Giants baseball!
Friends, Romans, Giants fans … lend me your eyes. Because it’s time to watch San Francisco Giants baseball.
For the first time in 133 days, the Giants are playing a baseball game today. Sure, it’s only Spring Training and it means nothing. And yeah, a lot of the players in the game won’t be on the Opening Day roster, or perhaps even in the Majors this year, or perhaps even ever. And OK, any takeaways we have from the game are probably hilariously immature.
But who cares. It’s Giants baseball, with a lot of dudes you love watching.
#SFGiants tentative starting lineup for their Cactus League opener tomorrow:
Wade 1B
Estrada 2B
Pederson DH
Slater CF
Crawford SS
Ramos RF
Schmitt 3B
Sabol CLF still TBD.
— Evan Webeck (@EvanWebeck) February 24, 2023
But the Giants playing today isn’t the only good news. There’s also good news at the intersection of two of my absolute favorite things: baseball, and beer.
Yes, on Friday Giants CEO Larry Baer revealed that $9 beers are coming to Oracle Park this year.
Larry Baer confirms lower beer prices at Oracle Park at some stands, $9 down from $14, says it’s a reward for fans after pandemic season, lockout, less than successful season last year. Small increases with food/other items, about 2-3%.
— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) February 24, 2023
Baer can say what he wants, but the reality is that lowering beer prices is almost surely a business move. The Giants figure that either more people will buy beer if it’s affordable, or more people will come to the park if it doesn’t cost them their life savings to have food and a drink. But I don’t care about the reason. I care about $9 ballpark beer, which makes me happy.
Finally, some news: the Giants have reunited with Connor Cannon. Cannon, a burly 6’5” 24-year old, was a 17th-round pick in 2019, the Giants first draft with Farhan Zaidi at the helm. He was traded in 2021 as the player to be named later in the Mike Tauchman acquisition.
After not playing in 2020 (pandemic) or 2021 (injury), Cannon struggled in 2022, hitting just .154/.289/.256 with a terrifying 43.7% strikeout rate with the New York Yankees Low-A affiliate. He was released, and the Giants pounced on the opportunity for a reunion.
But here’s the kicker: Cannon is apparently converting to the mound.
Cannon will convert to pitcher apparently. He pitched a little bit at UC Riverside, reportedly had a good FB. https://t.co/95fN5qhswM
— GPT (@giantsprospects) February 24, 2023
It’s unclear if the Giants will develop him exclusively as a pitcher, or if he’ll be a two-way player in the mold of teammates Ronald Guzmán, Reggie Crawford, and, starting next year, Shohei Ohtani.
Cannon does have silly power … Fangraphs gives him an 80/80 raw power grade, and in his first year he hit 13 home runs in just 148 plate appearances for the Giants rookie ball team. I’m very curious to see where the Giants place him to start the year, and how they use him.
Enjoy the baseball, Giants fans!