If the Giants need to maintain the success from their 107-win season a yr in the past, it begins with constructing the muse of organizational depth that hasn’t essentially existed within the lean years since their final championship.
With the thirtieth and remaining choose within the first spherical of Sunday’s MLB draft — a direct results of that success final season — the Giants added to their farm system a big, athletic left-hander who can throw 99 mph and often hits the ball 400 toes as a primary baseman. The potential danger: He's coming off Tommy John surgical procedure and has a brief collegiate monitor report.
His title is Reggie Crawford, a 21-year-old out of the College of Connecticut, who's listed at 6-foot-4 and 235 kilos. MLB.com ranked him because the No. 80 prospect coming into the draft. Baseball America, which thought-about him the No. 59 prospect within the class, described Crawford as “one of many largest wild playing cards within the draft,” contemplating “his expertise, restricted monitor report on the mound and medical historical past.”
Crawford pairs the fastball that touches triple digits with a plus slider however underwent Tommy John surgical procedure in October, which shut him down for your complete 2022 season. Between his freshmen and sophomore seasons, Crawford slugged 14 dwelling runs and slashed .309/.362/.546 as a primary baseman however logged solely eight innings on the mound.
Michael Holmes, the Giants senior director of beginner scouting, confirmed that the group will begin Crawford on a two-track growth as each a pitcher and a primary baseman as soon as he's totally recovered from the elbow process.
“We expect this man’s a particular expertise. He has the flexibility to do each,” Holmes stated. “He’s a plus defender at first base. He’s obtained large uncooked energy. … On the mound, he’s a giant bodily lefty that’s as much as 99-100 mph. … It’s a tough slider. It’s a giant fastball. It’s a creating changeup.”
Holmes stated he believed the Giants obtained a “prime first spherical” expertise with the thirtieth choose however greater than something raved about his character, which he described as “participating … particular … (and) prime of the charts.”
At No. 66, the Giants nabbed 21-year-old left-hander Carson Whisenhunt, out of East Carolina College, who additionally didn’t pitch this previous spring. After being named a preseason All-American, Whisenhunt examined constructive for efficiency enhancing medication (he has stated he didn’t know the substances of a complement from a sequence drug retailer) and was suspended for the season.
“He’s one other man on the mound we clearly like fairly a bit,” Holmes stated. “He’s a giant, tall left-hander. We expect he’s obtained an arsenal to assault each righties and lefties. He’s obtained the flexibility to melt the baseball. He can change instructions together with his breaking ball. And he’s obtained an efficient fastball that he can command. A starter’s combine for Carson.”
Crawford continues a pattern within the Farhan Zaidi regime of choosing faculty gamers within the first spherical, although he breaks from the mould a bit as a participant thought-about to have larger upside but additionally a decrease flooring. He follows choices of right-hander Will Bednar (2021, Mississippi State), catcher Patrick Bailey (2020, NC State) and outfielder Hunter Bishop (2019, Arizona State) since Zaidi took the reins because the group’s president of baseball operations.
As a result of they picked final, the Giants even have the smallest pool of funds to make use of to signal their draft picks, at $5.8 million. The urged slot worth of the No. 30 choose was $2.485 million, whereas the slot worth at No. 66 was $1.05 million.
Crawford confirmed that he intends to signal with the Giants, somewhat than return for his junior season. He had introduced plans to switch to the College of Tennessee shortly earlier than the draft.
Crawford enters a restocked San Francisco farm system that typically ranks in the course of the pack — nonetheless an enchancment on their standing by the top of the Brian Sabean/Bobby Evans eras. The Giants rank twelfth based on ESPN’s Kiley McDaniels, fifteenth in FanGraphs’ newest rankings and seventeenth based on Baseball America.
Left-hander Kyle Harrison, their third-round choice in 2020 (out of De La Salle, for properly over slot), is contemporary off an look within the Futures Recreation and headlines the system, together with shortstop Marco Luciano, one of many many worldwide signees who embody many of the prime expertise.
Draft choices of Buster Posey, Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain and Madison Bumgarner supplied a core to construct round that ultimately delivered three World Sequence titles. The present crop of homegrown expertise on the major-league roster contains two gamers who had been part of these groups, Brandon Crawford (2008, spherical 4) and Brandon Belt (2009, spherical 5), however Logan Webb (2014, spherical 4), Austin Slater (2014, spherical 8), Joey Bart (2018, spherical 1) David Villar (2018, spherical 11) and Tyler Rogers (2013, spherical 10) spherical out the one remaining gamers drafted and developed by the Giants.
The MLB draft concludes with rounds 3-20 on Monday and Tuesday.