Top San Francisco Giants prospect Edwin Escobar has poor outing in Futures Game

Things just aren’t going well for Edwin Escobar, one of the San Francisco Giants top prospects. The left-handed Escobar threw 1 inning in yesterday’s Futures Game for the World Team as part of the All-Star Break activities. After struggling the first half of the season for the Fresno Grizzlies, he really needed to have a good outing at the Futures Game.

He didn’t.

Escobar pitched the 3rd inning in yesterday’s game, and while he allowed just 1 run to score, it also happened to be the first run of the game. He allowed 3 hits and managed to get out of a bases-loaded jam, but he threw 26 pitches in the inning and didn’t strike one batter out. You could definitely say he struggled out there, much like he’s struggled this season in Fresno. However, looking at the silver lining, he did show he could stick with it and get out of a jam, and he didn’t issue any walks during his one inning.

Rox Pile

Escobar is the #2 prospect in the Giants farm and the front office had hoped he’d be making a big league appearance sometime this season. As the season progresses, that looks less likely that he’ll be contributing too much in San Francisco this year.

After a poor outing in Spring Training this year where he threw for a 5.19 ERA, he was sent to Fresno and has a 3-8 record with a 5.06 ERA, much higher than last year when he held a 2.80 ERA between San Jose and Richmond. However, he does hold a spot on the Giants 40-man roster, so if he can get his numbers down to a respectable level post All-Star Break, we may get a small glimpse of him once rosters expand on September 1st.

Looking at his game logs for the 2014 season, he looks a bit inconsistent in how he performs in his outings, but his ERA pitching to lefties is just 2.43 compared to righties, who are hitting 6.49 off him. He’s given up 15 home runs this season, all to right-handed hitters. If we see him in the fall, I’d expect to see him come in for some mid-inning relief pitching to left-handed batters. However, if he can’t figure out righties soon, his bright future may become dulled just a bit.