Can you smell that? That’s right, it’s the smell of baseball season. The San Francisco Giants start their Cactus League schedule on Tuesday, and they have announced who will start each of their first four Spring Training games.
On Tuesday, the Giants take on their Bay Area rival, the Oakland Athletics in what symbolizes the beginning of the final stretch to Opening Day. The game will be started by Madison Bumgarner for San Francisco. Bumgarner starting game one? Surprising. The two teams square off again the following day, and the Giants expect to trot out Jake Peavy.
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Thursday is the Giants’ third game, as they play hosts to the new-look Chicago Cubs. Ryan Vogelsong is slated to start. Friday, the Giants are the visitors against the Texas Rangers, where Yusmeiro Petit will start things off.
Despite being placed in the rotation during the offseason, Tim Lincecum is not among the starting pitchers for those first four contests. Instead, the right-hander will be the “piggy-back” pitcher for one of those game, acting as a bridge reliever to take some innings after the initial pitcher has worked his allotted amount of time.
The Giants are also playing it slow with Matt Cain, who is coming off two separate surgeries, one on his elbow, and one on his ankle, this past year. The team is reluctant to throw him to the Sharks (no, not Gregor Blanco) too soon, and instead, plan to pitch him around March 10th, about a week into the Cactus League schedule.
He’s come back throwing really from the position he was when he came up.
-Bochy on Cain
On Sunday, Cain did throw live batting practice, facing hitters for the first time since July 9th of last year, 234 days between live action. Manager Bruce Bochy, after seeing Cain throw, described him as “free and easy,” adding that “he’s come back throwing really from the position he was when he came up.” That is music to Giants’ fans’ ears.
San Francisco is also not rushing Tim Hudson back from his own offseason ankle surgery. He is expected to take the mound shortly after Cain pitches for the first time.
There has yet to be any word on when the Giants’ prospects, including Kyle Crick, Clayton Blackburn, and Ty Blach, will pitch, or what their roles will be. It seems likely that they will take turns between starting and piggy-backing.
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Sergio Romo also threw a bullpen session on Sunday, after being hampered by a sore shoulder through the early goings of the Spring. Bochy had rave reviews for his set-up specialist. The manager said Romo was “letting it go…he wasn’t hesitating at all.”
The reports make it seem like Romo could be good to go in one of the four games, but it wouldn’t be surprising if the team took an approach similar to Cain and Hudson, allowing Romo time to rest up even further before testing his balky shoulder against live hitters.
The Giants were scheduled to play their annual intrasquad scrimmage game on Monday, but the game was cancelled as the area is expected to get pounded with rain all day on Monday. Look on the bright side, at least it’s not a few feet of snow like the northwest has been dealing with for the last couple of weeks.
Baseball is inching closer, and with the announcement of the starters for the first four games, that thought is becoming more and more of a reality.