© Rick Scuteri-USA TODAY Sports
As the Giants get into the heart of the regular season, Senior Vice President and General Manager Bobby Evans spoke briefly on the Gary & Larry podcast about the Sacramento River Cats’ center fielder Steven Duggar. Duggar, a 24-year-old from South Carolina, was drafted in the sixth round of the 2015 MLB Draft by the Giants out of Clemson University.
“I think Duggar is definently improving.” Evans said. “In terms of turning the corner, he is the kind of player that doesn’t have a lot of corners left to turn. He’s ready in most every way. It’s just getting him the quantity of at-bats and having an approach at the plate that would translate to the big league level, and I think he is close.”
Since being drafted by the Giants three years ago, Duggar has had 324 hits and 123 RBI in the minors. However, in his last 10 games he has been batting nearly .400 and has 16 hits.
The only problem Evans sees with Duggar, is where he should play.
“I don’t think Boach or Brian or I want to see Duggar playing up here at a part time role,” Bobby said. “He needs to come up here and play every day. There are only so many roster spots and if you make a decision on Duggar early you don’t have a way to back off of it and change your mind. For us, as long as he is progressing and we are doing OK at the big league level we will stay pat but we would love to see him force his way up here. ”
Along with hope of seeing Duggar in orange and black soon, Gary & Larry also took some time to ask about first-round pick Joey Bart.
“How long for him Bob before he comes up?” Gary asked. “When you draft a guy number one in this day in age what does that mean?”
“You know two, three years in the minors is probably reasonable,” Evans responded. “This being his first year it won’t work out to be a full year, only work out to be a half a year. We will be off in time, to bring catchers out of the draft to big league camp his first camp. So we will see him in big league camp most likely, health provided.”
Bart, a junior out of Georgia Tech, is the highest draft pick the Giants have made in over three decades. The 6’3 catcher was batting .359 with 79 hits this past year for the Yellow Jackets.
However, the biggest question Gary had was this younger catcher’s relationship with the current catcher.
“Has he met Buster at all?” Gary asked. “I know you guys brought him to SF to kind of get a closer look at him, but in that meeting or in that visit did he get a chance to meet Buster or was the big league club on the road?”
“Ya, big league club was on the road.” Bobby said. “I know Bumgarner saw him from a distance and he was throwing in the outfield when we were doing one of our workouts, but i don”t think they have met. This game, as small as it is, its just hard for these guys to be in the same place at the same time, but we probably make it happen next home-stand”
Listen to full interview below. For Evans’s thoughts, start at 11:30.
