San Francisco Giants: Early 2016 Roster Chatter
Aug 28, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey (28) left fielder Nori Aoki (23) and first baseman Brandon Belt (9) greet right fielder Marlon Byrd (6) who hit a grand slam home run against the St. Louis Cardinals in the third inning of their MLB baseball game at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Lance Iversen-USA TODAY Sports
For the San Francisco Giants, what was a pitching duel early in the desert against the Arizona Diamondbacks, turned into another missed opportunity for the offense — and a big blow in the form of Joe Panik departing due to injury once again.
A day ago, Brandon Crawford left with ailments that he has been nursing the last couple weeks, which have overshadowed his breakout 2015 season.
With Crawford and Panik — two of the Giants’ best interior defenders and the future of this ball club — it may be time to shut them down to let their nagging injuries heal completely once and for all.
The Giants have an iron will and never quit. They are doing what they can, but even with a surprising Dodgers loss on the same night, they couldn’t take advantage of the opportunity and dropped another game.
Winning the World Series in 2014 and trying to defend it in 2015 sounds wonderful for the franchise and its fans, but now it may be time to start looking at 2016.
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The injuries once again have been a problem, much as they were in 2013, and the pile of bodies has been piling up at an incredible rate. Nori Aoki, Hunter Pence, Matt Cain, Jeremy Affeldt, and Hector Sanchez, all have seen stints on the disabled list this season. Jake Peavy started the year out of Spring Training on the disabled list, with Mike Leake, Tim Lincecum, Tim Hudson, Andrew Susac, Angel Pagan, and Jean Machi (a former member of the Giants) also seeing time on the DL over the course of the year. And Crawford and Panik are on the brink of joining that list. You do the math.
With 22 games left, all the Giants’ can do is just continue to fight, not quit, and keep playing hard with what they have left.
If there is any good news of late, it would be that there is extra time now for the team to get healed and figure out who will be staying and going in the offseason.
With a mighty large 2016 free agent to-be class, there may be some help available to them. The Giants will have some holes to address in left field, center field, and possibly even catcher depending on the health of Susac and Sanchez.
Let’s look at some of the options available to San Francisco in this way too early to be talking about 2016 roster chatter preview.
Next: Left Field