SF Giants spring training takeaways: Who will start Cactus League opener
Projected Opening Day starter Logan Webb will get the ball in Giants' spring opener, too; 19 games in 20 days to start season a 'big deal,' Kapler says.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The man taking the ball Friday night at Scottsdale Stadium will, if all goes as expected, be the same person throwing the first pitch on Opening Night at Oracle Park, too.
Right-hander Logan Webb will start the Giants’ Cactus League opener and throw two innings, manager Gabe Kapler said Thursday. Following Webb on the mound will be a series on non-roster invitees, but the Giants’ lineup will feature “some regulars from last year,” Kapler said.
Here is the Giants’ pitching schedule for Friday night (7:05 p.m. first pitch at Scottsdale Stadium). We’ll update with the lineup once it is posted.
- RHP Logan Webb
- RHP Brian Brickhouse
- RHP Raynel Espinal
- RHP Luis Ortiz
- RHP Gray Fenter
- RHP Nick Avila
- RHP Solomon Bates
- RHP Patrick Ruotolo
- RHP Juan Moreno
Webb, who began a throwing program at the beginning of February, said earlier this week that he was only one or two bullpens away from being game ready. San Francisco’s starters are “all at different stages,” Kapler said, but others have already tossed multiple innings. Alex Cobb and Alex Webb both faced live hitters Wednesday for two innings during a simulated game.
Although it is a forgone conclusion that Webb will get the nod on Opening Day, Kapler declined make that declaration Thursday as he announced Webb as the starter in for their Cactus League opener. After not making the team out of camp last spring, Webb finished the regular season as one of the National League’s best starter, going 10-0 with a 2.40 ERA over his final 20 starts.
New schedule is a ‘big deal’
Where the Giants go after Webb’s presumed Opening Day start will depend on how the want to attack a demanding first stretch of games that was only made more difficult by the re-jiggered schedule of makeup games.
With six games to make up to get to 162 in a condensed time frame, every major league team knew it was going to face challenges.
For the Giants, that comes at the start of the season, with 19 games in 20 days, and at the end, when they were robbed of closing the year at home with back-to-back series against the Rockies and D-backs, the projected bottom two teams in the division; instead, they travel to San Diego to make up the three games they were supposed to start the season with.
“It’s a big deal. It’s going to be incredibly challenging,” Kapler said. “Every club around the league right now is looking around like, wow, we have some major challenges. We’re no exception to that. … I think we’re going to be up for the challenge. … We also start at home. As much as it is going to be challenging to deal with that first road trip, we also get to have a few series at home first.”
The Giants’ first major road trip travels through Cleveland, New York and Washington. And now, tack on a game at Milwaukee to the end of it, on the day the Giants were supposed to be traveling cross-country, back home from Washington.
The demanding stretch could strain a pitching staff that already has less time to build up for the regular season with spring training shorted from six weeks to less than a month. Which pitchers are stretched out and healthy is more likely to determine how the Giants attack those first 20 games than the schedule itself, Kapler said.
“What we’ll probably try to do is factor in how built up our pitchers are, and that’s probably going to determine how we stack them at the outset,” Kapler said. How many available and healthy starting pitchers do we have? That in itself will dictate how we roll guys out much more than the schedule will.”