Who is the 3rd-best prospect on the Giants farm?
When we kicked off the 2025 Willie McCovey Memorial Community Prospect List last week, which will see us rank the top 44 prospects in the San Francisco Giants organization, everyone knew who would be ranked No. 1. But it was a complete mystery as to who would slide into the No. 2 spot.
Now we have an answer. After comfortably winning the vote on the six-player ballot, left-handed pitcher Carson Whisenhunt has been chosen as the No. 2 prospect in the Giants system. It’s a rise of two spots for Whisenhunt after he landed at No. 4 a year ago — and a very normal rise of two spots, as one of the names who was ahead of him stays ahead of him, while the other two graduated.
Whisenhunt didn’t have a spectacular 2024, but he stayed mostly healthy which was great to see. After rising from Low-A to AA the year prior, Whisenhunt was assigned to AAA Sacramento right out of the gates, and stayed there all year (save for a short rehab stint in San Jose). In 25 starts and 104.2 innings with the River Cats, Whisenhunt had a 5.42 ERA and a 4.66 FIP. Those aren’t standout numbers, but they look a lot better when you remember that Whisenhunt had thrown just 66.1 innings in the Minors prior to this year.
The most impressive part of his performance, though, was the strikeouts. The lefty, who just turned 24 and was the team’s second-round pick in 2022, struck out 11.61 batters per nine innings pitched. That figure was ninth-highest among the 92 Pacific Coast League pitchers with at least 50 innings last year.
Whisenhunt will surely hope this is his last time on the CPL, as he’ll have visions of making an MLB debut in 2025, and sticking in the roster. Let’s all hope it happens!
And now let’s move on with our list.
The list so far
Note: Clicking on the above names will link to the CPL where they were voted onto the list.
No. 3 prospect nominees
Rayner Arias — 18.6-year old CF — .735 OPS/98 wRC+ in ACL (105 PA)
Josuar de Jesus González — 17.0-year old SS — yet to debut
Jhonny Level — 17.7-year old SS — .909 OPS/140 wRC+ in DSL (215 PA)
James Tibbs III — 22.1-year old OF — .455 OPS/31 wRC+ in High-A (74 PA); .941 OPS/154 wRC+ in Low-A (42 PA)
Joe Whitman — 23.1-year old LHP — 4.96 ERA/3.56 FIP in High-A (52.2 IP); 4.29 ERA/4.05 FIP in Low-A (50.1 IP)
Note: Each player’s first name links to their Baseball-Reference page, and their last name links to their Fangraphs page.