Top Picks On the Move!

SF Giants Minor Lines, May 14, 2024

First rounders were on the move, as the Giants’ massive re-shuffling of bodies continued on Tuesday. Not only were the rumors of 2022 1st round pick, Reggie Crawford, heading to Sacramento true, but he took his 2019 counterpart, Hunter Bishop along with him, as the org keeps looking for ways to keep all of the shelves stocked.

Crawford’s handling continues to be a fascinating case study, as he makes his way to the top rung on the ladder after having thrown just 28.2 innings in his professional career, and fewer than 10 this season. The push with him makes it continue to look likely that he ends up part of the Giants’ bullpen sometime in 2024. The one nagging doubt I have on that is the management of the 40-man roster, which is starting to threaten to fall out of balance. The Giants currently have 23 pitchers on either the 40-man or the 60-day IL — with all of the 60-day IL pitchers expected to come back at some point this year. At least 20 of those pitchers are controllable into future years — most of them many years into the future. And we’re seeing right now the potential dangers of having the 40-man imbalanced one way or the other, as the club has come extremely close to running out of 40-man position players. Adding another optionable and long-term control pitcher to the 40-man, simply to add another arm to the bullpen could have consequences, and I suspect the Giants won’t attempt it unless circumstance once again forces their hand.

As for Bishop’s promotion, while he’s been settling in reasonably well in Richmond, this was more about making the trains run on time than about Bishop’s production. With Yusniel Diaz heading to Sacramento’s IL, the team had just 10 position players on its active roster going into the week, with just two full-time outfielders. And, of course, three of those ten are players from A-ball being pressed into duty with very limited pro experience at this point. Even with Bishop, they were back down to just 10 position players by the end of the day, with Marco Luciano recalled to San Francisco. That also leaves the Giants with only one healthy position player on the 40-man roster who is NOT on the Giants active roster (David Villar).

With Bishop joining Brett Auerbach in Sacramento, Richmond’s situation isn’t great either, as they are now down to just 12 position players on the active list. Things are getting dire. There was a story this weekend that former Marlins’ prospect (and briefly big leaguer) Jerar Encarnacion had been signed out of the Mexican League and would be assigned to Sacramento, but Susan Slusser reported yesterday that Encarnacion was also considering offers to play in Asia, and hadn’t yet made up his mind. Regardless, it’s all hands on deck time — the Giants can’t handle many more injuries at this point and still manage to play games at every level without getting some more bodies from somewhere. The need for bodies is just too great.

We’re going to have to put these players in bubble wrap soon. No more diving catches! Oh, ok, Ismael, just this once more!

HITTER of the NIGHT: Rodolfo Nolasco (Eug), 2 for 4, HR (1), 2b, RBI, K
PITCHER of the NIGHT: Carson Seymour (Sac), 5.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 7 K