I enjoy spending several days on Baseball Reference and writing 1,500 words on what I find. Did you know that after the Giants traded Bill Madlock, he won two batting titles and made two All-Star teams? Except two of the three players they got back from the Pirates (Al Holland, Ed Whitson) were eventually traded themselves, with Duane Kuiper and Mike Krukow coming back in separate deals. And that’s the story of how the Giants traded away a dude who would later hit .341, yet somehow still made one of the greatest trades in franchise history.
Heck, yeah. But for most of the five years that I’ve written for The Athletic, there’s been a gap in my coverage. I love deep dives and spicy opinions and formulaic jaunts, but there’s no room for the stray thoughts or the dumb deep dives. For example, I didn’t write a single word about this play last season:
That play was dumb. It was beautiful. It was the baseball equivalent of an Adam Sandler album that held up to critical scrutiny 30 years later — simultaneously the stupidest artistic creation in human history and an unparalleled masterpiece. It didn’t feel like enough to justify an entire article at the time, though. Maybe on a silly little blog, if you can imagine such a thing, but not for a serious publication like The Athletic.
So this is the first of what I intend to be a weekly recap of Giants musings and tidbits, where I can comment on news, moments and happenings that don’t justify a full article, or chime in on something that Baggs covered expertly in a recap a few days earlier.
Just don’t make me name it something like “The Weekly Beecap.”
Daulton Jefferies’ road back to the majors was far more intense than I’d realized. Check out Baggs’ article from the series finale to appreciate it fully. It was not a very good start, however. Disaster starts like that happen to the best pitchers, and they’ll definitely happen to pitchers with less experience.
This brings up an idea that came up in my predictions article, which is that it’s possible to have plenty of depth at a position while also having substandard results, at least for a while. Baseball Prospectus recently wrote about the teams with the most depth at various positions, and the Giants were notable for being “leaders in having more starting pitchers than necessary.” As in, they have a surplus of pitchers who seem capable of holding their own. There were 10 pitchers outside of the starting rotation who merited a mention, with only the Dodgers (of course) having more. Jefferies was specifically mentioned as a pitcher with a decent enough projection and a strong spring.
He still might be a solution to whatever problem is facing the Giants, and it can absolutely be true that they have more competent starting pitchers than they know what to do with. We’re not talking about pitchers you want to see for 32 starts, but guys who can help when you need them for a start or two. Here, let’s find examples from different decades:
• Mark Grant (1987)
• Joe Roa (1997)
• Ryan Sadowski (2009)
• Yusmeiro Petit (2012-2015)
• Jakob Junis (2022-2023)
That’s definitely not an exhaustive list, nor is it intended to include the best possible example from those decades. They’re the ones that came to mind, though. Need a guy? Here’s a guy. And he’s pretty OK.
The problem is that it takes sifting to find these guys. Before the Giants discovered the sublime brilliance of Petit in 2013, they gave some starts to Mike Kickham*, who was worth negative-1.5 WAR in just 28 innings, 12 appearances and three starts. That entirely wiped out Petit’s contributions, at least on paper.
Jefferies might be Petit, or he might be Kickham. The point is that while depth is always good, and it can be a serious advantage over a 162-game season, sifting can have a cost. It would be great to peek into the future and see which pitchers can thrive in the majors, but until then, it can get messy.
* Kickham is a Giants legend. He had a 10.98 career ERA with the Giants, but managed to have an even higher ERA (13.50) later with the Dodgers. He’s a hipster’s Jason Schmidt who deserves your respect.
Wilmer Flores is day-to-day with a shoulder contusion after tumbling into the Padres’ dugout.
Let’s be very clear: There’s a long tradition of dugouts not helping opponents while they navigate unfriendly terrain. There are 27 outs in a game. Any aid or comfort to the enemy in that situation is a fine way to give away one of those precious outs.
However, my theory is that this is stupid, and when you see a large individual about to have a gravity accident, you help him. Let’s change this bad unwritten rule into a good one. You can still yell “LOOK OUT FOR THE WHEELBARROW” as your opponent approaches, which Mike Krukow regularly reminds us is standard policy, but maybe do something a little more when you see problems a-brewing.
Here was the most active attempt to help Flores:
While Eric Hosmer’s stunt double didn’t help much, he at least lifted a finger. Flores was already hurtling toward his death, sure, but it was something. Guy on the left seems bemused, while the guy next to him is saying something like, “Ohhhhh, bro, no way.” If you rewatch the video, you’ll notice that one of the Padres goes from protecting himself to exiting stage right before Flores is even on the ground.
My suggestion is that there should be some sort of informal agreement between the 30 teams. A league-wide Geneva Convention, but for catching players about to go ass-over-tea-kettle onto cement. It should be an unwritten rule, with a little shared responsibility. That could be you next time. Or maybe it’ll be a teammate. Or maybe it’ll be a teammate you don’t like, but that’s not the point. We’re talking about large humans. Catch them when they fall, if you can.
Joey Bart was designated for assignment, and while it wasn’t exactly a surprise, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to process. You’re telling me that no team in baseball watched his strong spring (12-for-29, with as many walks as strikeouts) and wanted to use him as a backup with latent potential? It was always going to be tough to trade Bart in this economy, but I still can’t believe there wasn’t a bad team willing to take a low-risk, high-reward chance on him. We’re talking cash considerations, here.
The Giants are hoping he’ll go unclaimed. I’m not. It would be better for the organization to have another competent emergency catching option in Triple A, but at this point, he needs a situation that’s best for him. If the Giants need a catcher other than Patrick Bailey and Tom Murphy, they’ll call up Blake Sabol, who’s already on the 40-man roster. It’s hard to imagine the roster avalanche that would need to happen for Bart to get added back to the 40-man. Just let the guy have a fresh start.
He’ll probably get claimed. If/when he does, don’t be surprised if he has a Tom Murphy-like career, which means he’d be in demand as an overqualified backup, hosing another young catcher eight years from now. That’s the circle of life, baby.
If you’re looking for signs that Jordan Hicks can stick as a starter, what are you looking for?
The first is an assortment of pitches. It’s one thing to pump 102-mph sinkers past hitters you’re going to see only once, but what about the second and third times through the order? What about the intra-divisional matchups, where it feels like you’re facing Max Muncy every inning in every game?
The second is control. There can’t be an overabundance of walks. Nothing close to his career rate of nearly five walks per nine innings pitched, which is completely unsustainable. That’s a good way to get pulled from the game in the third inning. Or win the Cy Young.
The third is the ability to pace himself. It has to be difficult for a late-inning firebreather to adjust to the more measured pace of a five- or six-inning slog.
It’s been just one start, but Hicks checks all of these boxes. We know his fastball is hard to hit, even when it’s right down the middle, but his sweeper has been outstanding in recent weeks. As for his splitter, let’s fall in love with this pitch all over again:
That’s the splitter you’d expect from a Cy Young winner in his 10th season, considering the situation and execution. That was a 3-2 count with two runners on base, and while there was a base to play with, Jackson Merrill was the batter to get. He might make 10 All-Star Games and/or the Hall of Fame, but he’s still a green-as-green rookie just a couple of years removed from his prom. It was going to be easier to get him out than to load the bases and attack the top of the order.
The control was far, far better than I expected. Hicks got into eight full counts on Saturday, and he threw strikes with every full-count pitch. Sometimes they were fouled off, and sometimes they were put in play and sometimes he got swings-and-misses. It was one game, and if he walks five batters in each of the next two games, there’s a much different narrative. But if you’re looking for signs of what Hicks is capable of, here you go. If he throws strikes with all of his pitches, he’s going to be a baseball anomaly in the best possible sense.
The last sign had to do with endurance, so here’s the final pitch Hicks threw on Saturday:
The location wasn’t perfect, and it took a brilliant play to get the out, but it was still a 99-mph sinker, and one of the best hitters in baseball couldn’t do anything with it other than pound it into the ground. That’s what Hicks is doing in the fifth inning, and it was only his 81st pitch of the game. He might have gone another inning or two in a June or July game.
This doesn’t mean the show of faith in Hicks as a starter is a proven success. It doesn’t mean he won’t be in the bullpen by the end of the season. But if you’re looking for signs, here you go. Check, check, check. At the very least, he’s turning into a starter worth paying attention to.
(Photo of Jordan Hicks: Brandon Sloter / Getty Images)
