San Francisco Giants report: Stripling joins Manaea in the latest of signings

By Morris Phillips and Michael Duca

Former Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Ross Stripling throws against the Philadelphia Phillies in the second inning at Citizen’s Bank Park in Philadelphia on Tue Sep 20, 2022. Stripling joined the Giants signing a two year $25 million deal with a option for 2024 (AP News photo)

SAN FRANCISCO– Not waiting for the end of the year the San Francisco Giants made moves this week on Monday they signed former Oakland A’s left hander Sean Manaea who was anchor in the A’s bullpen when he pitched there. Manaea who signed a $25 million for two years with 2024 being a option year.

Manaea pitched for Oakland from 2016 until the end of the 2021 season. He joined the San Diego Padres soon after his former manager Bob Melvin went to manage in San Diego. Manaea’s 2022 season record 8-9 ERA 4.96. Manaea is being considered for the fourth or fifth spot in the Giants rotation. The Giants despite Manaea’s struggles in San Diego say they like what he brought to the Bay Area when he pitched here and he can adjust and the Giants are confident they can get him back on track.

Ross Stripling signing: On the heels of the Manaea signing the Giants signed right hand pitcher Ross Stripling in a $25 million two year deal. The contract call for an opt out after the first season. If Stripling pitches anything like he did in 2022 the Giants may not even give that opt out even a second thought. With Toronto Blue Jays Stripling went 10-4 with impressive 3.04 ERA in 134 plus innings.

Stripling 33, gets a $5 million signing bonus and will receive a $7 million salary for the 2023 season and Stripling who can reach for the brass ring and get a second year will get $12.5 million for the 2024 season. The Giants are looking to replace an effective pitching staff from the 2021 season in the pitchers of Alex Cobb, Anthony DeSclafani, Alex Wood and the Giants are looking for Alex Wood with Logan Webb, Jakob Junis, and Sean Hjelle to fill that void.

Now with Stripling and Manaea joining the pitching staff they could very well get an effective performance that the Giants have been looking for in their rotation. No doubt about it Stripling and Manaea bring lots of experience to the pitching staff. Manaea had had some arm problems in the past when he pitched in Oakland and was looking forward to working that out when he was in San Diego but will get a chance to work with Giants pitching coach Andrew Bailey.

Michael Duca and Morris Phillips both podcast Giants baseball for http://www.sportsradioservice.com

Cubs Provide Help, Giants Win: Post ASG slide ends with 4-2 win over Chicago

By Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–Things get so bad that sometimes… you need a little help.

The Giants’ seven-game losing streak exposed a club that needs to pitch, hit and defend a lot better to win games. In a stretch this poor, a team with holes can get exposed.

A 4-2 over the Cubs to snap the skid on Thursday didn’t find the Giants miraculously better, but definitely more fortunate after riding a three-run third inning that was fueled by Cubs’ mistakes and decisions.

Patrick Wisdom fanned on an infield pop and gave Mike Yastrzemski a life on second base to start the rally. Yermin Mercedes in the at-bat of the evening–11 pitches, six fouled off–delivered a two-run single after Wilmer Flores was hit by a pitch, a call that was lobbied for by the Cubs. Thairo Estrada knocked in Flores when shortstop Nico Hoerner couldn’t turn Estrada’s well-place grounder into an out.

Alex Wood took a 3-0 lead at that point, and did something with it, pitching into the seventh while allowing just two hits. Wisdom, in an atonement swing, knocked Wood out of the game with a two-run homer that narrowed the Giants’ lead to 4-2. Wood retired 15 in a row at one point, a streak that ended in the sixth when he walked Nelson Velazquez. Wood flirtation with a no-no lasted into the seventh, and was aided by Yastrzemski’s highlight, leaping catch in the right field alley in the sixth.

“The biggest difference in today’s game was we played crisp defense and made some very difficult plays,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “We’re going to be fine if we play strong defense behind our pitchers. That’s probably the most important thing we can do.”

Justin Steele took the loss for the Cubs. Steele was lifted in the fourth after allowing Austin Slater’s RBI double that gave the Giants a 4-0 lead.

The series continues Friday with Marcus Stroman facing Alex Cobb.

Wood starting to find his groove

San Francisco Giants starter Alex Wood seen here throwing against the San Diego Padres on Sun Jul 10, 2022 in San Diego. Pitched four plus inning on Fri Jul 15, 2022 against the Milwaukee Brewers for the win. (AP News photo)

By Jeremy Harness

SAN FRANCISCO – In a game that quickly became a comedy of errors, which turned into a crazy swing of momentum in the Giants’ favor, what became overshadowed was the re-emergence of starter Alex Wood.

After a mixed bag of results last month, the left-hander turned in his third solid start in a row Friday night at Oracle Park, although the end result did not tell the entire story. He gave up three runs – two earned – on four hits over 4 2/3 innings, but he was undone by an untimely fielding mistake that ultimately cost him a chance at a win.

Wood had not exactly brought his best stuff to his home park. He entered Friday’s contest with a 2-3 home record, while opponents had hit .301 against him in those outings. Particularly damaging was a May 22 start against San Diego that saw him surrender five runs before being yanked after only three innings.

He began to narrow that down in June while collecting a pair of home wins, and that form extended into Friday. After giving up a single to lead off the game, Wood escaped the inning without allowing another runner and was cruising along until the Brewers mounted a two-out threat in the fifth.

With the Giants leading 2-0, Kolten Wong and Jonathan Davis both singled, but he was poised to get out of the inning when Christian Yelich bounced one harmlessly to the right side. However, first baseman LaMonte Wade, Jr. misplayed the hop off the infield dirt, allowing the ball to get past him as a run scored.

At that point, he was pulled for Tyler Rogers, who promptly gave up a walk to load the bases. Andrew McCutcheon, a former Giant, immediately followed that by lashing a bases-clearing double into the left-field corner to give Milwaukee a 4-2 lead.  

Wade busts out of slump

After showing some serious promise last year, Wade has struggled to regain that form at the plate in 2022.

A lot of that has had to do with inflammation in his left knee that knocked him out of a total of 61 games this year. He landed on the injured list last month and had gone 5-for-40 since his reinstatement.

He made some loud contact on Friday night, however, and seems to be showing signs of rejuvenation. After lining out to lead off the first inning, Wade smacked a Woodruff fastball into the gap in right-center in the second and wound up with a stand-up triple, scoring two runs in the process and giving the Giants a 2-0 lead.

However, his fielding error three innings later quickly decreased the impact of the hit, as the miscue was shaping up until the Giants’ late heroics that won them the game in the bottom of the ninth.

Rally Wreckers: Giants do the same stuff in latest loss, 3-2 to the visiting Tigers

By Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–If the Giants were to find a way not to win a third, consecutive series, this wasn’t the way.

More of the same. When the Giants’ offense fails to get the key hit, and knock in some runs, they often lose. Wednesday afternoon’s loss to the Tigers, 3-2, was just another example in a less than lengthy stretch of games.

“I think it’s as simple as getting one more big at-bat,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “We’ve talked about that for a while now.”

The Giants rallied in the third–leading 1-0, then loading the bases with one out–but came up empty. In the seventh–now trailing 3-1–the Giants had the same, advantageous setup, but scored just once, on Mike Yastrzemski’s fielder’s choice ground ball. A run in each inning, and the hosts are likely winners, and building on a 41-33 record. Instead, they’re stuck in a 3-6 stretch against beatable opponents.

The Giants finished 2 of 9 with runners in scoring position, intriguing, in that the two successes were from guys that could pick it up and change things. Evan Longoria homered in the first inning, and his infield single loaded the bases in the third. Lamonte Wade Jr. returned to action–after missing 61 of the first 73 games–and singled in the seventh. Wade was put in a tough spot, hitting against a tough lefty Gregory Soto in the ninth, when the Giants normally would have pinch-hit, but at that point in the game on Wednesday, Kapler had expended all his hitting options.

Alex Wood–who started, and gave up the decisive two-run homer to Detroit’s Eric Haase in the sixth–best expressed the agony of his own shortcomings and the teams saying “these are the days that are just extremely frustrating. I felt really good. I thought it was the best my slider’s been in a long time, if not (this entire season). So to have that (home run) happen at the end really sucked, to be honest. Just really frustrating.”

“It starts with our staff. Webby and ‘Los have put up their lines. The rest of us have to step our s— up,” Wood said, applauding his staff mates Logan Webb and Carlos Rodón. “Start having the lines match up with how we’re feeling and putting up some zeroes and finishing some starts with zero or one run on the board. A lot of those one-run games are on us.”

There’s some truth to Wood saying this is not all on the offense. And, once again, this is a team with a winning record and a clear-path to the newly, expanded playoffs. But off a 107-win campaign, something missing or somethings are missing. To Wood’s point, the Giants ERA of 3.99 puts them just above the league average. Last season, their staff had a National League top-three ERA virtually the entire season. Defensively, the Giants have committed 41 errors, also a league average number, but reflective of how poor the defense has been, the Giants defensive efficiency, as defined by baseball-reference.com is in the bottom four in all of baseball. What’s that last bit really mean? The Giants could suffer even worse defensively going forward, so far, they’ve made defensive mistakes, but in a lot of cases, not suffered run scored against them.

The Giants open a three-game set with the White Sox on Friday at Oracle Park. Lance Lynn of Chicago and Alex Cobb will get the starting assignments.

Giants Stay Hot, Roast the Royals 6-2 at Oracle Park

By Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–Buoyed by all their success gathered in a sweep of the Dodgers, the Giants kept their momentum going Monday night by breaking open a close game, and beating the Royals 6-2.

Alex Wood stood out, pitching six innings and allowing just four hits. He threw an economical 80 pitches and retired the last ten batters he faced, which was enough for manager Gabe Kapler, who turned to his bullpen to protect a 3-2 lead. Wood pitched with base traffic in the first three innings, but managed to keep the visitors from cashing in outside of a two-run third.

Brady Singer started for Kansas City, and Amir Garrett relieved him in the fifth, and neither seemed comfortable with Singer issuing five walks, and Garrett one to Austin Slater, who advanced to second on a wild pitch, and scored on Thairo Estrada’s base hit that gave the Giants a lead they wouldn’t relinquish. Singer issued four consecutive walks in the third, allowing the Giants to tie the game with free passes issued to Darin Ruf and Joc Pederson coming with the bases loaded, forcing in a pair of runs.

In all Giants’ batters drew nine walks, likely infuriating former catcher and Royals manager Mike Matheny. The walks in combination with the Giants five hits–four of them doubles–put the Giants in position to add on with two runs in the seventh and one in the eighth.

Relievers Mauricio Llovera, Jake McGee and Camilo Doval each pitched a scoreless inning after Wood departed with Doval picking up the save. Llovera was a gameday callup from AAA Sacramento as Heliot Ramos was sent out after another short stint with the big club.

The Giants have won four in a row, impressive in that it brings them within three games of the Dodgers and the division lead, and somehow has kept them in front of the Atlanta Braves in the wild card stack, despite the Braves winning a 12th straight on Monday. The Giants hold the lead wild card spot, significant this season in the expanded playoff field which will see that lead team host an opening round series in the postseason.

On Tuesday, the Giants and Royals play game two of a three-game set with Logan Webb, coming off arguably his most impressive start of the season facing Kris Bubic, who has an unsightly 0-3 record with a 9.13 ERA.

Shut Out On South Beach: Giants can’t solve Alcantara in 3-0 loss to the Marlins

By Morris Phillips

The Marlins with their sub .500 records overall and at home haven’t moved the meter thus far in 2022, but the Miami pitching has. Pablo Lopez and Sandy Alcantara are the headliners with near-100 mph four-seam fastballs, and Alcantara got his chance to make an impression on the reigning NL West champion Giants on Thursday.

Let’s just say mission accomplished.

The 26-year old right hander was electric, throwing 111 pitches with the best of those coming late, in a 3-0 shutout win over the Giants. Alcantara allowed three hits, walked two, struck out eight and kept the Giants off balance by starting 17 of the 25 batters he faced with strikes, and inducing 24 swings and misses. Knowing they were entering a battle, Giants’ hitters got the majority of Alcantara’s pitches out early with several, lengthy at-bats. But the response was simple: as the game wore on, Alcantara became highly efficient, dispatching Giants’ hitters quickly and quietly.

“If it were up to me, I would have stayed until the ninth, but I respect the manager’s decision,” Alcantara said through an interpreter.

Marlins manager Don Mattingly lifted his ace after seven innings, but rightfully termed the process of Alcantara finishing better than he starts by saying, “he finally got that groove that we talk about where it’s like he’s going 75 mph on the highway.”

So ingrained is the process, Mattingly actually delivered the previous quote after Alcantara’s previous start in Atlanta in which he struck out a career-best 14 in eight innings of work.

The timing of Alcantara’s start couldn’t have been better for the Marlins, who played two games in Denver against the Rockies on Thursday before returning home. The Giants, who got an early start in Philadelphia to conclude their series with the Phillies looked like the far more sluggish team as the hosts got RBI hits from Jacob Stallings (second inning), Jesus Aguilar and Miguel Rojas (both in the sixth) to create breathing room for Alcantara.

The Giants dropped their second straight after a pair of wins in Philadelphia. Their lineup was thin with Brandon Crawford, Evan Longoria dealing with bumps and bruises along with Darin Ruf away on the bereavement list following the death of his father. The Giants are also missing Lamonte Wade Jr., Brandon Belt and Austin Slater, who took batting practice and could make his way into the lineup on Friday night.

The poorly-situationed Alex Wood didn’t pitch poorly for the Giants. Wood worked into the sixth inning, allowing two runs on four hits. Wood has dropped three, consecutive starts and his record is 3-5.

“Any time you face a guy like Sandy, he’s pretty good, so there’s no going to be a whole lot of room for error,” Wood said afterwards.

The announced pitchers for the second game of the series are the Giants’ Alex Cobb and Miami’s Elieser Hernandez.

Dodgers Swat the Giants: 9-1 win part of LA’s emphatic early-season statement

By Morris Phillips

The Giants were in a competitive ballgame Wednesday night, and then they were not. Simple as that.

In consecutive innings the Dodgers got a Mookie Betts home run, a two-run triple from Freddie Freeman, and another homer from Max Muncy and the Giants were trounced 9-1 at Dodger Stadium. In the brief, two-game set, the Giants scored just two runs, a continuation of their rough times that started on their previous, home stand.

Alex Wood breezed through the Dodgers lineup the first time through, but by the end of his stint in the sixth inning, his former club figured him out, scoring three times on four hits to lead 3-1.

Freeman’s breathless run around the bases was the centerpiece to Los Angeles’ four-run seventh that turned the game into a rout. Muncy’s home run with Will Smith aboard capped the Dodgers’ outburst in the eighth.

“I think collectively it was the best game we’ve played,” manager Dave Roberts said. “Just a well-played offensive game.”

The Giants have dropped five of six, and are finally showing the stress of all their personnel issues, although they did see Mike Yastrzemski return to the lineup on Wednesday. Evan Longoria, Tommy La Stella and Lamonte Wade Jr. are all expected to return within the next seven days.

“When we get leadoff runners on consistently, we’re going to score runs,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “Obviously didn’t happen in this game. They beat us throughout the night.”

The Giants return home for Thursday’s opener against the Cardinals, a four-game set that will take them through the weekend.

West Coast Chess: Brainy managers, twins highlight Padres 4-2 win over the Giants

By Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–A match-up of high-minded managers that won’t give an inch while trying to swipe a couple of runs isn’t necessarily groundbreaking, but deploying competing, identical twins on a freezing cold night sure provides a unique edge.

That was the scene at Oracle Park on Monday as the Bob Melvin-led Padres pushed their way past the Giants and newly-minted Manager of the Year, Gabe Kapler, winning 4-2.

The NL West hopefuls, both trying to top each other while keeping the division favorite Dodgers within their sights, engaged in station-to-station baseball while searching for a breakthrough with San Diego’s Austin Nola the only slugger able to cut through the cold air with his solo blast in the fifth that gave the Padres a brief 2-1 lead.

The rest was a chess match, orchestrated by Melvin and Kapler and executed by the competing twins, Taylor and Tyler Rogers. In the seventh, Tyler allowed a tie-breaking run on two hits, and Taylor–recently acquired in a trade with the Twins–pitched a scoreless ninth and saved it for the visitors.

“We’re both trying to throw a lot of strikes,” Tyler said. “We both do throw a lot of strikes. We pitch different–I pitch different than everybody–but, really, if you look at it, we’re very similar pitchers.”

The twins were only fifth set to compete in a major league game and the first since Ozzie and Jose Canseco did it in 1990. The upcoming two games of the series won’t feature both as Tyler departed after the game to be with his wife, Jennifer, who is due to give birth in the coming days.

But the occasion was clearly energizing for both, and they’ll 16 more opportunities to compete this season after the trade brought them closer together.

“Normally we leave for the season and I don’t see him again for eight months,” Tyler said. “So I’m looking forward to seeing him throughout the year. Dinners are on him.”

More so than Tyler Rogers’ rough inning, the Giants saw their evening unravel with an 0 for 11 performance with runners in scoring position which wasted eight base hits, four walks and two doubles. San Diego’s Nick Martinez, making his first big league start since 2017, was the first to survive all the Giants’ traffic on the basepaths by pitching five innings while striking out six, walking one and scattering five of those Giants’ hits.

Alex Wood lasted just 4 1/3 innings in his first start, departing after he allowed Nola’s homer that put the Giants in a 2-1 hole.

The Padres and Giants pick it up again on Tuesday with Yu Darvish and Alex Cobb getting the starting pitching assignments.

Longo Takes Scherzer Out And It Stands Up!: Giants take Game 3 of epic, LA-SF showdown

San Francisco Giant hitter Evan Longoria swings for the game’s only run in the top of the fifth inning for the Giants second win of the NLDS against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles on Mon Oct 11, 2021 (AP New photo)

By Morris Phillips

On an unusually windy night in Los Angeles, pitching ruled the evening in Game 3 of the NLDS. Heaters, thrown by numerous pitchers, darted, dashed and overwhelmed hitters, especially up in the strike zone. Those that were hit all came to rest near the warning track in a subdued Dodger Stadium.

Only one man on either team stood up: Evan Longoria.

“I didn’t want to get beat by another fastball,” Longoria said of his fifth inning confrontation with the incomparable Max Scherzer.

He didn’t. Scherzer threw an 0-2 fastball that grabbed too much of the plate, and Longoria launched it… 407 feet into the left field bleachers. Incredibly, that one run stood up in a 1-0 Giants’ win that has them one victory from taking the series with Game 4 in Los Angeles on Tuesday, and a potential, winner-take-all Game 5 in San Francisco on Thursday. There were 20 strikeouts in the game (14 suffered by San Francisco hitters), only one extra-base hit (Longoria’s) and after the Giants’ third baseman gave the Giants the lead, they never saw the base paths again: the last 15 Giants’ hitters were retired, most without a fuss.

So what had to happen for the NL West champions, did. Giants’ pitchers–starter Alex Wood and relievers Tyler Rogers, Jake McGee and 24-year old Camilo Doval–ruled the evening, shutting down the Dodgers for nine innings, despite some base traffic, and quite a few anxious moments.

Scherzer, who was previously foiled by the Giants in the 2012 World Series, was great again. The surefire Hall of Famer went seven, striking out ten, and walking one, but he couldn’t corral Longoria in the fifth. That one pitch unraveled his whole evening.

“He’s just a professional hitter who has done it very successfully for a very long time,” manager Gabe Kapler said of Longoria.

In the manner that Kapler has employed all season, his team switched roles and convention on the fly. Closer McGee, who had 31 saves this season, but was only pitching for the second time in a month on Monday due to an oblique injury, came on in the seventh in a big spot. With two runners on, McGee struck out Austin Barnes on three pitches, and got Mookie Betts to line out to shortstop Brandon Crawford, who climbed an imaginary wire to make the catch.

Doval, the closer of the moment, then came on to shut the door in the eight and ninth, needing just 22 pitches to retire the side in each inning, and give the Giants the win.

Bucking convention? Sure, but it all made sense, really. McGee was the NL Reliever of the Month in July, and Doval–sensational in 14 1/3 scoreless innings with 20 strikeouts–was the NL Reliever of the Month in September. In a bullpen filled with high-leverage arms, Kapler sensed the shift, and followed his instinct. In both Giants’ wins in the series, Doval was the one to close it, despite only having 29 appearances–all this season–in his career.

Wood, the former Dodger who still participates in fantasy football leagues with his ex-teammates, wasn’t looking around for familiar faces on Monday. He too was fantastic, working through situations and lengthy innings that drove his pitch count up. He pitched into the fifth inning, allowing just two base hits and no walks.

Fly balls populated the outfield throughout as everyone in the park, and watching at home, learned to train their eyes on the sold-out bleachers, and watch the reaction of the fans seated there. Every time, with the exception of Longo’s blast, there was no reaction. The fans in the outfield–and their inactivity–told the story. The final blow from Gavin Lux off Doval may have been the most threating, but it too found a home… in center fielder Steven Duggar’s glove.

“I think any other night, the (Chris Taylor) ball and the Gavin Lux ball would have been home runs,” Dodgers’ manager Dave Roberts said.

Homers in Bunches: Giants slug their way to 8-6 win over the Astros

By Morris Phillips

SAN FRANCISCO–Could the power outage in the Giants’ clubhouse at Oracle Park continue for a fifth straight day?

No, and neither could Zach Greinke’s magical touch at Oracle Park.

Greinke has never lost a game at Oracle Park, posting a microscopic ERA in the process, and barely being tested in the majority of his six wins. But these days, the Giants have a brand new approach, and Greinke found out first hand that things might be different going forward. And when was Greinke notified of the change? Probably three home runs into the four homer barrage the Giants hit him with, all in the game’s first five innings.

“Three of them might have been home runs still in any situation,” Greinke said of his start, the first time he’d allowed four home runs to the Giants, and the first time he’d allowed any club that many homers since 2019. “They weren’t cheap.”

In 53 innings pitched at Oracle Park, the 218-game winner described as a future Hall of Famer in the Astros’ media notes, had never allowed a home run. In fact, his dominance was the essence of velvet: Greinke averaged little more than six strikeouts in his previous eight starts along McCovey Cove, showing that he was content to let the Giants get themselves out without needing to display a dominant stance.

What’s new is the Giants are swinging harder. Among the few quality home run hitting teams not to feature one, standout slugger, the team’s across-the-board approach is to look for pitches to launch, swing hard, and don’t get discouraged by strikeouts or meager batting averages. Against Greinke, who’s not only unlikely to allow a big fly, but also stingy with teams trying to string together base hits, the approach works. Maybe not everytime, but during a day game in a park where the park needs ideal conditions to surrender big hits, it worked on Saturday.

“We put some really good swings on the ball. All the homers were pretty much no-doubters,” Ruf said. “Although it was a nice day to hit and the ball seemed to be traveling well, those would have been homers in any other day game.”

The Giants’ homer drought–none over the first four games of the homestand–ended with a bang. The four, consecutive games without at least one home run was a first in manager Gabe Kapler’s run of 164 games at the helm.

The Astros, considered MLB’s top-rated offensive club, attempted to keep up the pace. They homered three times, two of those from Aledmys Diaz, and during a stretch of nine half-innings in which runs were scored in eight of them, the teams went back-and-forth, wiping out any leads that one of clubs established. But that pattern broke in the sixth when Brandon Crawford singled home a run with two runners aboard to give the Giants a 7-6 lead they wouldn’t relinquish. The only run on the afternoon the Giants would produce without hitting a home run was the difference, and it came after Greinke departed, allowing him to escape with his undefeated record in San Francisco in tact.

Alex Wood, described as the Giants’ stopper with his excellent record in games following a Giants’ loss, was anything but, allowing six hits–two of them home runs–in his abbreviated 68-pitch outing. But often, it’s better to be lucky than good, and Wood benefitted from the Giants’ offensive breakout, and a bullpen effort that saw four relievers following him and allow just one, meaningless base hit. Jake McGee capped that effort with a perfect ninth to earn his 22nd save.

Ironically, the Giants played without newly acquired Kris Bryant from the Cubs, who was flying to San Francisco during the game Saturday. Bryant will be in uniform on Sunday, and will assume a lofty position in a lineup where he will lead the Giants in hits (87), be tied for the lead in home runs (18), and second in doubles (19). To say the Giants lineup will be not only loaded, but versatile, would be understatement. But the objective is to do it on the field, and not on paper, over the season’s final 59 games.

In a final move before the trade deadline the Giants reacquired Tony Watson from the Angels with Sam Selman the key piece headed to Anaheim. Watson has a recent, string of exemplary outings but he also moves into a crowded situation in the Giants’ bullpen. Currently, the Giants have relievers Dominic Leone, Jack McGee, Tyler Rogers, Jarlin Garcia and Jose Alvarez with ERA’s under 3.00. Reliable arms Caleb Baragar and Reyes Moronta could also be the mix as well at some point if they recover from injury.

On Sunday, the Giants have Logan Webb starting in a matchup with Houston’s Luis Garica at 1:05pm.