Should the San Francisco Giants be Worried About the Starting Pitching?

The San Francisco Giants have probably been one of the most active organizations so far in this sluggish offseason, and their additions have come primarily in the form of offense.

There’s no question in my mind that Andrew McCutchen, Evan Longoria, and Austin Jackson are going to be significant upgrades at there respective positions for the 2018 team.

On the other hand, doing so made the team lose one starting pitcher (Matt Moore) and put them within about $2 million of the luxury tax threshold.

Not that Matt Moore was really any good in his time as a Giant, it’s just that it’s tough to be a playoff team when 2/5 of the rotation aren’t settled and no significant additions are on the way.

So, as the roster currently stands, the options for those two spots would be RHP Chris Stratton, LHP Ty Blach, RHP Tyler Beede, and perhaps RHP Albert Suarez.

We have become familiar with Stratton and Blach over the past two seasons, and they’re both fine generally, but I probably wouldn’t be excited if either were to take the mound during a playoff race.

Meanwhile, Beede and Suarez were teammates last season in Triple-A Sacramento, pitching in the offense-driven PCL. Beede pitched more innings there, but also struggled more than Suarez did.

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The Giants may also just choose to stash both in the minors for a few weeks to reduce their MLB service time to get an extra year of control and push back the arbitration clock.

Personally, I think the ideal scenario would be for either Beede or Suarez to dominate spring training and force his way into the rotation along with Stratton, who continues his strong performance from last season in San Francisco.

Ty Blach would then become the second lefty/long reliever in the bullpen, the same role he was in at the end of last season.

Between the two rookies, the one that doesn’t make the roster will likely be headed back to Sacramento for more seasoning and as much-needed depth.

The team would also be remiss if they didn’t at least examine the free agents and invite a few to camp on a low-risk contract, like they did with Chris Heston (Chris Tillman, anyone?).

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If they can “hit” on any of those free agents, the roster would have even more flexibility and options, which is all a fan could really ask for at this point.