Veteran outfielder Justin Ruggiano has opted out of his minor league deal with the Giants, tweets Alex Pavlovic of CSN Bay Area. The 35-year-old had been playing with the team’s Triple-A affiliate. San Francisco also bumped reliever Reyes Moronta from Double-A to Triple-A, and Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle tweets that the righty, who is already on the 40-man roster, could get a look later this season.
Ruggiano appeared in 19 games and made 63 plate appearances with the Giants earlier this season, hitting .217/.238/.333 with a couple of home runs. He was outrighted earlier this year and accepted the assignment, but he’s yet to return to the Majors despite a solid .280/.325/.478 slash through 169 plate appearances with Triple-A Sacramento. He’ll now presumably look to latch on elsewhere — likely on another minor league pact.
Ruggiano is a career .256/.318/.434 hitter through 1478 plate appearances across parts of nine Major League seasons. A right-handed bat, Ruggiano is most valuable as a weapon against lefties, as evidenced by his lifetime .273/.336/.515 slash when holding the platoon advantage. He spent most of his time in Triple-A playing center field, but he hasn’t posted positive marks there in the Majors since his 2012 campaign with Miami.
Oh no! I was going to see Sandoval at the River Cats tomorrow! Guess I won’t see him
Ruggiano is the one that opted out.
I know that, I meant I won’t see Ruiggiano
Sandoval is starting at high A I thought.
He’s in Sacramento today, San Jose yesterday
Giants have had so many terrible outfielders this year I completely forgot Ruggiano was one of them.
Yeah. The Giants have an odd affinity for older outfielders past their prime. Pence and Hernandez are examples from this year, but I remember cody Ross, Randy Winn, Pagan, Blanco, Rowand, Torres…loyalty is sometimes detrimental.
Pence, Pagan, blanco, and Ross all helped win World Series
Yes, and then the Giants hung onto them well past their usefulness. I mean, did they really think any of these guys were going to age well?
Yawn