Starters have one or two turns left. The bullpen, which has transformed in unexpected ways since Opening Day, is trudging through the September sludge.
There have been dominant campaigns, worrying regression and everything in between. Pitching Ninja highlights and can’t-look-away car wrecks.
To qualify for a grade, Giants pitchers need to have logged at least 20 innings or make five starts. Luis González didn’t make the cut.
Like with the position player report cards, pitchers will be evaluated on their production compared to both that of their peers and expectations set by their own track records.
As a team, the Giants rank 10th in overall ERA (3.84). They’ve allowed 128 home runs, tied for the fewest in baseball with Houston.
So don’t be surprised if the report cards for a sub-.500 team seem surprisingly glowing.
Statistics accurate as of Monday, Sept. 26
Rotation
Carlos Rodón – A+
The Giants’ leader in scowls, double fist-pumps, grunts, struts and swords will get deserving Cy Young votes.
Rodón is second in the National League in strikeouts. Nobody has a better FIP or more Fangraphs WAR. He’s fanned 11.9 batters per nine innings — tops in the NL. The lefty broke the Giants’ franchise record for double-digit strikeout games in a season, vaulting ahead of Tim Lincecum and Jason Schmidt.
Most of all, he’s been healthy. Rodón’s injury history was the biggest, and only concern heading into the season. He’s already posted for a career-high 30 starts and 172 innings and never slowed down.
10 out of 10 season, no notes.
If Rodón does in fact leave San Francisco after opting out, he’ll have a strong case as the greatest single-season, One Year Wonder Giant ever.
Logan Webb – A
Webb broke out in 2021 to become San Francisco’s Opening Day starter, and he’s only gotten better.
While carrying a true ace’s work load, Webb has registered a 2.93 ERA. He’s held up physically despite throwing more innings than he ever has in his life. Any time he takes the ball, he has a chance to do something special.
Webb’s super power is inducing weak contact. He’s allowed just 11 homers all year — the third best rate in MLB — and has the second-best ground ball rate (56.7%).
Only one nitpick in an otherwise glistening year: after owning the rival Dodgers in 2021, both in the regular season and NLDS, Webb went 1-2 in four starts with a 5.57 ERA against LA — his highest against any opponent. Did the Dodgers adjust or is it just a small sample blip?
The Giants were 90% sure they had their ace of the future last November. Now they can be 100% certain.
Alex Cobb – A-
Cobb threw the hardest fastball of his career and paired it with the nastiest offspeed pitches he’s released. And somehow repeated that recipe throughout essentially the entire season.
A victim of porous defense and batted-ball bad luck, Cobb’s counting numbers don’t amaze. But a quick peek under the hood reveals a shiny, well-oiled engine.
With his fastball and splitter arsenal, Cobb misses bats in the 95th percentile, per Baseball Savant. He does allow hard contact, but mostly keeps balls on the ground and a more athletic defense behind him should prevent that from becoming a recurring issue.
Cobb’s FIP, for the second straight year, is 2.92. This season’s not an aberration. If he’s your third best starter, you’re in fantastic shape.
Alex Wood – C-
Wood has always been a notorious “third time through” guy, but this year even he took a step back in that regard.
Hitters facing Wood for a third time in a game hit .326 with a .941 OPS (compared to .295 with a .909 OPS last year). Essentially every batter turns into Freddie Freeman when facing Wood a third time.
If Wood realistically should only pitch five innings per game, that puts more emphasis on the bullpen. It’s not an insurmountable problem to have if he’s in the back-end of San Francisco’s rotation, but it’s a weak point in the rotation nonetheless.
Anthony DeSclafani – D
DeSclafani’s ankle injury that reappeared in spring training never subsided, and his 2022 season was quickly lost. When he did pitch, he was ineffective. When he didn’t, the Giants’ rotation and pen were taxed for it.
The Giants need DeSclafani to return and be able to consistently pitch deep into games, like he did in 2021. He’s under contract through 2024, so he and the Giants have no choice but to get right.
Jakob Junis – B
For a brief moment in the first half of the season, Junis was San Francisco’s most valuable starter. He leaned into his slider more than ever, and the commitment to the pitch led to immediate success.
A hamstring injury disrupted his rhythm and likely threw some of his mechanics off down the stretch, but Junis still put together a solid year. He rarely walks batters — 89th percentile in BB rate — and his slider graded out with -8 run value, per Baseball Savant.
Junis came out of nowhere to be a keeper for SF. If not for him, how would the Giants have replaced DeSclafani’s lost innings? Whether as a fifth starter or in more of a hybrid role, Junis has earned a chance.
Bullpen
Camilo Doval – A
If you were building a closer from scratch, Road To The Show style, perhaps you’d give him a cutter that can touch 105 mph, a 98-mph sinker and a low-90s slider. You’d drag the game sliders so that he keeps an easy heartbeat no matter how tense a situation becomes. You’d push his endurance to be able to pitch effectively in back-to-back nights and in four-out save situations.
The development of Doval’s two-seamer halfway through this season allowed him to make a leap in Year 2. It helps him get left-handed sluggers out and complements his other two already effective offerings.
Only four more relievers have more saves than Doval’s 14 since the All-Star break. In that stretch, no reliever has a better ground ball to fly ball ratio and he has a 1.75 ERA.
The Giants found a special closer. Can they build a bullpen around him?
John Brebbia – A-
John Brebbia, the hardest working man in show biz.
In his first full year after Tommy John surgery, Brebbia was the most leaned upon pitcher in baseball. Just about every other game, Gabe Kapler motioned to the bullpen for his 6-foot-1 lumberjack with an elastic arm.
For most of the season, Brebbia paced MLB in games; he still leads the NL. In eight starts as an opener, Brebbia has a 0.00 ERA. He was flexible, dependable and indispensable.
Dominic Leone – D+
Leone lost the feel on his slider, lost his confidence, and lost his job.
Even though he still has swing-and-miss stuff, Leone didn’t stay in the zone enough and got punished for falling behind in counts. Batters slugged .630 on his fastball and overall some of his batted-ball luck flipped on him compared to 2021.
Leone is an example of how delicate relievers’ performance can be year-to-year. The Giants’ bullpen was terrific in 2021, and bringing the band back together made sense. But that’s often a futile undertaking, and slippage like Leone’s is why.
Jake McGee – F
By late May, the Giants already lost faith in McGee. They couldn’t find advantageous situations in games to insert him. He wasn’t missing bats like he did last year, and the contact that followed was loud.
McGee earned a team-high 31 saves with a 2.76 ERA in 2021. Then he fell off. Now released by his third team in the year, the 36-year-old will have to fight to keep his career alive.
Tyler Rogers – C+
The Giants never wavered in their belief in Rogers, even when the results just weren’t there. His September of 11.1 scoreless innings justifies that stance. He still generates the weakest contact in the bigs and there’s incalculable value in the different look he brings to a game.
Still, the wake rate doubled, adding more opportunity for randomness with traffic on the basepaths. Rogers is best suited to enter clean innings, and things went haywire with men on too often this year.
Jarlin García – B-
Pitcher A: 17 games, 0.00 ERA, 12 strikeouts, 7 walks, opposing batting average of .107
Pitcher B: 18 games, 5.89 ERA, 13 strikeouts, 6 walks, opposing batting average of .342
Pitcher C: 21 games, 2.89 ERA, 29 strikeouts, 4 walks, opposing batting average of .204
All three of those pitchers are Jarlin García, except it’s Jarlin García’s season split into thirds. It’s one of the most remarkably up-and-down seasons imaginable.
He was untouchable to start the year, utterly disastrous in June and July, and right in the middle to finish the year. If the Giants can reasonably expect him to be closest to Pitcher C going forward, he should be in their plans.
Zack Littell – C-
Littell showed flashes, like his six straight scoreless innings after returning from the IL, but injuries and inconsistency made him unreliable. He falls into the “punched above his weight in 2021” category, a club that’s flooded with disappointed relievers.
Sam Long – B
In a tough, ever-evolving role, Long posted a 3.61 ERA. His curveball is coming along nicely and his fastball ticked up 2 mph from last year. 2022 was a step forward for Long, although an injury removed him from what could’ve been a big developmental month of September.
Plus, the fastest worker in the bigs won’t have to worry about the pitch clock next year.
Yunior Marte – D
In the same span of games that shows Camilo Doval as one of the game’s best relievers, it reveals Yunior Marte as one of its worst. Marte owns a 7.11 ERA since the All-Star break, third-highest among qualified relievers.
Both his four-seamer and sinker sit around 97 mph and should pair well with his slider. But the 27-year-old has work to do on command to ever turn those tools into outs.
Alex Young – C
He still walks too many batters, but Alex Young joined the Giants at the start of August and has quietly registered a 2.53 ERA in 21 games.
Young wasn’t historically a lefty specialist, and he’s actually had pretty significant reverse splits for the Giants. Righties are hitting .234 with a .608 OPS against him. Maybe Young brings a subtly different look than a typical lefty would out of the pen.
Notable Incompletes (tiered)
Coming On Strong — Scott Alexander
Could This Be a Guy? — Cole Waites, Shelby Miller, Jharel Cotton
Fun While It Lasts — Thomas Szapucki
Work In Progress — Sean Hjelle, Luis Ortiz, Gregory Santos, Mauricio Llovera
Tyler Beede — Tyler Beede
Wow, Everything Really Did Go Right in 2021 — Kervin Castro
