top notch nostalgia right there.

A lot of people kind of brush over 2012 because they swept the Detroit Tigers. However, they had their backs against the wall for the rest of the playoffs which made the sweep that much more enjoyable for me.

But you cannot discount 2014 and the legend that is and will always be Madison Bumgarner. On paper, there was no way that team should have won the World Series. That rotation was Bumgarner, duct tape and a prayer. And Bumgarner said “Hold the duct tape,” before walking out from the bullpen to get the job done in Game 7. You know, after carrying the team to even get that far to begin with.

Am I being reductive? Absolutely. But in 30 years, when someone asks me about that series, that is what I will always remember first.

So now, I have to do the thing that I am forcing you all to do and choose.

I’m going to probably be the odd one out on this, but I’m going to have to pick 2012. The question wasn’t “best” but “favorite.” And I loved the 2012 World Series.

After having had to spend the 2010 World Series alone and deathly ill, I had my dad visit during the 2012 NLCS. They won every game after he got there, so I told him he had to stay until they stopped winning. And they never stopped winning.

That was the first time a favorite team of mine had ever won a championship (while I was not near-death on my couch and unable to celebrate with anything heartier than a feeble “yay!”.)

I wrapped a Giants flag around my shoulders and ran through the neighborhood. We played Ashkon as loud as we could and danced around my apartment. It was absolutely one of the happier days of my life.

So now it’s your turn to decide.

Which World Series Championship was your favorite?​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2025/3/25/24393464/giants-fan-questions-world-series-favorites

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Giants DFA David Villar, add Lou Trivino to roster

Photo by Jeff Dean/Getty Images

Two big moves that were entirely expected.

On Tuesday, two days before Opening Day, the San Francisco Giants made a pair of significant roster moves, though neither move was at all surprising. Veteran right-handed reliever Lou Trivino — a non-roster invitee — was added to the roster, while third baseman/first baseman David Villar was designated for assignment to clear a spot on the 40-man roster.

It’s the likely end of a long journey in a Giants jersey for Villar, who was open all camp about seeing the writing on the wall. With Matt Chapman locked up long-term at third base, a set platoon at first base, and not enough oomph in Villar’s bat to warrant a role as a full-time DH, it was matter of “when,” not “if” Villar, who is out of options, would get cut.

There’s a chance the Giants sneak Villar through waivers and outright him to AAA Sacramento, though I wouldn’t hold my breath. The industry is, reportedly, still fairly interested in the right-handed hitter, and the projection systems continue to be bullish on him: ZiPS projects the 28-year old for about 2.5 WAR if given a full season’s worth of plate appearances this year. I would guess that a few teams will come calling, and that the Giants are able to trade Villar for a modest return, as they did with Joey Bart this time last year.

The recent injury to Jerar Encarnación might have opened the door for Villar to stick around were he having a better spring, but he hit just .200/.265/.444 with a 36.7% strikeout rate in 49 plate appearances.

As for Trivino, he felt like the most likely non-roster invitee to make the team all through camp, in part because of his close relationship with manager Bob Melvin — the first four years of Trivino’s five-year career came while pitching for Melvin on the Oakland A’s. The 33-year old hasn’t pitched in the Majors since the 2022 season due to Tommy John surgery, but impressed all spring with a 0.00 ERA, a 2.89 FIP, and 10 strikeouts in 9.1 innings.

With the move, the Giants have now revealed their entire eight-man bullpen: Trivino, Hayden Birdsong, Randy Rodríguez, Spencer Bivens, Tyler Rogers, Camilo Doval, Erik Miller, and closer Ryan Walker. With the rotation — Logan Webb, Justin Verlander, Robbie Ray, Jordan Hicks, and Landen Roupp — also set, and Sam Huff named the backup catcher, there are only a few roster spots left to be filled. Assuming Luis Matos makes the roster as Mike Yastrzemski’s platoon partner, it would seem that all that’s left to do is pick a backup middle infielder, and one additional bench player to replace Encarnación.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2025/3/25/24393782/giants-roster-moves-david-villar-lou-trivino

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Wednesday BP: What are your favorite Opening Day memories?

Photo by Bob Kupbens/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Opening Day is here! Well, almost. What are Giants fans’ favorite memories of Opening Days past?

Good morning, baseball fans!

With just one more day to go until the San Francisco Giants play their first regular season game of 2025, today I wanted to hear from you all about some of your favorite memories from Opening Days past.

Personally, I think Opening Day should be a national holiday. Unfortunately for me and baseball fans everywhere, that is not the case. So I usually end up having to work and play the game on the radio if I’m lucky.

So instead I’ll chime in with one of my favorite memories of home openers. Somehow I ended up being on long drives for both the 2010 and 2011 home openers, so I was listening on the radio. And if you remember those games at all, you may remember having a huge sense of deja vu in 2011.

Both games ended up going to extra innings and both games were won with a walk-off single by Aaron Rowand. I even had the same friend in my car for both games. She didn’t really follow baseball but even she found the whole thing to be incredibly odd. It was great.

What are your favorite Opening Day memories?​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2025/3/26/24394262/san-francisco-giants-opening-day-fan-memories

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Giants announce Opening Day roster; Murphy and Encarnación to the IL

Photo by Chris Coduto/Getty Images

Officially official.

On Wednesday morning, a little more than 24 hours before Opening Day, our own Bryan Murphy attempted to put the pieces of the roster together, coming to a conclusion as to what the San Francisco Giants Game 1 active roster would look like, based on all the reports that had been coming out. And by the end of the day, Bryan had officially gained the role of resident McCovey Chronicles Puzzle Master. Because on Wednesday evening, the Giants officially announced their Opening Day roster, exactly as Bryan had seen it unfolding.

Here she is, in all her glory:

Starting pitchers (5)​

Jordan Hicks
Robbie Ray
Landen Roupp
Justin Verlander
Logan Webb

Right-handed relievers (7)​

Hayden Birdsong
Spencer Bivens
Camilo Doval
Randy Rodríguez
Tyler Rogers
Lou Trivino
Ryan Walker

Catchers (2)​

Patrick Bailey
Sam Huff

First basemen (2)​

Wilmer Flores
LaMonte Wade Jr.

Infielders (5)​

Willy Adames
Matt Chapman
Tyler Fitzgerald
Christian Koss
Casey Schmitt

Outfielders (4)​

Jung Hoo Lee
Luis Matos
Heliot Ramos
Mike Yastrzemski

The surprise certainly comes in the infield grouping. Not only did Koss, a non-roster invitee with no Major League experience, beat out two rostered players, but the Giants opted to have their backup infield group be he and Schmitt. As a result, the Giants are backing up two of the most durable players in all of baseball, plus a third infielder who is an everyday player with no injury history, with not one, but two players who have the same handedness.

As a whole, the Giants are carrying no left-handed bats on the bench. Even with that right-handed dominant lineup, the Giants — hurt by Jerar Encarnación’s injury — have put themselves in a place where, when a left-handed pitcher is on the mound, they’ll have to either have the highly unproven Koss, Schmitt, or Huff be the designated hitter, or start one of their two lefty platoon bats, Wade or Yastrzemski.

It’s probably not what they were envisioning at the start of camp, but Encarnación’s injury changed the equation quite a bit.

Koss getting the nod for his MLB debut is incredibly exciting, and a wonderful story for the 12th-round pick from 2019. It’s a bit unclear where he’ll find time to play given that his best attribute is shortstop defense, and the Giants employ a 160-games-a-year defensive stud there, but that’s a problem for Bob Melvin, not for me.

In addition to announcing the roster, the Giants announced a few other moves. Encarnación was placed on the 10-Day IL to start the year, while catcher Tom Murphy was placed on the 60-Day IL, which opened a spot on the roster for Koss. In finishing out the bookkeeping post-camp, outfielder Grant McCray and infielder Brett Wisely were optioned, while catcher Max Stassi and right-handed reliever Joel Peguero were reassigned. It’s especially tough news for Wisely, who looked to have an inside track to a roster spot given the lack of left-handed options on the bench.

And now we know who is going to Cincy! Bring on the season!

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...schmitt-tom-murphy-jerar-encarnacion-injuries

 

[San Francisco Giants]

The first series preview of 2025: Giants @ Reds

That’s Chappie. And Willy. | Rick Scuteri-Imagn Images

Ahhhhh, that new season smell.

Baseball has returned! Let it thaw the icy winter and bring forth the promise of spring and summer. May it pause our fears and captivate our imaginations. If not for the next several weeks, then at least for today. The San Francisco Giants begin their next trip through the 162-game season and in this moment... anything is possible.

This is a feeling that’s shared by their opponent. The Cincinnati Reds haven’t had as transitional an offseason as the Giants, but both fandoms have reason for optimism. The Reds didn’t shake up their front office, but they did have a modest offseason from a transactions standpoint — a trio of trades (for SP Brady Singer, IF Gavin Lux, and LHP Taylor Rogers), and a trio of payroll adds (SP Nick Martinez accepted the qualifying offer, OF Austin Hays, RP Scott Barlow) — kicked off by installing a new manager. Terry Francona has got Reds fans excited about the team’s chances, as the mix of youth and experience is now directed by a surefire Hall of Fame coach.

It’s not quite bringing in Buster Posey to run the team, but it’s certainly of a kind with that. The Giants’ biggest move after that, of course, was signing SS Willy Adames to a franchise-record contract. He’ll matchup against the Reds’ homegrown superstar Elly De La Cruz, who not only posted an .809 OPS last year but stole 67 bases on his way to getting some MVP votes.

Adames received some votes as well, and having most recently been in the NL Central as a Brewer, the Giants’ newest player has amassed a nice track record against the Reds. He’s slashing .269/.326/.521 in 28 games (129 PA) at Great American Ballpark (8 HR, 6 doubles) — overall against the Reds, (57 games), he’s .255/.327/.563 with 19 home runs and 12 doubles.

The Giants-Reds series was a tough one for the Giants prior to 2021, save for the 2012 NLDS, of course. With the home run-ability of the park the biggest issue, this will be a good first test for this edition of the Giants. The team’s success this season ought to be the result of great pitching and sound defense. The forecast suggests that at least one of these games (Sunday’s) might be impacted by rain and let’s hope that it’s only one game.

Neither team is projected to be all that good against the NL playoff field and maybe only interesting to its fans, but you can’t predict baseball, and fans watch not only because it makes great background noise that occasionally grabs your attention, it also creates thrilling storylines of improbable comebacks and even harder to fathom streaks of dominance. Both teams have a great number of homegrown players on their 40-man rosters — with the Giants edging out the Reds 20-18 in that category, believe it or not — and they’re counting on that talent to propel them here in 2025.

The Giants have a 21-6 Spring Training record (+57 run differential!) fueling their optimism, plus Buster Posey guiding the ship, Logan Webb on the bump to start the season, Willy Adames alongside Matt Chapman, the return of Jung Hoo Lee, Justin Verlander in the rotation, and a bunch of power arms in their bullpen (plus Tyler Rogers!). Open the gates and let that excitement sprint onto the track!

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Series overview​

Who: San Francisco Giants at Cincinnati Reds
Where: Great American Ballpark, Cincinnati, Ohio
When: Thursday, Saturday, Sunday
National broadcasts: None.

Projected starters (2024 Stats)
Thursday: Logan Webb (13-10, 3.47 ERA) vs. Hunter Greene (9-5, 2.75 ERA)
Saturday: TBA vs. TBA
Sunday: TBA vs. TBA

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FanGraphs preseason projected W-L​

Reds, 78-84 (5th in NLC), .501 strength of schedule, 20.5% Postseason odds
Giants, 81-81 (4th in NLW), .511 strength of schedule, 28.7% Postseason odds​

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Reds to watch​

Taylor Rogers: The Giants dumped him off to the Reds to save themselves $6 million and now he’s their primary setup man. He had a solid spring for them until his final appearance in the Cactus League (4 earned runs and 0 outs recorded), which ballooned his ERA to 6.43 in 7 innings. The Giants moved on from him because the signing was — in their eyes — a bust nearly as soon as the ink dried. With the Giants featuring an all right-handed bench, his revere platoon split will get an interesting challenge right away. Also, will the telecast feature some b-roll of he and Tyler interacting before the game?

Christian Encarnacion-Strand: Is he the Big Bopper from the Bay who’s here to stay? He had a great spring and is looking to reestablish himself after a wrist injury limited him to just 29 games last season. You may recall that he made his MLB debut in 2023 against the Giants, and in his second game he swatted a mammoth home run.

Matt McLain: After a breakout rookie season in 2023 (.290/.357/.507 in 403 PA), the Reds hopes for competing in 2024 were pinned in part to McLain, but shoulder surgery cost him all of last season. Now he’s back and looking to cause trouble. Will he hit the ground running or will the Giants still find some rust?

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Giants to watch​

Jung Hoo Lee: The Reds are seeing a lot of their injured players return and that’s given the franchise renewed sense of hope. That’s a similar feeling with the Giants. Jung Hoo Lee might not be a 30-homer threat, but he might be the most important bat in the lineup. Nice to have him back.

Patrick Bailey: I assumed that Elly De La Cruz as a player to watch is a given, but just in case it’s unclear, please do keep your eye on one of the best players in the sport. We know that Patrick Bailey will if he gets on base. Indeed, as nice as it would be for the Giants’ backstop to also hit, his job will be to contain the Reds’ running game as best as possible. Hopefully, Giants pitchers worked on holding runners better, as the Giants were one of the worst teams in the sport in that regard in 2024. His pitch framing will be important, too. Limiting free passes and base traffic could determine the series.

Ryan Walker: Closing on the road is no small feat and the Great American Ballpark is a place where an inning can get away from a starter or a reliever rather quickly. He wrested the closer job away from Camilo Doval and the Giants didn’t think about it again last season once he did. But there’s a different kind of pressure that comes with entering the season with the job. The expectations are even greater.

---

Prediction time​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...-cincinnati-reds-jung-hoo-lee-elly-de-la-cruz

 

[San Francisco Giants]

What a lovely way to start the year

Photo by Lauren Leigh Bacho/MLB Photos via Getty Images

Undefeated!

The San Francisco Giants dominated the Cactus League this year, leading to a chorus of voices (yours perhaps among them) reminding you on an hourly basis that Spring Training results don’t matter. In a quest for optimism ahead of the long journey that is a 162-game baseball season, you might have found yourself questioning authority, asking the immortal why when presented with said hourly reminder.

There are, unfortunately, a lot of answers to that question; answers you’ll eagerly pull out the next time the Giants finish their spring schedule five games under .500. But the largest reason might be this: many baseball games are decided in the late innings, when Spring Training games are populated by players who won’t be deciding Major League games that season.

Here’s an example: on March 9, the Giants beat the Chicago Cubs 8-6. They trailed 6-3 entering the ninth inning, but then had a rally that began with a solo home run from Aeverson Arteaga and concluded with a three-run home run from Sabin Ceballos ... a pair of players on loan from Minor League camp who spent last year in A-Ball.

That might tickle your baseball fancy, and it might even portend success for the 2027 Giants, but it doesn’t mean diddly squat for winning Major League games over the next six months. We would have to wait and see how the Giants actual big leaguers did against other teams’ actual big leaguers.

The early returns weren’t great. Against a reigning Cy Young vote-getter in the Cincinnati Reds Hunter Greene, the Giants struck out six times the first time through the order, with just one batter reaching base. Or, as Alex Pavlovic noted while graciously previewing this game story...

The Giants have five strikeouts through the first two innings. See, the thing about that 21-win spring was that they weren't facing dudes who sit at 100 mph.

— Alex Pavlovic (@PavlovicNBCS) March 27, 2025​

But we’re getting sidetracked here. While it’s true that the Giants weren’t facing the Hunter Greenes of the world with regularity in the desert, the point I led with was that a large number of games are decided late.

So let’s start with the late. The latest of the late. The latest that baseball games get before the rules change for reasons we won’t get into.

The ninth inning.

The Giants trailed the Reds 3-2 in the ninth inning on Thursday, in all her Opening Day glory. The heart of the order — three players with nine-figure contracts — was due up ... not something we’d seen in the ninth inning of a spring game. They were facing veteran righty Ian Gibaut ... also not something we’d seen in the ninth inning of a spring game.

Willy Adames led off and struck out, the 15th such instance of a Giants batter striking out.

One down.

Jung Hoo Lee followed and fell behind 0-2, before taking three balls, fouling off two pitches, and finally taking ball four. The tying run was on the bases.

Matt Chapman was next. His quest to roll his hot spring over into the season had hit a snag, as he was 0-3 with a strikeout. He punched the second pitch he saw the other way, shooting it through the hole in the right side of the infield while Lee motored from corner to corner.

The Giants had the tying run at third base. Heliot Ramos took a sweeper at the knees for strike one.

There was only one out. Ramos fouled off a fastball at the hands for strike two.

The Giants had preached situational hitting all spring, how they had focused on putting the ball in play in RBI situations, and avoiding harmful strikeouts. Ramos took a sweeper at the edge of the zone for strike three.

You had to feel for Ramos. To that point he had been the entirety of the offense, providing both runs on what I can confidently say will stand as one of the best at-bats of the year, even after 161 more games are played. In the fourth inning, against a right-handed flamethrower, Ramos — attempting to prove he can hit same-handed pitching well enough to be an honest-to-goodness everyday player — worked a count full before fouling off five consecutive pitches. Finally, on the 11th pitch of the at-bat, Greene hurled a seventh straight fastball at Ramos, who drove it the other way for a gorgeous home run.

But in the ninth inning, that memory faded into the distance. Ramos, needing but a lazy fly ball to tie the game, was caught staring at a perfect Gibaut pitch, and that seemed destined to haunt him all through Friday’s off day, leaving fans squirming in the hellacious discomfort of sports what-iffery.

The sympathy was short lived, because the failure was fast forgotten. Five pitches later, Patrick Bailey found just enough bat to ground a ball over the infield and past a diving body and a flailing glove, scoring Lee to tie the game and keep the Giants alive.

But the fun wasn’t over, even after Wilmer Flores fell behind 0-2.

If you’re looking for reasons to stake your Giants fandom to optimism — or pessimism — this year, Flores is one of them. The journey to a successful season rests, in no small part, on players who very recently were quite good, but are unsure about their ability to follow the path back to that success. In 2023, Flores had an .863 OPS, 23 home runs, and two functional knees. In 2024, he had a .595 OPS, four home runs, and zero functional knees.

The Giants’ blueprints for both a surprisingly good and a painfully bad season each contain one of those Floreses (Florii? Floreaux? Florese? Wilmers Flores?), and we all eagerly await the answer of which one will show up.

It won’t be revealed in one day, of course. But in the land where Buster Posey sent 43,000 fans home miserable, while a pitcher reacted in despair on the mound as the ball sailed over the left field wall — and with Posey present for both his 38th birthday and his first game as Top Dog — Flores did the same.

Ian Gibaut is no Mat Latos, and Opening Day is no NLDS, but it’s hard not to see one and think of the other.

The Giants intend to win with strong pitching this year, and this game served as a poetic reminder not just that there are other ways to win, but perhaps that the Giants can master some of them as well. Their ace, Logan Webb, took the mound and simply wasn’t very sharp. He walked three batters — something he had only done on eight occasions over the last two seasons — and gave up untimely hits, surrendering three runs in five innings of work. Their elite closer, Ryan Walker, needed the insurance runs afforded him after plunking a batter and giving up an RBI single, setting the final score at 6-4.

But the bullpen between the two — Randy Rodríguez in the sixth, Erik Miller in the seventh, and Tyler Rogers in the eighth — was sensational, keeping the Reds suppressed enough so that the offense could shine. And even though they only mustered six hits, while striking out 17 times, the offense did, indeed, come through. Ramos and Flores brought the boom, and Lee, Chapman, and Bailey the calm, clutch, necessary at-bats late. The kind of at-bats their Minor Leaguers frequently exhibited in compiling a shockingly-good spring record. The kind of at-bats that maybe, just maybe, will lead the Giants to do the same.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...flores-patrick-bailey-heliot-ramos-logan-webb

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Friday BP: Daytime baseball or nighttime baseball?

Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images

It’s Friday, so we’re asking the tough questions. And if you think I’m being sarcastic, you clearly haven’t been here for the McCoven’s greatest debates.

Good morning, baseball fans!

We are officially in the weirdest day of the baseball season. The San Francisco Giants started things off yesterday against the Cincinnati Reds, and will be back at it tomorrow. But for now, it’s an extremely rare Friday off.

So what better time to stir the pot and bring up one of the more divisive issues among baseball fans? That is, of course, the great debate over whether daytime baseball or nighttime baseball is better.

There are valid points on both sides, and like most arguments about taste, it’s highly subjective and based on individual preference.

That said, I am firmly on team nighttime baseball.

If we’re talking in-person games, here are my reasons: I am paler than the moon and even standing near a tinted window can give me a sunburn. I have blue eyes, which means they do not function in sunlight, even with sunglasses. I can’t see the ball, so I end up having to watch the screen to figure out what happened. Plus it’s usually too hot, even in San Francisco. All in all, it’s absolute sensory hell for me. Plus it’s a three hour drive each way so going to a day game involves getting up at hours of the day I prefer not to see on the weekends.

And as for watching games on television, it’s simple. I work during the day so I can’t watch games that start during the day. Even on the weekends, I’m usually getting things done around the house or running errands. So I don’t settle down to watch anything until the evening. A perfectly good time for a baseball game to start.

I recognize that my reasons are extremely biased and based on my own personal preferences. But that’s kind of the point. There is no objectively right or wrong answer to this question. But I know that will not stop anyone from arguing like there is.

So now it’s your time.

Daytime baseball or nighttime baseball?​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...-san-francisco-giants-great-debates-community

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Off Day Mysteries: The Incredible Shrinking Giants

Photo by Lachlan Cunningham/MLB Photos via Getty Images

Something in the water? Some Giants players have shrunk!

While we wait for the San Francisco Giants to conclude their series in Cincinnati this weekend, let’s examine a minor mystery that cropped up during Spring Training. Multiple Giants have seen their height change. The result of offseason dehydration? Too much computer use? Let’s get to the bottom of this.

If we compare the roster at the end of last season to what we got for Opening Day, then these changes leap out. Some players lost two full inches off their height! What’s going on here? Well, it’s not really much of a mystery.

Men are liars!

SI.com wrote about it a month ago. The new ABS system (automated ball-strike challenge system) has brought a bit of chaos to the ballplayer’s ego. Statcast has been a fine add to the baseball world, attempting to bring more facts to the sport with laser-guided tracking, but it’s also true that it’s really effective at raining on a player’s parade.

Amid the fungoes and photo days has come a new rite of spring: the couple of hours when Major League Baseball descends upon camps to measure hitters for the automated ball-strike challenge system (ABS) in use for approximately 60% of exhibition games this spring.

[...]

But first there are some logistics to sort through, starting with the dimensions of the automated strike zone. MLB has settled on a strike zone width of 17 inches and height spanning the length between 27% of a batter’s height to 53.5% of a batter’s height (roughly the letters to the knees when he’s in his normal stance). In order to get that height, they have to measure it.

The heart of the article lays bare a weird truth most of us probably assumed the opposite of: the heights in the media guide were more or less based on the honor system. It’s kind of hard to believe that in a multibillion-dollar industry where aging curves and specialty doctors turn these “assets” inside out to make valuations has had such a loophole.

I’m a short dude, so I just assume that everyone is taller than me. Whenever I’m asked how tall I am, I answer, “Not very.” I never considered the possibility that tall dudes would fib. Let’s take a look at what this says about the Giants (please, please know that I’m saying this tongue in cheek).

The Liars​

Willy Adames | -1 inch: 6’0” in 2025, 6’1” in 2024​

Maybe he lost an inch off his frame going from the Brewers to the Giants because he’s weighed down by that massive deal Buster Posey gave him? That’s the fun way of looking at it. He certainly carries himself like someone who’s 6’1”.

Jung Hoo Lee | -1 inch: 6’0” in 2025, 6’1” in 2024​

It’s interesting to note that Baseball Reference shows him at 6’0” during his last season in the KBO, because if you go to this KBO reference page, he’s listed at 6’1”. That means the JHL database in Baseball Reference backfills that sort of biographical information rather than reflect the record at the time. I have no other point to make.

Casey Schmitt | -2 inches: 6’0” in 2025, 6’2” in 2024​

His vibe seems like it includes a bit of bravado and so I can see why a dude who might’ve been on a team of six-footers decided to leverage his Alpha status to give himself the edge over his teammates. But still... that’s a whopper of a tall tale, Schmitt.

LaMonte Wade Jr. | -2 inches: 5’11” in 2025, 6’1” in 2024​

I’m not mad. I’m disappointed.

On the other hand, going from 6’1” to 5’11” is explicable. If you’re 5’11”, why not shoot for 6 feet? But what if experience has taught you that people who hear “Six feet” assume you’re rounding up? This is the only reasoning I can understand that helps me figure out how one lands on such a discrepancy. Good job, lasers.

I suspect that in at least a couple of cases from the group above (Schmitt and Wade Jr. mainly), these discrepancies have something to do with playing multiple sports in their youths or — and, perhaps, most likely — a carryover from trying to meet women on dating apps (none of this group is married, but at least a couple have girlfriends).

The Honest​

Patrick Bailey | no change: 6’0” in 2025, 6’0” in 2024​

Sam Huff | no change: 6’4” in 2025, 6’4” in 2024​

Luis Matos | no change: 5’11” in 2025, 5’11” in 2024​

Heliot Ramos | no change: 5’11” in 2025, 5’11” in 2024​

I feel this group falls into a “no reason to fib” grouping. There’s no upside. They also don’t seem like dudes who are interested in stuff like that, so they’ve only ever gone off what a doctor’s told them (how’s that for a person making something up and presenting it as fact?).

Christian Koss | no change: 6’1” in 2025, 6’1” in 2024​

I even went to his milb.com page from last year to be sure. No wonder Buster Posey likes him so much. He’s an honest man, through and through.

The Modest​

Mike Yastrzemski | +1 inch: 5’11” in 2025, 5’10” in 2024​

Matt Chapman | +1 inch: 6’1” in 2025, 6’0” in 2024​

Tyler Fitzgerald | +1 inch: 6’2” in 2025, 6’1” in 2024​

Wilmer Flores | +1 inch: 6’3” in 2025, 6’2” in 2024​

Did his offseason knee surgery give Wilmer Flores an extra inch of height? Probably not. But like the other two players in this group, there’s something fitting about all three of them being slightly off by their own assessments. They all exude a glow of purpose — they’re almost bigger than the numbers say (even Fitzgerald, who seems like a lock to be DFA’d this season and out of the sport after next), and if you’ve heard them speak at all you can feel their humble natures.

Now we need to figure out which pitchers are kidding themselves and messing with us.

/peruses the pitching staff

Hmm. Jordan Hicks is listed at 6’2”? We sure about that?

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...n-francisco-giants-height-changes-by-statcast

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Saturday BP: Which active former Giants are you planning to follow this season?

Photo by Nick Cammett/Diamond Images via Getty Images

The term “Forever Giant” gets thrown around a lot these days. But which active former Giants do fans still want to follow on their journeys with other teams?

Good morning, baseball fans!

The 2025 San Francisco Giants season continues today. And as things get rolling, I know we all kind of like to keep tabs on which former Giants are doing what with other teams.

Personally, I’m always going to root for Andrew McCutchen. Sure, he didn’t even get to play a full season for the Giants. But you can’t help but root for that guy. He’s the best.

And it’s pretty convenient that he play for the Pittsburgh Pirates, considering they have at least two other former Giants that I can think of off the top of my head. Joey Bart and Bryan Reynolds. So it’s a three-for-one deal!

One former Giant I will not be rooting for is Blake Snell. Not only did he choose to sign with the Los Angeles Dodgers (which I can generally forgive at the end of the day because I’m a reasonable human being), but he has done nothing but trash talk Giants fans since he left. If anything, I will be actively rooting against him. Well, passively rooting against him. I don’t actually care that much.

Which active former Giants are you planning to follow this season?​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...sburgh-pirates-former-player-rooting-interest

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Back to the grind

Katie Stratman-Imagn Images

Justin Verlander pitched well in his Giants debut... just not well enough to prevent the first loss of 2025

The 9th inning magic that secured victory in game 1 of the 2025 season reflected the flair, pomp and hope of Opening Day. Two days later, Opening-Day-plus-one and the San Francisco Giants are already in the grind.

A warm midwestern day in Great American “Smallpark” seemed to set-up ideal conditions to hit, but offense ended up being at a premium for both teams, with Christian Encarnacion-Strand’s opposite field solo shot in the 6th proving to be the decider in the Giants’ 3-2 loss.

Pleasant Hill’s own Encarnacion-Strand tucked a 2-2 sinker from reliever Spencer Bivens just inside the right-field foul pole for Cincinnati’s third, and unexpectedly decisive run of the game.

March 29 - SF at CIN Heliot Ramos - LF Willy Adames - SS Jung Hoo Lee - CF Matt Chapman - 3B Wilmer Flores - 1B Luis Matos - RF Patrick Bailey - C Casey Schmitt - DH Tyler Fitzgerald - 2B RHP Justin Verlander

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser.bsky.social) 2025-03-29T16:02:23.461Z

Wilmer Flores, last game’s hero, picked up right where he left off with another homer in the 2nd off Cincinnati starter Nick Lodolo — the first time in his career that the veteran homered in the first two games of the season. San Francisco would pick up another run the next inning on a Jung Hoo Lee hole-punch that cashed in Heliot Ramos’s lead-off double.

Opportunities against Lodolo dried up after the 3rd. Through the middle innings, the Reds’ starter retired nine in a row with consecutive eight ground-outs (6 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 1 K). San Francisco’s last plate appearance with a runner in scoring position came with two outs all the way back in the 3rd.

Singles from Matt Chapman, Luis Matos and Tyler Fitzgerald in the 6th, 7th and 8th innings were all immediately erased by double-play balls. Obviously it’s good that Giants hitters found a way to not strike out 17 times in a game, but the toothless, rally-killing balls in play kinda made me miss the whiff. At least you can’t strike out twice on one pitch.

On the other side of the baseball, Justin Verlander made his 527th game appearance of his career, and first as a Giant. He threw 80 pitches over 5 innings, allowing 2 runs on 6 hits, 1 walk and 5 strikeouts. There were no laborious innings, pitch count trouble or long at-bats. He twice got Luke Fraley to close out an inning and strand runners, first with back-to-back elevated four seamers he swung through in the 2nd, and then with a breaking ball he rolled into the mitt of Matt Chapman in the 4th.

Flipping the script from Thursday, the Reds found their way back out of an early hole, led by the bat of second baseman Matt McClain.

McClain, who homered in the 9th inning on Opening Day, took a lazy Verlander slider deep in the 3rd, and his 2-out double in the 5th put him in position to cruise home on Elly De La Cruz’s RBI single in the 5th.

A couple of pitches he probably would have called mulligans on — but that’s the rub. A “decent” outing with its flaws overblown due to the nature of a close game and low run support.

At this point in Verlander’s career, he’s a master at moving on. He understands that nothing good comes from second-guessing himself, or keeping himself up at night debating whether he should’ve gone back to the fastball instead of the 2-2 curve that De La Cruz yanked into right.

Here’s what he said about the game-tying hit in a postgame interview”

“That’s baseball. You can beat yourself up as a pitcher on many things, but if you make a pitch and the guy doesn’t hit it hard and he gets it in the right spot, you’ve got to tip your cap and move on. He laid off a really good slider the pitch before that. That’s what the best players in the game do.”

After two decades in the business, there’s really not too much to fret over for Verlander. He’s seen it all. Things like a tight zone, missed location, hung breaking ball, or a good pitch nullified by a better take, or a great pitch somehow swatted over the fence — all things that would make a younger, hotter head throttle a new ball like it was an umpire’s neck — won’t derail him. He’s not a robot by any means — rather the opposite, I think. He feels the game intuitively, and pitches based on the ebbs and flows of counts and innings. Only so much can be planned before he’s out on the mound, and there’s only so much he can control after he throws the baseball.

A core truth of the game.

Another: sometimes good pitches get crushed and bad pitches get the job done.

One more: sometimes a team strikes out 17 times and wins a ball game, and sometimes they strike out once and lose.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...25-recap-cincinnati-reds-justin-verlander-mlb

 

[San Francisco Giants]

3/30 Gamethread: Giants @ Reds

Photo by Norm Hall/Getty Images

Robbie Ray vs. Nick Martinez.

After close and dramatic contests on Thursday and Saturday (the former a victory for The Good Guys; the latter a loss), the San Francisco Giants and Cincinnati Reds are back in action today, for some series-deciding day baseball. In a few hours the Giants will either have their first series win of the season, or their first series loss.

Taking the mound for San Francisco is lefty Robbie Ray. 2024 wasn’t a great year for Ray, as he missed most of the year while recovering from Tommy John surgery. He made his season (and Giants) debut late in the year and had some struggles: in seven games he went 3-2 with a 4.70 ERA, a 4.96 FIP, and 43 strikeouts to 15 walks in 30.2 innings. But he was utterly dynamic in Spring Training, giving the Giants optimism that he has re-gained his Cy Young form: in five spring starts, Ray had just a 1.86 ERA and a 0.621 WHIP, while striking out 23 batters and allowing just one walk in 19.1 innings.

For the Reds it’s right-hander Nick Martinez, who returns for a second season in Cincinnati after signing the Qualifying Offer. The 34-year old had a strong 2024 splitting time between the rotation and the bullpen: in 42 games and 16 starts, he went 10-7 with a 3.10 ERA, a 3.21 FIP, and 116 strikeouts to 18 walks in 142.1 innings. Like Ray, Martinez had a strong Spring Training, sporting a 2.25 ERA.

Interestingly, the Giants are starting Luis Matos, rather than Mike Yastrzemski against a right-handed pitcher.

Enjoy the game, Giants fans!

---

Lineups​

Giants

1. LaMonte Wade Jr. — 1B (L)
2. Willy Adames — SS (R)
3. Jung Hoo Lee — CF (L)
4. Matt Chapman — 3B (R)
5. Heliot Ramos — LF (R)
6. Wilmer Flores — DH (R)
7. Luis Matos — RF (R)
8. Sam Huff — C (R)
9. Tyler Fitzgerald — 2B (R)

P. Robbie Ray (LHP)

Reds

1. Matt McLain — 2B (R)
2. Santiago Espinal — RF (R)
3. Elly De La Cruz — SS (S)
4. Christian Encarnacion-Strand — 1B (R)
5. Jeimer Candelario — 3B (S)
6. Spencer Steer — DH (R)
7. Gavin Lux — LF (L)
8. Blake Dunn — CF (R)
9. Austin Wynns — C (R)

P. Nick Martinez — RHP

---

Game #3​

Who: San Francisco Giants (1-1) vs. Cincinnati Reds (1-1)

Where: Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati, Ohio

When: 10:40 a.m. PT

Regional broadcast: NBC Sports Bay Area

National broadcast: n/a

Radio: KNBR 680 AM/104.5 FM, KSFN 1510 AM

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...how-to-watch-lineups-robbie-ray-nick-martinez

 

[San Francisco Giants]

High-Five!

Katie Stratman-Imagn Images

Robbie Ray threw 5 perfect innings in his debut, and when he wasn’t perfect, his team had his back with an impressive display of both offense and defense. Alright!

Reds starter righty Nick Martinez and lefty Robbie Ray may have been separated at birth. It seemed like everything Martinez did during the top of the frame, Ray followed suit in the bottom, like a delayed reflection.

Both pitchers cruised through the first four innings of Sunday’s rubber match between the Cincinnati Reds and San Francisco Giants.

Martinez, like every other Cincinnati arm this series, generally pitched with count leverage. It felt like every Giants batter stepping into the box was already down a strike. Shuffling through six different pitches, Martinez threw everything away and away, only coming in briefly on a hitter to set up the next pitch away. Nothing was off the plate, nor was anything he threw completely on it either.

When Ray took the mound, he simplified things as he always does. Caveman grunting through his hard-hard-slow approach to pitching, he played his four-seamer off his slider which accounted for nearly 90% of his offerings today (according to Baseball Savant, some of those might’ve actually been his change-up).

Typically Ray has been a high-walk, high-K pitcher, but mirroring Marinez today, the Giants lefty was efficient while limiting long at-bats. There were only five 3-ball counts through the first five innings, and none of them resulted in a base-on-balls. He managed a somewhat subdued velocity on his fastball with excellent location, while benefiting from solid defense behind him on balls in play.

The first half of the game was akin to a leisurely stroll: Lots of strikes, lots of insignificant contact, zero stress. The two starters recorded 25 consecutive outs before we saw the game’s first base runner — who didn’t run the bases at all but jogged them after Heliot Ramos yanked a Martinez change-up into the left field bleachers.

Ramos gets the Giants on the board with his second of the season

— Giants on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcsgiants.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T18:38:09.533Z

Ramos’s second long-ball in three games opened up the scoring. After the breezy first five innings, both Ray and Martinez came off the rails a bit in the 6th.

A lead-off double from Tyler Fitzgerald appeared to be inconsequential after Martinez followed the extra base hit with two quick strikeouts of LaMonte Wade Jr. and Willy Adames. Needing a hit to score a run, Jung Hoo Lee showed off his bat-to-ball and situational hitting skills by slapping an outside cutter into right field for an RBI double, his second hit in as many at-bats with two-outs and runners in scoring position.

Lee extended the inning, and Matt Chapman took the opportunity to pile on with his first home run of 2025.

CHAPPY'S GOT HIS FIRST DINGER

— Giants on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcsgiants.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T18:57:32.443Z

An impressive swing especially considering how far that sinker was inside, and how far away that pitch’s location was from the preceding cutter off the plate away.

But Martinez’s stumble in the top of the inning appeared to trip Robbie up as well.

Gavin Lux rolled a single up the middle to break-up Ray’s perfect-o on the first pitch of the inning. The year’s first web-gem by Matt Chapman managed to just postpone rather than quell the Cincinnati response. The retaliatory blow came soon after, when Ex-Giant Austin Wynns ripped a hanging slider 410 feet to left center.

An absolute menace at the hot corner

— Giants on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcsgiants.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T19:01:54.170Z

Wynns’s homer followed a pitch clock violation, Ray’s first hiccup of the game. Dealing with a runner in scoring position for the first time, Ray was looking to reassert control over the game with some macho pitching. He wanted a capital-K K. Not only did he get called for an automatic ball, but Ray also showed his hand by finishing his motion as Gonzalez waved off the throw. The 1-2 heater that never was looked to be a decent one: mid-90s, a bit elevated, on the outer third of the plate. Who knows what Wynns would’ve done with that pitch, because Ray decided to switch things up after the automatic ball. The slider had been great all game, but — perhaps still grinding his teeth about the previous infraction — the one he delivered clearly lacked conviction, and Wynns teed off on its shape-less break.

A knock about the ears that sent Ray spinning. Five pitches later, official pain-in-the-rear Matt McLain took a middle-middle four-seamer deep to pull the Reds within one. Four straight balls after that, Ray’s day was done.

5.1 innings pitched, 3 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, 2 HR — a pitching line that doesn’t quite capture Ray’s dominant season debut, nor how quickly it fell apart.

Still, reliever Erik Miller secured the hold, not without complicating things first by giving up a single to put the tying run on base. But with traffic on the base paths, Miller coaxed a 4-6-3 double play off the bat off yesterday’s hero Christian Encarnacion-Strand, preserving the Giants’ significantly winnowed, but still existent, lead.

Up until that point everything offensively for the Giants and Reds had happened fast, i.e. sudden home-runs producing crooked numbers. What proved to be the decisive rally in the 8th was of a different style, something Giants fans had only read about in history books, or seen in black-and-white newsreels of sped-up game action narrated by a deep voice proclaiming the values of Small Ball.

Aggressive base-running! An infield single! A sacrifice bunt and a sacrifice fly! Considering the Giants teams of recent years, these qualify as phenomena — and to all happen in the same inning, nothing short of a miracle.

All of it was set-up by speed. The speed of Tyler Fitzgerald forced Elly De La Cruz to spike a throw to first on a routine grounder. Wade Jr.’s well-placed bunt pushed Fitz to second from which he stole third (barely) and then scored on Willy Adames flyball to center.

Jung Hoo Lee then extended the inning with his speed by legging out a single that just rolled past the outstretched glove of another ex-teammate Taylor Rogers (Tyler probably would’ve got it). A four-pitch walk from new reliever Scott Barlow advanced Lee into scoring position who scored from said position on a Ramos single.

But the Reds-Giants, Martinez-Ray atmospheric connection threatened to continue in the 8th, with two people that are actually identical twins.

After a series of paper cuts forced Taylor Rogers off the mound in the top frame, nearly the same fate fell upon his brother, Tyler in the bottom.

As often it is the case with Tyler on the mound, things got weird.

Stress levels skyrocketed after a dinky lead-off single and walk immediately put the Giants new three-run in jeopardy, the tying run now represented at the plate with no outs in this notoriously hitter friendly park with the wind whipping off the Ohio from right to left.

Fortunately Matt McLain didn’t tie the game with one swing, but his poorly hit grounder was so poorly hit it worked to advance both runners into scoring position. At least one run scoring felt inevitable. An off-balanced, goofy swing being just goofy enough to bloop a dying quail into the outfield meant San Francisco’s lead would be back to one. Based on how this Opening Week series has gone, this outcome felt predetermined. It’d happen today and it’d continue to happen for the rest of the season. Day after day, another nail biter, another barn burner — our bullpen would be spent by May.

The fatalistic, but learned and earned, outlook of a San Francisco fan.

Important reminder though: we’re all just a bunch of doofuses. Baseball is a game of 9 doofuses against 9 doofuses trying not to out-doofus one another. We should never underestimate the ability of people to be doofuses! Often our only hope in hopeless situations are the mistakes of others.

And hark! Good news! A Reds player turned off his brain! Rejoice!

Off the bat, Santiago Espinal’s grounder to third would be the second out of the inning but at least plate a run. Instead, the trail runner on second, Jacob Hurtubise bolted for third even though the baseball was hit directly towards third. Chapman charged and fielded the grounder easily, and practically collided with Hurtubise for the first out before throwing down to first for the second.

Instead of whittling down the Giants lead and setting up one more at-bat with the potential tying run at the plate, the double-play ended the inning and erased the Reds’ fourth run, prompting Tyler Rogers to gleefully skip off the mound, once again affirmed as the more handsome, more successful, and in this case, luckier twin.

Just your average Matt Chapman play

— Giants on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcsgiants.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T19:56:00.526Z

Camilo Doval stepped into his old closer role (Ryan Walker is day-to-day with back discomfort) and turned in a breezy 9th (aided by a final flash of leather). The 6 - 3 final secured the Giants first series win of 2025.

What a play by Ramos

— Giants on NBC Sports Bay Area (@nbcsgiants.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T20:09:07.790Z

Somersaulting on to Houston.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...ecap-robbie-ray-matt-chapman-heliot-ramos-mlb

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Giants-Astros Series Preview

Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images

Two tricky offseasons for teams in transition. Does their early season success serve as a portent?

It was funny watching the main analytics writers of MLB struggle with naming the San Francisco Giants the “Team of the 2010s.” They so wanted to give it to the Astros and, indeed, I think most of them did, but I bring it up to point out how these two teams do stand side by side here in 2025.

The former NL West rivals have had a lot of success and at points throughout the past 15 years or so have been considered Baseball’s Peak or Baseball’s Pit. Today, they’re somewhere in the middle and are keenly interested in charting a new future that eschews the strict analytics approach that recently defined them.

The Astros have shifted from a McKinsey and sociopath-driven management style to a scouting/player-focused one. the Giants have shifted from Billy Beane acolytes to Buster Posey. They both seem to be part of a growing shift sport-wide (the Rangers and Red Sox are two other teams that have moved to this setup), and the very early returns seem to be going okay, even if there’s some unpopular choices being made along the way.

The Astros traded away Kyle Tucker in the offseason and let Alex Bregman walk. One player a potential franchise fixture, the other one who helped redefine them for the 21st century. Is that the equivalent of letting Blake Snell walk? Nope, but it goes to show how this franchise has approached its transition out of its championship era. They were content with keeping Jose Altuve and Yordan Alvarez and switching things up elsewhere. The Giants never did this and we’re still feeling the effects of that decision.

For their troubles, Houston got from the Cubs in exchange for Tucker third baseman Cam Smith, the #14 overall pick of the 2024 MLB Draft. Former Giant and current Astro Mauricio Dubon declares that he’ll be a 60-home run guy once he figures it all out. He was taken one pick after the Giants’ pick, James Tibbs III (ranked #3 overall in the Giants’ system, according to the McCovey Chronicles community). Let’s hope this isn’t another Hunter Bishop over Corbin Carroll situation for our favorite squadron.

But he’s been a huge infusion of infectious joy for the Astros. His mom was brought in to tell him that he’d made the Opening Day roster out of Spring Training, and this media hit stuck in my mind — I don’t even care about another team’s top prospect!

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Moms. They sure do a lot for us, don’t they?

Anyway, the Astros have become more player-focused (like the Giants!), but they’ve also done things like move Jose Altuve to left field, picked up Rockies non-tender Brendan Rodgers to replace him at second base, and signed Christian Walker to be their new first baseman, shifting traded-for Isaac Paredes from his best position (first) to Alex Bregman’s old spot (third). Cam Smith, drafted as a third baseman, is in instead replacing Kyle Tucker in right field. Remarkably, outfielder Chas McCormick — best remembered as the dingus who publicly complained about playing time under Dusty Baker — has been relegated to the bench. Haven’t heard him complain about it, though.

Their pitching group is without Justin Verlander for the first time in a long time (yes, he signed with the Mets recently, but he wound up right back on the Astros) but looks to be a group they’re hoping will remain a strength. Last decade, once the team finished its multiple years of 100+ losses rebuild, it had the second-best pitching group in the sport. From 2015-2019, their team fWAR of 108.3 trailed only Cleveland. Their 481 wins trailed only the Dodgers. And for the Jeff Berrys out there, their team ERA of 3.71 was fourth-best, behind the Dodgers, Cubs, and Cleveland.

Over the weekend, they held the New York Mets to just 5 runs.

Remarkably, the Giants have won the last three season series (2021, 2023, 2024). They had a really nice weekend in Cincinnati with decent starting pitching, stellar bullpen work, and great work from the lineup. We’ll get to see two season debuts this time around (Jordan Hicks & Landen Roupp) and see just how much of a factor the team’s all right-handed bench plays in this one. There are three lefties in Houston’s pen: closer Josh Hader, Bryan King, and former Giant, Steve Okert.

---

Series overview​

Who: San Francisco Giants at Houston Astros
Where: Daikin Park | Houston, Texas
When: Monday & Tuesday - 5:10pm PT, Wednesday - 1:10pm PT
National broadcasts: None.

Projected starters (2024 Stats)

Monday: Jordan Hicks (4-7, 4.10 ERA) vs. Ronel Blanco (13-6, 2.80 ERA)
Tuesday: Logan Webb (2025: 0-0, 5.40 ERA) vs. Hayden Wesneski (3-6, 3.86 ERA)
Wednesday: Landen Roupp (1-2, 3.58 ERA) vs. Framber Valdez (2025: 1-0, 4.76 ERA)

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Where they stand​

Giants, 2-1 (3rd in NL West), 14 RS / 10 RA | Projected W-L: 83-79
Astros, 2-1 (2nd in AL West), 6 RS / 5 RA | Projected W-L: 84-78​

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Astros to watch​

Christian Walker: He went just 1-for-12 against the Mets this past weekend but against the current Giants pitching staff he has a career .864 OPS (22-for-70). Pitchers are usually ahead of hitters at this point of the season, but when it comes to former division rivals I submit... maybe not?

Yainer Díaz: A little over a month ago, he received a glowing writeup in FanGraphs that looked at his batted ball data and suggested a breakout was on the horizon. Against the Mets, he wound up being one of their worst situation hitters, going 1-for-7 with an RBI, a walk, and a pair of strikeouts and generating -13.9 Win Probability Added. That’s a very, very small sample size, so don’t be surprised if he winds up getting some big hits in the series.

Framber Valdez: Every year, he and Logan Webb vie for the league lead in groundball rate. He is not quite the left-handed Logan Webb and the differences are important: he walks guys more, he gives up more home runs, but he also strikes out more batters on average. It’s a shame Logan Webb won’t be matched up against him in this series so we can see two aces go at it.

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Giants to watch​

Camilo Doval: With Ryan Walker experiencing back problems, 1 or 2 of the games in this series might come down to Doval pitching in the 9th or in a critical leverage spot after the 7th. He probably doesn’t have much more to go to earn back the trust of the coaching staff — and maybe not even many in the fanbase — so this will be a good early season test.

Tyler Fitzgerald: The Astros’ starting staff is much more of a groundball staff than a strikeout group and so if he can focus on putting the ball in play I’d like to see him use his speed to get on base more. His Opening Day swings were not encouraging, but he pretty quickly turned his series around and it was in part because of feet.

Jordan Hicks & Landen Roupp: We’re already at the point where it’s fair to put both of these pitchers’ starts under a microscope because cooling Hayden Birdsong out in the bullpen doesn’t seem like a wise decision. Landen Roupp has been a favorite of the organization for a couple of years now, and when healthy would seem to be their preferred pitcher over Birdsong. But that health seems like the reason he might lose his spot to Birdsong — it might be a surprise if it’s because of performance.

Hicks on the other hand? Well, I’m not so sure if he’s setup to pitch himself out of a spot. Fans seem to have turned on Jordan Hicks because of his final few starts, forgetting that through May he was one of the team’s best pitchers. The same Blake Snell injury/bad pitching plan heading into the season that necessitated Birdsong’s callup is the same context for Hicks’ midseason collapse. They pushed a guy converting from reliever to starter and it wound up making him ineffective — and then injured. Will that carry over to this year? Possibly. Pitchers need surgeries all the time, and prior use can cause future troubles. But it would not be a surprise if he wound up being effective to begin the season.

---

Prediction time​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...ants-houston-astros-series-preview-march-2025

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Giants cruise behind star performance from Things That Bode Well

Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images

Yes, that’s his government name.

One of the primary reasons for optimism for San Francisco Giants fans this year — in addition to, you know, the courtesy optimism handed out in a pretty bag to every fan at the start of a season — is the lack of holes in the roster. The potential lack of holes, that is.

While some teams achieve mediocrity or even respectable competency by surrounding a few stars with random humans possessing vaguely baseball-sounding names (see: Angels [of Anaheim], Los Angeles for the last decade) the Giants figure to do so with unrelenting decency. There are uninspiring spots on the roster and areas where a role is defined more by a question mark than a player, but there are no holes; no glaring, known, sub-replacement level players being given a mitt and a bat and asked to be something they’re not.

The joy of such roster construction is that you can dream anywhere and everywhere, because any decent player can be a damn good player in any given year. You may think the Giants will be under .500 this year, but you know that more than half of the players on the roster could make the All-Star Game without it surprising you (individually, I should clarify; half the team making the All-Star Game together would surprise everyone, certainly). Or, put in more quantifiable terms that you may find encouraging or terrifying, Fangraphs projects to Giants to finish with exactly 81 wins and 81 losses. And that comes despite projecting the supposed strength of the team to struggle: in their annual preseason positional rankings, the site projects the Giants to employ the eighth-worst bullpen and ninth-worst rotation in the Majors. Just imagine if the pitching is as good as they seem to think it should be!

And so you can dream a little. If players A, B, and C actualize their potential, and players X, Y, and Z bounce back to their pre-2024 levels, while players 1, 2, and 3 continue their history of quality play and good health, well my goodness, the Giants might actually have something interesting simmering away on the stove.

Of course, the reason for pessimism is reflected there, as well. Talent has not been the Giants’ lack in their three-year run of flawless mundanity, so much as a lack of contingency plans when A, B, or C didn’t actualize their potential, X, Y, or Z didn’t bounce back, and 1, 2, or 3 didn’t continue their bill of clean health.

But that’s an article for another day. A day when the team spends nine innings trying to insert square pegs in round holes while limping their way to a listless loss. That day is not today. Today is a day in which the Giants played baseball exactly the way Buster Posey and Bob Melvin drew it up, beating the Houston Astros 7-2.

Today is a day where the Giants won because the players who could be good, which would almost surely spell a very successful season, were good. It was a data point firmly in favor of the players you believe in, who have earned you quizzical looks from fans of opposing teams when you express said belief.

Take Jordan Hicks. With a full offseason of preparing to be a starter, and working with the training staff to gain muscle weight and increase stamina, can he be the pitcher who had a 2.33 ERA through his first 11 starts last year? Or is he the player who had a 6.42 ERA over the next nine starts, was moved to the bullpen, struggled there, and was shut down? The answer to that question is one that will help determine whether the Giants flirt with 90 wins or 70.

On Monday he was the former. He gave up a hit and a walk in the first inning, needing 22 pitches to get out of the inning unscathed, but there were signs: even as his pitch count crept into the 20s, he was comfortably sitting in the 99s.

In the second inning it clicked. He needed just 11 pitches to strike out the side, setting down all three batters — Jerema Peña, Cade Smith, and Mauricio Dubón — with buckling sinkers that they idly watched whip across the edges of the zone. It was part of a string of 14 consecutive batters that Hicks would retire, before finally walking Jose Altuve with one out in the sixth. But even that didn’t rattle him.

Were it not the first start of the year, perhaps Hicks would have had a chance for a shutout, but instead he was pulled after six exceptional innings in which he allowed just one hit and two walks, struck out six, allowed no runs, and threw 51 of 72 pitches for strikes. He ended the day by pumping 98-mph sinkers and four-seamers, getting lefty Yordan Alvarez — who has a career .975 OPS against righties — to line out.

That Hicks might be the best fourth starter north of ... well ... you know. I don’t need to say it.

Or take Camilo Doval. He relieved Hicks, taking over to start the seventh inning. A day after recording his first save of the year — in drama-less fashion — Doval faced Christian Walker, Yainer Diaz, and Peña, setting them down in order and devoid of both danger and three-ball counts.

That Doval looked more like the 2023 All-Star than the 2024 player who got optioned. That Doval would give the Giants arguably the best one-two-three punch of any bullpen in baseball.

Or switch to the other side of things, and take Wilmer Flores. On Thursday, when Flores hit the go-ahead home run in the ninth inning on Opening Day, I wrote this:

If you’re looking for reasons to stake your Giants fandom to optimism — or pessimism — this year, Flores is one of them. The journey to a successful season rests, in no small part, on players who very recently were quite good, but are unsure about their ability to follow the path back to that success. In 2023, Flores had an .863 OPS, 23 home runs, and two functional knees. In 2024, he had a .595 OPS, four home runs, and zero functional knees.

The Giants’ blueprints for both a surprisingly good and a painfully bad season each contain one of those Floreses (Florii? Floreaux? Florese? Wilmers Flores?), and we all eagerly await the answer of which one will show up.

His encore was another home run on Saturday. And then, on Monday, in the sixth inning (after starting the scoring with an RBI single in the second), with the Giants clinging to a 2-0 lead, and with a pair of runners on the basepaths following walks drawn by Jung Hoo Lee and Patrick Bailey, and with stud pitcher Ronel Blanco forced out of the game, representing a team on the ropes, and with two outs ... Flores did it again, launching a three-run blast to give him as many home runs this year as the rest of his teammates combined.

That Flores is one of the best designated hitters in baseball, a day-in, day-out presence against both right and left-handed pitchers, who can anchor an offense that surprises.

Hicks, Doval, and Flores were the poster children of how a successful game can mimic the blueprint for a successful season, but there were other reasons to feel similarly. Heliot Ramos who, despite his All-Star success a year ago, hit below league-average against right-handed pitchers, giving some worries that a platoon role might be in his future, smoked an eighth-inning double off righty Ryan Gusto, already the third extra-base hit of the year for Ramos against same-handed pitching. He, Matt Chapman (who had two walks and a two-run single), and Mike Yastrzemski (who had a pair of singles) all stole a base, giving the Giants five through four games ... a year after having just 68 all season. The Giants once again played clean baseball, and through four games have yet to commit an error or allow a stolen base.

It wasn’t perfect, of course; neither baseball nor anything else is. Spencer Bivens got roughed up a bit, giving up a pair of runs in the eighth. Through four games the Giants still have a reliever (Hayden Birdsong) and bench player (Christian Koss) who have yet to get into a game, highlighting a reliance on their main players, and reminding us that they’re not as equipped as some teams to handle adversity.

But a 7-2 victory on the road against a very good team is a very good thing. A 3-1 record to start the season is a very good thing. And winning on the backs of players whose faces will pop up whenever you think, what is the best-case scenario this season? is a very, very, very good thing.

Perhaps they’ll win this year the way they won on this day.

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...recap-jordan-hicks-wilmer-flores-camilo-doval

 

[San Francisco Giants]

4/1 Gamethread: Giants @ Astros

Photo by Kevin M. Cox/MLB Photos via Getty Images

Logan Webb vs. Hayden Wesneski

The San Francisco Giants game two of their three-game road series against the Houston Astros tonight.

Taking the mound for the Giants will be right-handed ace Logan Webb. The Giants opted to skip Landen Roupp’s first start of the season due to the extra day off after Opening Day, allowing Webb to make his second start of the year. His first start was, of course, Opening Day against the Cincinnati Reds in which Webb allowed three earned runs on six hits with five strikeouts and three walks. Not the most ideal start to the season, but the Giants got the win regardless.

He’ll be facing off against Astros right-hander Hayden Wesneski, who will be making his first start of the year. He ended the 2024 season, his third in the majors, with a 3.86 ERA, 4.51 FIP, with 67 strikeouts to 21 walks in 67.2 innings pitched over 28 games (with seven starts).

Willy Adames and Wilmer Flores have had pretty good luck against Wesneski. Adames has averaged .400 in five at-bats, with a home run and three RBI; and Flores has averaged .500 in four at-bats, with a home run and two RBI.

Meanwhile, Yordan Alvarez has probably the best history against Webb, averaging .429 in seven at-bats with a home run and two RBI. Christian Walker also has decent numbers against him, with a .273 average in 22 at-bats, including an RBI.

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Lineups​

Giants​

1. LaMonte Wade, Jr. - 1B
2. Willy Adames - SS
3. Jung Hoo Lee - CF
4. Matt Chapman - 3B
5. Heliot Ramos - LF
6. Mike Yastrzemski - RF
7. Wilmer Flores - DH
8. Patrick Bailey - C
9. Christian Koss - 2B

RHP: Logan Webb

Astros​

1. Jose Altuve - LF
2. Isaac Paredes - 3B
3. Yordan Alvarez - DH
4. Christian Walker - 1B
5. Yainer Diaz - C
6. Jeremy Peña - SS
7. Cam Smith - RF
8. Brendan Rodgers - 2B
9. Chas McCormick - CF

RHP: Hayden Wesneski

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Game #5​

Who: San Francisco Giants (3-1) vs. Houston Astros (2-2)

Where: Daikin Park, Houston, Texas

When: 5:10 p.m. PT

Regional broadcast: NBC Sports Bay Area

National broadcast: n/a

Radio: KNBR 680 AM/104.5 FM, KSFN 1510 AM

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...w-to-watch-lineups-logan-webb-hayden-wesneski

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Wednesday BP: What do you think about retaliation pitches?

Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images

In Monday night’s game, it seemed possible that the Giants hit Cam Smith on purpose in retaliation for the Astros nearly hitting Wilmer Flores. What do Giants fans think of these sort of retaliation pitches?

Good morning, baseball fans!

The San Francisco Giants will be wrapping up their series against the Houston Astros later this afternoon. One of the down-sides of writing the morning articles is that I have to pre-write them, because they go live at the crack of dawn and I do not. Unfortunately, that means that they don’t always get to include the most timely information.

For instance, yesterday’s BP was all about predicting who will lead the team in home runs this season. Did I suggest Wilmer Flores? No. I mentioned him as one of the team leaders and proceeded to pick other players. What happened in Monday night’s game? Three-run home run by Flores to make me feel foolish.

So in keeping with the spirit of “yesterday’s news,” I wanted to use today’s BP to touch on yet another hot-button topic within the McCoven and the baseball community at large. And that topic is retaliation pitches.

During Monday night’s game, Flores was nearly hit by a pitch late in the game. In the bottom of that inning, Spencer Bivens hit Cam Smith with a pitch, leading the broadcasters and fans alike to speculate if it was retaliation. To me, it could go either way but my point here isn’t to speculate on that.

My point is more that retaliation pitches seem dumb. At least that’s how I feel about it. I know a lot of baseball fans disagree, and that’s fine. That’s kind of the point of these, to have discussions. But as far as I’m concerned, intentionally throwing a baseball at someone is dangerous.

It doesn’t matter if they’re aiming for the player’s thigh or somewhere else that can theoretically take a hit without too much damage. A lot of pitchers don’t have enough control over their locations in the best of times. So aiming at another player’s body with the intent to hit them? Nah. That’s not safe.

And I get it. There’s pride involved. There’s supporting your teammate in the way the game has taught you. There’s tradition. Whatever. That doesn’t make it any more safe.

Pitchers throw SO dang hard. I’ve seen the horrible damage an accidental hit by pitch can do. Look no further than what Ryan Vogelsong had to go through.

So with that in mind, it’s so easy for a pitch that was meant to hit someone in the thigh or butt to go wild and hit them in the face. Or hit them somewhere else unintended and break a bone. End a season. Or, Mays forbid, a career.

So that’s how I feel about it. If you want to show someone up, beat them. Don’t hit them. That’s the sportsmanship I was always taught, anyway.

What do you think about retaliation pitches?​

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...-pitch-wilmer-flores-cam-smith-spencer-bivens

 

[San Francisco Giants]

Slugging Giants come away with road sweep of Astros

Wilmer and Willy celebrate a first-inning homer in Houston. | Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images

Heliot Ramos and Wilmer Flores continued their slugging ways and the Giants bullpen threw five scoreless innings in a 6-3 win.

Before the season, there were concerns with how the San Francisco Giants would fare against strong left-handed pitching. Against Houston Astros ace Framber Valdez, the Giants responded those questions with dingers.

Wilmer Flores blasts his 4th homer of the season pic.twitter.com/GOSDAvGVe8

— MLB (@MLB) April 2, 2025​

Wilmer Flores, Luis Matos, and LaMonte Wade, Jr. all went deep in the Giants’ 6-3 win over the Astros, capping off a three-game sweep and a 5-1 season-opening road trip. They also got five innings of stellar bullpen work, with four relievers combining for six strikeouts and only four baserunners. And while the Astros chased starter Landen Roupp with no outs in the fifth inning, the second-year starter did log eight strikeouts in four innings.

The scoring began in the first inning, when Willy Adames drew a walk and Flores followed up with his fourth home run of the season for a 2-0 lead. He’s now hitting .227 (shout-out to Jackee Harry) but he’s slugging .773. We’d also like to give a shoutout to Dr. Steve Yoon, who performed the knee surgery on Flores last August, and restored his power stroke.

In the second inning, center fielder Luis Matos continued his hot hitting from spring training by blasting a 395-foot homer off of Valdez. The blast initially looked like a double off the wall, and Matos stopped at second, but eagle-eyed former Astro Justin Verlander recognized from the dugout that the ball hit above the yellow home-run line.

After further review, Luis Matos has his first home run of the year️ pic.twitter.com/cUbjCVewSY

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) April 2, 2025​

Thankfully, Duane Kuiper and Mike Krukow still delivered a delayed home-run call, and added one for Dave Flemming.

Kruk and Kuip: national treasures pic.twitter.com/U5suyMKkL0

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) April 2, 2025​

Matos went 2-for-3 with a bases on balls Wednesday, meaning he’s already 20% of the way to last year’s walk total!

After Mike Yastrzemski and Tyler Fitzgerald both drew walks, with a Yaz steal in between, baseball’s most powerful leadoff man Heliot Ramos hit a double into the left-center gap. The shot easily scored the speedy Fitzgerald from first and Roupp had a 5-0 cushion.

Make it 6⃣ straight games with an extra-base hit for @HeliotRamos pic.twitter.com/UggTW55lKx

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) April 2, 2025​

That’s Ramos’ sixth extra-base hit in six games and his seventh RBI. He has six hits on the season: three home runs, and three doubles. Ramos is slugging .731, hot on Flores’ tail. The only other San Francisco Giants to open the season with extra-base hits in his first six games is former outfield and manager Felipe Alou, who did it in 1963.

Houston got a run back in the bottom of the second when Jeremy Peña walked and stole second, then scored on Zach Dezenzo’s single. Walks hurt Roupp again in the bottom of the fifth, when he sandwiched two walks around a Jose Altuve infield single, loading the bases with no outs and ending his afternoon. His final line was four innings, four hits, four walks and eight strikeouts, with two infield singles. When Yordan Alvarez golfed a single off Randy Rodriguez, that line also had three earned runs.

Yordan Alvarez makes it a 2 run game!!! pic.twitter.com/AOKOaiZp6z

— Michael Schwab (@michaelschwab13) April 2, 2025​

But Rodriguez limited the damage. He got Christian Walker to pop out, then struck out the next two batters to preserve the 5-3 lead. Erstwhile starter Hayden Birdsong pitched around two singles in the sixth to get out of a first-and-third jam, then stranded Alvarez at first after a walk in the seventh.

In the eighth inning, the Giants got an insurance run and a struggling player got a much-needed big hit. After an 0-for-16 start, Wade got his first hit and first homer of the 2025 season pinch-hitting for Casey Schmitt, blasting a 2-2 pitch over the right field wall.

Welcome back, LaMonte pic.twitter.com/MmkQ8YFvUO

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) April 2, 2025​

Tyler Rogers retired the Astros in eight pitches in the eighth, then erstwhile closer Camilo Doval got his second save of the season with a 10-pitch ninth inning. The Giants retired the last nine Astros hitters and they did it on just 23 pitches, not counting an automatic ball charged to Birdsong for a pitch clock violation. As Larry David would say, that’s pretty, pretty good.

The Giants are now the winningest road team in baseball, though they remain 1.5 games behind the 7-0 Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres in the NL West. They’ll get a well-earned day off before veteran starter/amateur umpire Verlander takes the mound for the home opener Friday afternoon against the Seattle Mariners and split-finger artist Bryce Miller.

For a team that’s only hitting .206, 5-1 is a pretty nice outcome. Seattle offers strong starting pitcher, but if the Giants can continue their power surge, good things might happen. They could even move into second place!

Source: https://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2...ants-come-away-with-road-sweep-houston-astros