SF Giants prospects rundown 5/13: NO-HITTER! NO-HITTER!

Minor league baseball is finally back. After MLB canceled last year’s slate of affiliate games due to the COVID-19 pandemic and began an unprecedented consolidation of minor-league ball, fans finally have official box scores to track and highlights to watch on MILB TV. Make sure to revisit our daily SF Giants prospect rundowns to keep up with each of their minor-league affiliates.

If you do not feel well acclimated to the prospects throughout the farm system, you might want to revisit our prospect week articles that detailed the system from the top prospect to lower-level fringes. If you’re just interested in the biggest names, then the preseason SF Giants top 31 prospects list is the one-stop-shop for you.

SF Giants Prospects Rundown 5/13: Triple-A

Sacramento River Cats 5 at Oklahoma City Dodgers 2
Performance of the Game: Nick Tropeano (5 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 3 BB, 6 K)

In a relatively quiet Triple-A West affair, the Sacramento River Cats pulled out a strong all-around victory against the Dodgers’ Triple-A affiliate. Nick Tropeano received the start and allowed just one run over five innings of work. Tropeano was extremely effective out of the Pirates bullpen in 2020 and given some of the Giants’ own struggles out of the pen, he could end up being pushed there out of necessity. At the same time, with the closest Giants starting pitching prospects all almost entirely at Double-A, Tropeano is probably the best starting depth piece available to the organization while Tyler Beede continues working back from UCL surgery.

From there, the River Cats relied on arguably the strongest bullpen in the minor leagues. Filled with former big leaguers and top prospects, manager Dave Brundage has a bevy of options to choose from late in close games. Yunior Marte, James Sherfy, Trevor Gott, and Dominic Leone each through an inning and combined to strike out eight while allowing just five baserunners. Gott did allow one run to score after surrendering a double following a one-out walk.

Former Giants farmhand Mike Kickham received the start for Oklahoma City and showed the same flashes he had in San Francisco. He allowed just two hits across four innings of work but walked three and hit a batter. After loading the bases with one out in the fourth, an RBI groundout by Justin Bour was followed by a two-RBI single by Mitchell Tolman that gave Sacramento a 3-1 lead.

In the eighth inning, Joe McCarthy gave the bullpen another insurance run, blasting his first home run of the season, before walks once again got the Dodgers in trouble. After McCarthy’s homer, Bour walked, Tolman singled, Drew Robinson walked, and Bryce Johnson walked to bring one more run across.