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San Francisco Giants: Pre-Spring Training Roster Prediction

By Daniel Sperry
Sep 10, 2016; Phoenix, AZ, USA; San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy (15) looks on prior to the game against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
Sep 10, 2016; Phoenix, AZ, USA; San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy (15) looks on prior to the game against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports /
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Aug 18, 2016; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants shortstop Eduardo Nunez (10) celebrates with right fielder Hunter Pence (8) after scoring against the New York Mets in the fifth inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: John Hefti-USA TODAY Sports /

Infielders:

So right now, we have 14 spots of the 25 man roster taken up. I’ve given my predicition on the bullpen and catchers, making 9 spots total. Adding in the five starters, we come to 14, with 11 spots remaining. They will most likely be divided up between the infield and outfield with either seven infielders and four outfielders, or six infielders and five outfielders.

I frankly am not sure where they are going to go with this. One could assume 6/5 would be the best bet, but the personnel to do that doesn’t exactly match-up. You’ll see why when I run this down. My projected infielder group on the roster?

What are your first thoughts on this? Probably, “Well Duh.” But that’s a solid four that I can give you. There is no way that four changes, unless there are injuries or Jae-Gyun Hwang turns out to be Josh Donaldson-esque. That scenario is probably a 500-1 shot, so Nuñez at third it is.

The biggest question is how do the backup infield spots shake out? That depends on a range of factors. The first, is who get’s picked as the backup infielders. Kelby Tomlinson is one of the only infielders in the camp that can effectively play both positions in the middle infield. Nuñez can also play short a bit, but that leaves the question of who plays third when/if he plays short?

One factor that would make this all easy, is Christian Arroyo playing so well the Giants have to put him on the opening day roster. Arroyo can play short, second, and third. If he can make the big league roster, it’s an easy choice to only roll with six infielders. That’s mainly because of the outfield situation. They will really need to have five outfielders, that I will explain in the outfielders section.

If he doesn’t, they just might have to go with seven infielders, and hope Belt or Nuñez can serve as a fifth outfielder on occasion. There is also the ability to go with Tomlinson and Gillaspie as the two backups in the case of six infielders, and have each infield spot covered admirably. Buster is the backup first baseman, so that’s not even an issue here.

So here is my infield bench setup for both scenarios, six or seven infielders.

For Six:

  • Gillaspie
  • Rollins

For seven infielders:

  • Tomlinson
  • Gillaspie
  • Rollins
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