PHILADELPHIA -- The end of Spring Training brought some bittersweet news for Hayden Birdsong. The 23-year-old right-hander made his first Opening Day roster after putting together a strong camp, but he ended up being the odd man out in the Giants’ fifth-starter competition, which relegated him to the bullpen to start the year. Birdsong hadn’t pitched in relief since he played college ball at Eastern Illinois, but he’s taken the new role in stride, logging a 1.80 ERA with nine strikeouts over 10 innings in five appearances this year. He didn’t allow a run over his first four relief outings, though he stumbled a bit on Tuesday, when he surrendered a two-run home run to Bryce Harper while pitching on one day of rest in the seventh inning of a 6-4 loss to the Phillies. Despite the hiccup, the Giants believe Birdsong has the potential to emerge as a leverage arm who can handle multiple innings and help shorten the bridge to closer Ryan Walker. He certainly looked the part on Sunday, when he needed only 20 pitches to get through two shutout innings against the Yankees, helping the Giants pull out a 5-4 win that sealed the club’s first series victory at Yankee Stadium since Interleague play began in 2002. “I do what I have to do to get in a game, obviously,” Birdsong said last week. “I haven’t done it since college, so it’s a little weird. But it’s just pitching. It’s the same thing. It doesn’t matter what inning it is. It’s the same game. In the back of my head, it’s the same everything. “I think it helps to get ahead in the count, no matter if I’m starting or if I’m relieving. That’s what I worked on this offseason, so it’s worked out for me. Hopefully I can just keep doing it.” |
|
|
The Giants would like to find a way to keep Birdsong stretched out in case they need someone to step into the rotation down the line, though he’s mostly been limited to working in two- or three-inning bursts through the first few weeks of the regular season. The shorter stints haven’t kept Birdsong from using his entire arsenal, though, as he's continued to mix in his four-seam fastball (48.5%), slider (22.1%), changeup (21.3%) and curveball (8.1%). “You see some of the swings and some of the looks from some of the hitters walking back to the dugout,” manager Bob Melvin said Monday. “He’s pitching with a lot of confidence. It’s just another huge weapon for us. On days when maybe we are a little beat up down there [in the bullpen], he’s a guy that can run the table if we need him to. We’ve thrown a lot at him, and he’s done really well.” |
While the Giants don’t have any vacancies in their rotation right now, they fully expect Birdsong to get a chance to start for them in the future. Until that opportunity presents itself, Birdsong is determined to show that the can keep thriving out of the bullpen. “He’s been great,” right-hander Logan Webb said. “He got put in a tough position. He is a starter. He’s going to be a starter for a long time. He’s going to be a very good one, too. You get told you have a great spring, you get told you’re going to be put in the bullpen -- some guys would probably be upset about that. He just kind of put his head down and said, ‘OK, I’m going to dominate this role.’ “I think he’s done a fantastic job. Obviously, the stuff is there, but I think the mentality and the personality is coming out that everyone wanted to see.” |
|
|
MLB MORNING LINEUP PODCAST |
|
|
• Right-hander Landen Roupp leaned heavily on his trusty curveball to collect his first win of the season in Monday night’s 10-4 rout of the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park. He threw his breaking ball 56 times and used it to induce 15 swinging strikes, which is the most any Giants pitcher has had on a curveball in a single game in the pitch-tracking era (since 2008).
“The game plan before was definitely curveball-heavy, offspeed-heavy,” said Roupp, who gave up four runs on six hits over five innings in the 101-pitch effort. “I don’t know that we planned to throw that many, but as you go in the game and you see the reaction and the swings of hitters, you kind of flip the script on that. That’s what we did.” |
• Right fielder Mike Yastrzemski has gotten used to sitting against lefties, but the Giants aren’t necessarily committed to keeping him in a strict platoon, especially now that he’s swinging a hot bat to start the season. The 34-year-old veteran got a chance to stay in and face Phillies southpaw Tanner Banks in the seventh inning on Monday and ended up blasting a two-run shot to right field, which was his first home run off a lefty since his walk-off blast against the Padres’ Ray Kerr on June 19, 2023. Yastrzemski didn’t start against Jesús Luzardo on Tuesday night, but Melvin said he’s likely to face another left-hander -- Cristopher Sánchez -- in Thursday’s series finale at Citizens Bank Park. “I think his approach this year would suggest he’s going to have a better time with lefties because he’s not trying to pull everything,” Melvin said. “I think he’s trying to see it a little bit longer and hit it the other way and stay on top of it.” • Camilo Doval is an avid horseman, so much so that he threw a birthday party for one of his beloved equines at his home in the Dominican Republic last week. |
|
|
FORWARDED FROM A FRIEND? SUBSCRIBE NOW |
|
|
To subscribe to Giants Beat, visit this page and mark "Giants Beat" from our newsletter list. Make sure you're following the Giants or that they're checked as your favorite team. |
|
|
|
