© Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
You could make a strong case the San Francisco Giants didn’t have a competent left-handed arm out of the bullpen in 2017. With the highly-touted Will Smith missing the entire season recovering from Tommy John surgery, the club’s two remaining lefty relievers, Josh Osich (6.23 ERA) and Steven Okert (5.67), struggled mightily.
Things are looking different heading into 2018, however. Giants beat writer Andrew Baggarly told Marty Lurie on Sunday that if Derek Holland makes the club as a reliever, the Giants may have four quality left-handed arms out of the bullpen this season.
“I talked to an NL West scout who said they’d be foolish if they got rid of him the way he’s throwing the baseball,” Baggarly said of Holland. “Talking to him the other day, yeah you look at his numbers and say he had a 6 ERA with the White Sox last year, but his numbers the first two months were pretty good. This is a guy who had a lot of health problems the previous two years, didn’t throw many innings, and I think maybe he just hit a little bit of a wall and now he’s like ‘I threw 140 innings last year I’m going to take the positive out of that.’”
Holland, 31, has spent nearly his entire major league career as a starter, but posted inflated ERAs the last two seasons with the Rangers and White Sox. His stuff has looked impressive so far this spring, however, striking out 13 batters in 11 innings of work.
“If it’s a relief role, he can be preserved even more,” Baggarly continued. “You know he’s left-handed, he throws strikes, he’s got an athletic delivery, and he can move the ball around. He can throw a lot of different pitches and he’s been there, he’s been on a lot of good teams and he’s a good clubhouse guy with a good sense of humor. I could see him being a pretty good fit on this staff.”
Along with Holland, Osich seems to have turned things around, and has been lights out in seven spring training appearances, striking out 10 batters without allowing a single run. There’s also new free agent acquisition Tony Watson, who has been one of the top left-handed relieves in the bigs for most of his seven year career.
Finally there’s Smith, who Baggarly says won’t be ready for opening day, but looked a stud before his injury.
“Down the road obviously you’ll have Will Smith,” Baggarly said. “I was talking to Will today and he’s going to face hitters April 1. He’s going to stay here as the rest of the team goes north. It was his goal to start the season with the team, but he knows he can take that extra month and they can get him back-to-back and cross all those boxes off so he can really be a functional piece when he comes back.
“All of the sudden though, there are a lot of really good left-handed options here.
Listen to the full interview below. To hear Baggarly on the bullpen, skip to 3:15
