SF Giants prospects rundown 5/8: Kyle Harrison’s anticipated debut

SF Giants Prospects Rundown 5/8: High-A

Eugene Emeralds 6 at Spokane 10
Performance of the Game: Carter Aldrete (2-4, 2 R, K)

Giants fans should probably familiarize themselves with Conner Nurse. An above-slot 34th round pick in the 2017 draft out of Ridge Community High School (Davenport, Florida), Nurse was quietly solid in his pro debut at the Arizona Rookie League in 2018 (12 G, 3.23 ERA, 53 IP, 48 H, 26 BB, 56 K) and had some flashes at Salem-Keizer in 2019. Even after losing the 2020 season, Nurse is still just 21 and is clearly someone the organization’s player development staff is high on if they were willing to start him at High-A.

Nurse was drafted as a projectile 6’6” righty, and he still has some room to fill out. Historically he’s been a low-90s arm that relied on mixing in his breaking ball alongside solid control to be effective. That seems to still be the case. He struck out just one batter in four innings but walked three and allowed two runs on four hits. Nurse is unlikely ever to have the upside of most of the other well-known arms in the Giants system, but his continued progression at such a young age should make sure no one sleeps on his potential.

Replaced by Taylor Rashi, things very quickly got out of hand. Rashi took 38 pitches to get through the fifth inning, and before he recorded three outs, Spokane had added six more runs and was leading 8-0.

The Emeralds offense would not be held down for long, recording six runs and eight hits by the end of the game, but they never got within six runs. Still, Franklin Labour hammered his first home run of the season. Carter Aldrete, who entered the day 1-10 on the season, scored a pair of runs and two hits. Jacob Gonzalez also had a multi-hit game and scored once.