San Francisco Giants: Thoughts and Notes for Thursday’s Off-Day

The San Francisco Giants have an off-day today, leaving plenty of time to sit and think about the team. Here’s some off-day thoughts and notes before they get back to action on Friday.

• Brandon Belt might be the hottest hitter in baseball right now. He’s currently riding an eight-game hitting streak, three short of tying his career-high, and he’s really dialed in during that time. In those eight games, Belt has hit .379/.455/1.000 with five home runs, as well as a double and a triple. At the start of the streak, he was hitting .250/.367/.375 on the season. Now, he owns a .304/.402/.638 slash-line, with a slugging percentage that ranks eighth-best in baseball.
• Pablo Sandoval‘s double in the sixth inning against Max Scherzer on Wednesday was an incredibly impressive piece of hitting. Scherzer threw his hard, nasty cutter way inside on Sandoval. The 89-mph pitch started inside on the plate, and just kept breaking in toward Sandoval. By the time it reached Sandoval, it was maybe eight or 10 inches from his thigh. Sandoval was still able to get around on the pitch, drilling it into right field for a run-scoring double. These are the moments that remind you of just how good Sandoval can be handling the bat.
• The Giants’ bullpen has never really been home to flamethrowers, but Reyes Moronta is trying to change that. All Giants’ pitchers have combined to throw 21 pitches at 97 mph or better. Moronta has thrown 20 of them, topping out at 98 (Josh Osich is the only other Giant to reach 97). Moronta’s 96.2 average fastball velocity is over a full mph faster than the next-hardest thrower in San Francisco (Hunter Strickland sits at 95).
• In the 2016 and 2017 seasons, Joe Panik was the hardest player in baseball to strike out, with his 9.2 percent K-rate (101 strikeouts in 1,099 plate appearances). He’s continued that trend this season. Entering play on Thursday, no player in the big leagues has struck out less often than Panik and his 6.3 percent K-rate. He’s only struck out six times in 96 plate appearances, and just once in his last 12 games (52 plate appearances). Even as his team’s strikeout rate has jumped from 19.6 percent in 2017 to 25.2 percent in 2018, Panik is still doing his thing.
• Mac Williamson seems to have jumpstarted his big league career with three massive home runs in five games, but one of the most impressive parts of his new game has been the strikeouts. He’s not on Panik’s level, but has still struck out just three times in 19 plate appearances for a 15.8 percent strikeout rate since being recalled, a far cry from his 29.1 percent K-rate in his first three big league seasons.

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• Including AAA, Williamson has struck out eight times in 69 plate appearances (11.6 percent), also a far cry his combined 276 strikeouts in 1,069 PA (25.8 percent) between AAA and MLB from 2015 to 2017. Since being recalled, he’s actually swinging at pitches outside the strikezone more often (seven percent more than 2017), but making contact on those pitches far more often (19 percent more). His swinging strikes are way down, from 16.5 percent last year to 12.1 percent now.
• Down on the farm, center field prospect Steven Duggar has heated up in AAA with the River Cats. Overall, he’s hitting .281/.370/.359 on the season, but in his last nine games, he’s up to .333/.442/.444 with four of his five doubles and 10 runs scored. He hasn’t showed the power he produced in Cactus League, but that’s fine. That’s not his game. His game is getting on base with hits and walks, showing his speed, and crossing the plate, all of which he is doing. Hopefully he can keep this up, and get the call soon.

• While Duggar started slow and got hot, one guy who started hot and stayed that way in AAA is Alen Hanson. The utility player who was a non-roster invitee this Spring Training has a mighty impressive .429/.492/.661 slash-line in 16 games with Sacramento, including five doubles, a triple, and two home runs. His calling card has always been his speed, and that shows with his 14 runs scored and six stolen bases, both totals that lead the team. He’s had multiple hits eight times in those 16 games, including a four-hit day on April 19th that featured two doubles and a triple.

Next: 3 Up, 3 Down: Another Series W

• Sticking with AAA, lefty reliever Will Smith is getting extremely close to returning to the big leagues, and right on the targeted date. On Wednesday night, he made his fourth rehab appearance with Sacramento (sixth overall) and gave up a double in 0.2 innings of work. That was the first baserunner Smith has allowed with Sacramento, and he has struck out six batters in 3.2 innings. The reliever is scheduled to go again on Thursday as part of his first back-to-back since surgery, and then hit the mound one last time on Sunday. After that, he should be activated on Tuesday, hitting the May 1st target date right on the nose.