ARIZONA – The beginning of spring training is always a momentous occasion. By the end of March, however, to quote B.B. King: The thrill is gone. In fact, it’s safe to say fans, players, announcers and everybody in between start the countdown to opening day as soon as the first cactus league game is in the books. After the Giants 6-3 victory over the A’s Saturday in Oakland, that wait was finally over. The orange and black are finally set to head straight back to Arizona to face the Diamondbacks and kick off the regular season Sunday afternoon at Chase Field.
The Giants will face D’backs ace Zack Greinke, who didn’t failed to live up to the incredible $206.5 million price tag that Arizona signed him for prior to last season. A year after putting up an astonishing 1.66 ERA in 2015, Greinke had his worst season since 2010, ending with a 4.37 ERA, his worst hits-per-nine-innings rate in ten seasons (9.1) and a career worst home-runs-per-nine-innings (1.3).
That said, much of Greinke’s struggles may be attributable to nagging injuries all season, and after last June, he looked much more like himself minus two abysmal outings where he allowed nine and eight runs respectively.
Don’t count on Greinke or the Diamondbacks being a floor mat for the rest of the NL West again this year. The team acquired promising young starter Taijuan Walker from the Mariners to round out a rotation that has yet to live up to its potential. Couple that with a full year of All-Star centerfielder A.J. Pollock back in one of the league’s best lineups last season and it’s not hard to see why the snakes will certainly put up a fight in this opening series and could be a sleeper pick to make the playoffs.
For the Giants, however, aspirations once again go beyond just making it to the postseason. Per usual, these expectations are thanks in large part to a potentially stellar starting rotation and exemplary defense. The team’s top four starting pitchers, Madison Bumgarner, Johnny Cueto, Matt Moore and Jeff Samardzija, make up what is arguably the best foursome in the National League, rivaled most closely by the Mets’ Noah Syndergaard, Jacob DeGrom, Matt Harvey and Steven Matz (although staying healthy has been difficult for Mets’ pitchers for the last two seasons and Matz will start the season the 15-day DL). The Giants’ staff, on the other hand, has been one of the most durable in baseball, with three starters – Bumgarner, Cueto and Samardzija – all throwing more than 200 innings each. The Giants were the only major league team last season with at least three pitchers logging more than 200 innings each.
Bumgarner remains the unquestioned ace of the staff, and he will make his 4th straight opening day start tomorrow, joining Tim Lincecum and Juan Marichal as the only San Francisco Giants to have that many opening day assignments. The Giants have never lost a season opener with Bumgarner on the mound and the odds are favorable that that trend will continue considering his career ERA in Arizona currently sits at a lovely 2.80 over 15 starts.
While starting pitching will get most of the headlines once again for the Giants, defense has been their secret weapon over the past few seasons. Of course, it may not be much of secret anymore as Buster Posey, Joe Panik and Brandon Crawford all took home Gold Glove awards in 2016.
Defensive statistics, however you may value them, suggest the Giants were one of the most sound defensive teams in baseball last season. Only the defending champion Cubs ranked higher in defensive runs above average and defensive runs saved in the National League. Anyone who watched the team day-in-and-day-out won’t need any newfangled stats to confirm their fancy glove work. It’s widely agreed that Buster Posey has now taken Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina’s spot as the best defensive catcher in the game and the game’s best defensive shortstop, Brandon Crawford, has a knack for making the toughest plays look routine.
It’s a safe bet that the Giants will be playing meaningful baseball come September but just how far they go will likely be dictated by the play of their bullpen, which was historically abysmal a season ago. Their lack of 9th inning stability has been well documented and their 31 blown saves (32 if you’re counting the 9th inning meltdown in game 4 of the NLDS) still haunts fans.
Despite all of that, the bullpen somehow managed a 3.65 ERA last season, not amazing, just rather surprising considering just how bad things got for the men sitting in Bochy’s bullpen.
The signing of All-Star closer Mark Melancon means Giants fans can breathe a sigh of relief this season. Melancon has been one of baseball’s most reliable closers over the past three seasons, racking up 131 saves during that span while posting a 1.93 ERA. What will please Giants fans the most is his lack of blown saves, only 10 during that stellar stretch.
There were rumblings that the constant pitching changes and shuffling of bullpen roles had pitchers on edge near the end of last season, but that shouldn’t be much of a worry in 2017. With Melancon locked into the 9th inning spot, the bullpen finally has something they were lacking a year ago: stability. Throw in the continuing development of young and talented righties Derek Law and Hunter Strickland and there are plenty of reasons to believe the Giants bullpen will make an improvement this season, even after the devastating injury to lefty-reliever Will Smith.
While many pundits have the Dodgers pegged as the odds-on favorite to win the NL West once again, the Giants have to be considered one of the few teams who have a legitimate shot at winning another World Series title if everything can come together as expected. L.A. may have a roster built for a division title, but the Giants one built for October. The cold months are still a long way away, however, so for now we’ll sit back, relax and thank the Gods that Giants baseball is finally back.
Full coverage of opening day begins tomorrow afternoon at 12:10 with first pitch at 1:10 on KNBR 680.
