There's really gonna be baseball?

It’s great to finally get down to baseball. After a weekend of gloom and doom on the injury front, the Giants open their Catcus League action today against the Los Angeles /Anaheim/El  Segundo/Champ Kind Rally Moneys. Whammy! (Game available on KNBR and MLB.TV at noon with MLB Network picking up coverage an hour later .. slackers!).

Opening Day (of Spring) Starter, Jeff Samardzija

At least it’ll sorta be the Giants. Jeff Samardzija will get the start and Buster Posey will catch one of Bruce Bochy’s new toys, but a huge chunk of the anticipated Opening Day line-up will be playing golf or dining at the Pho King Kitchen by the time it’s over. (BTW, Pho King Kitchen is a real place, insert joke at your own peril. Thanks to reader Ritch Murrell down in Scottsdale for that one). Only Joe Panik and Brandon Belt are scheduled.

So it’s largely a minor league game for the position players. That’s partly by design as Bochy hopes to avoid injuries to the key cogs. Of course, the other part of that equation is the injuries that have already struck said cogs.

 

Here's mud in your eye.

At least it’s not all gloom and doom. An MRI on Hunter Pence’s achy Achilles revealed inflammation and not structural damage, according to a tweet by Andrew Baggarly of the San Jose Mercury News. Pence reportedly is out for a week and supposedly on track for Opening Day, so it could have been worse.

Giant fans breathed a collective sigh of relief, but started thinking about depth. Gregor Blanco is seemingly a lock for the fourth outfielder and first guy off the bench spot. He’s been relatively healthy during his Giants tenure, but so had Pence. We’ve beaten up Angel Pagan’s recent woes, but newly-acquired Denard Span isn’t exactly a peach.

Span is set to open the season as the everyday center fielder and lead-off hitter. If he can stay healthy, Span should provide plenty of hits, steals and runs. Ah, but you caught the “if”, didn’t you? He made three trips to the DL last season and was limited to just 61 games. His numbers were great (five homers and 11 steals with a .301/.365/.431 line) when he was on the field, it just wasn’t often enough to help a Washington team that so dramatically underachieved that Manager Matt Williams was a dead man walking by August. CSN Bay Area reports he's still not 100 percent and the Giants are handling him with kid gloves. Yikes.

So the Giants have an entire starting outfield that, potentially, has one foot in the emergency room and another on a banana peel. Pence’s injury, however minor, is a bad omen to start the season.

Other tidbits …..

New organizational prospect lists are out and Giants have a new Number One: shortstop Christian Arroyo. Unfortunately for him, the position is filled for the forseeable future with Brandon Crawford locked up with off-season extension. Arroyo knows moving day is coming, either to another position or to another team if the Giants decide to deal from strength. The afore-mentioned Baggarly writes second, third and the outfield are possible options.

Giants' new No. 1 prospect flashes leather

With Panik and Matt Duffy entrenched and Arroyo considered an average defender, the outfield may be in his future. It does seem, however, a big of a waste to take a player with a bat like Arroyo’s stick and essentially turn him into the next Joaquin Arias. If he performs but the Giants don’t have that infield need, they might be better off looking for a trading partner.

The Giants have reportedly been in contact with veteran outfielder Ryan Raburn but a marriage seems unlikely. The team reportedly wouldn’t mind having him as insurance on a minor league deal, but he wants a contract in The Show. Raburn was highly regarded when Detroit drafted him in 2001 but he never really panned out. He hasn’t played 90 games since 2011 and his career .256 average over 10 ML seasons belies his hitting .200 or below twice in the past four years. Considering he’ll be 35 next month, he seems to have overvalued himself. Good luck finding work, pal.

Unless there’s another injury. Oy vey.

Now finally, some baseball to watch.