Former SF Giants veteran reliever joins Padres on minors pact

Longtime reliever and former SF Giants hurler has found a new home for 2022 after agreeing to a minor league deal with the San Diego Padres. Yusmeiro Petit will return to a familiar division in the NL West after spending considerable time with the Arizona Diamondbacks and Giants earlier in his career.

Former SF Giants veteran reliever joins Padres on minors pact

The 14-year veteran signed a minor league deal with the Giants prior to the 2012 season and that proved to be a shrewd addition by the front office. Petit appeared briefly with the Giants in 2012 and carved out a more significant role in the ensuing three seasons with San Francisco.

In parts of four seasons with San Francisco, Petit registered a 3.66 ERA, 3.25 FIP, 1.12 WHIP, 8.8 K/9, and a 4.47 SO/W ratio while seamlessly moving between the rotation and the bullpen. This included a 2014 campaign in which he accumulated 117 innings across 39 appearances, including 12 starts.

The Giants non-tendered Petit after the 2015 season as a means to control costs and that is a move that continues to be questionable to this day. An effective bulk innings reliever is an extremely difficult role to fill and the Giants have not really had a pitcher capably fill Petit's role since then.

Of course, Giants fans remember him for a number of reasons. The first was when he completed 8.2 perfect innings before allowing a hit to Eric Chavez of the Diamondbacks in September of 2013. He was not able to complete the unlikely achievement, but it remains a memorable game.

He flirted with a different type of perfection as he set an MLB record by retiring 46 consecutive hitters over the course of eight games in 2014.

Petit etched his name in Giants history during the 2014 postseason when he completed six scoreless frames to secure the extra-innings victory for the Giants in Game 2 of the NLDS against the Washington Nationals. The Nationals were the favorites in that series and Giants history might look a little different if not for Petit's performance against Washington.

Since his Giants tenure came to an end in 2015, the veteran hurler has made stops with the Nationals (2016), Angels (2017), and the Oakland A's (2018 - 2021). He has excelled at every stop while assuming a considerable workload.

After posting a 3.92 ERA in 78 innings for the A's in 2021, it seemed like Petit was well-positioned for a guaranteed contract. However, that did not come to fruition as the righty remained on the market one month into the regular season.

The Giants might face off against the 36-year-old pitcher a lot down the stretch, but he remains a popular Giants player and an easy person to cheer for.