The Giants will select the contract of right-hander Daulton Jefferies prior to Sunday’s game against the Padres, manager Bob Melvin announced the team’s beat in tonight’s postgame session (X link via Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle). He’ll get the start. Since Jefferies isn’t on the 40-man roster and the Giants don’t have a vacancy, they’ll need to clear space.
It’ll be an emotional day for Jefferies, whose last MLB appearance came nearly two years ago as a member of the A’s — the only team for which he’s ever pitched. The 28-year-old righty has undergone both thoracic outlet surgery and Tommy John surgery (in that order) since walking off the mound that day. The two procedures were performed only months apart; Jefferies suffered a torn UCL while working back from that TOS operation. Considering that was the second Tommy John procedure of Jefferies’ career, his return to a big league mound is all the more remarkable.
The A’s selected Jefferies with the No. 37 overall pick back in 2016. He was long considered one of the system’s more promising arms, even after that first Tommy John procedure slowed his development. Between those two UCL surgeries, the TOS and the canceled 2020 minor league season, Jefferies has pitched only 231 2/3 professional innings — just 11 more than he pitched in his three-year college career at Cal.
Jefferies may not have a large volume of innings, but at least in the minors, the work he’s turned in has been strong. He sports a solid 3.93 ERA in his minor league career, with a strong 25.7% strikeout rate and a superlative 3.1% walk rate. He’s been roughed up for a 5.75 ERA in 56 1/3 big league innings, with far fewer missed bats in the majors but still very strong command (5.8% walk rate) and an above-average 45.5% ground-ball rate. Jefferies was excellent for the Giants this spring, pitching 14 innings and allowing just four runs (2.57 ERA) on 14 hits and three walks with 16 strikeouts.
Tomorrow’s appearance could go down as a spot start when all is said and done. The Giants currently have Logan Webb, Jordan Hicks, Kyle Harrison and Keaton Winn in the rotation. Reigning Cy Young winner Blake Snell, who signed late in spring training, tossed 74 pitches against Double-A hitters in an extended spring training game yesterday, tweets Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area. The quality of competition obviously wasn’t MLB-caliber, but Snell still punched out 11 batters in a four-inning appearance. The Giants are still determining his next step. It’s possible Snell will get a minor league start to finish off his tune-up, but it doesn’t sound like he’s too far from game readiness.
Tremendous writeup on a smallish story S.A
Why not Winn? Strange move. Joey Bart traded? Teng back down?
Winn is starting Monday’s game.
Maybe they are shortening the rotation before slotting in Snell? Just a thought.
I think Wisely is gone if they can’t trade Bart.
Should trade Donovan Walton, get him off the 40
Teng probably comes in right behind Jefferies. Doubt he’s built up to more than 3-4 innings at this point.
I believe Scott called this and I disagreed. I thought it would be Black. Good call Scott. Is Bart the odd man out?
Bart, ramos, wisely, Lopez look like the possible candidates, not sure about Trevor McDonald
Never did see the Wisely attraction.
Lopez may have pushed him out.
That or Bart to Atlanta.
My official guess.
Jim Callis likes Trevor.
Random: How close is Rayner Arias to joining the Top 100? Also which Giants arm is poised to breakout this year?
Callis: As for a Giants pitching prospect ready to take a big step forward, I’d go with underrated right-hander Hayden Birdsong (San Francisco’s No. 7 prospect), if he didn’t already break out in 2023. Keep your eye on righty Trevor McDonald (No. 14), who signed for second-round cash ($797,500) as an 11th-rounder in 2019 but has been slowed by the pandemic shutdown and repeated hamstring injuries. His fastball and curveball keep improving and are now plus offerings, and his strong finish in High-A Eugene last year has San Francisco thinking he could become a No. 3 starter.
They’ll DFA Teng. It’s more likely that he will pass through outright waivers than Bart, etc., and if they lose him, they have other better pitching prospects. They’re not going to let Bart go for free if they can help it.
There is no way teng passes through waivers. Teams are often more willing to add an arm than a position player since it usually requires pushing someone out and an arm you can stash in the pen
Bart has no value. No one will pick up his contract. The Giants have no ML plans for him, so if he is claimed, its no loss. The worst case scenario is not that he gets claimed, its that he doesn’t get claimed.
Atlanta may be interested in Bart after Sean Murphy’s injury.
Hoping he surprises everyone and becomes Vogelsong 2.0.
Bloody hell. The things you learn. Thanks. Quite the difficult journey. It will be an emotional day. Go well, young man.
May have to wait a bit longer. Weather forecast for tomorrow in SD looks like rain all day.
It was poring all day up here in Mira mesa, when I got to the ball park at 3:30 it was still overcast but by the time the 2nd rolled around it was sunny and gorgeous out. Not sure I felt a drop all game. It’s pretty rare for a game at petco to get rained out. Such a beautiful park, especially when Conforto is hitting grand slams.
Good to see him back. Hard luck on the injuries, but I’ve always been a huge fan of his. Best of luck Dalton!
Gregg Jeffries kid brother??
Darren Daulton.
Well if they start Jefferies, at least Melvin is not going to a BS bullpen opener game. Let’s see what Jefferies can do with Teng and Roupp backing him. This certainly beats starting Walker for an inning and draining the pen.
He went 2 innings, giving up 9 runs. Please tell me how this was better?
It wasn’t. Should have gone with Walker and bullpen.
I agree
Jefferies looked great in Spring Training, and definitely fits Zaidi’s mold of injury history-laden invitees. I hope Jefferies can find some stability and success in SF.
Congrats to Jefferies. Third man to overcome two TJ surgeries and one TOS surgery. There’s Shawn Hill and Zach Burdi (who joined the list this week).
Randy Rodríguez?
This guy’s not ready for the majors.
Maybe a BS Kapler bullpen game with Walker starting would have worked better than Jefferies. Oh well.
Faultin Jeffries
BOOOOO!!!!!