SF Giants would be foolish to employ controversial strategy after Robbie Ray outing

Robbie Ray just had his best outing of the year for the SF Giants on Wednesday against the Atlanta Braves. It was technically a relief outing as he came in to start the bottom of the second inning after Tuesday’s game was postponed due to rain but he pitched beautifully, throwing 6 and 1/3 scoreless innings as the Giants won 7-2 and boosted his trade value in the process.

After his outing, there were some who began floating the idea that the Giants should start using an opener for Ray. Many fans despised the controversial opener strategy that reigned supreme during the Farhan Zaidi era.

For those who have forgotten, using an “opener” means using a relief pitcher to start the game and give the team one inning before replacing him with a starting pitcher who can go five or more innings.

The Giants have moved away from that strategy in recent years, opting to go with traditional starters for the most part except for a few cases where they did not have a healthy starter ready to go. 

Those advocating for the Giants to use an opener with Ray don’t understand the special circumstances that allowed him to thrive on Wednesday. The reason he had so much success is because the Braves were stuck with the lineup they went with on Tuesday night in anticipation of Adrian Houser.

Openers would not help the Giants going forward

They had a lot of lefties in the lineup to face the righty Houser who has struggled mightily against lefties this season and they tagged Houser for two runs in the bottom of the first inning. But since the game got postponed, they couldn’t change the order which gave the Giants an advantage by going with Ray.

Ray typically doesn’t face a ton of lefties since opponents will try to stack the lineup with right-handed hitters so Ray was able to take advantage of the matchup afforded him by the rain.

If the Giants were to use an opener going forward with Ray, opponents would adjust and would still use their normal lineup against lefties and just accept that maybe the first inning wouldn’t be a great matchup for their first few hitters.

The Giants have a lot of problems this season but failing to use openers is not one of them. The bigger issue is relying on Tyler Mahle and Adrian Hosier when they should permanently hand things over to Trevor McDonald and Carson Whisenhunt going forward.

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