The Giants optioned rookie first baseman Bryce Eldridge, the team informed reporters (including Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle). San Francisco also optioned second baseman Tyler Fitzgerald and outfielder Grant McCray.
Eldridge will open the season in the minors after finishing the ’25 season on the MLB roster. The 21-year-old top prospect made his big league debut in September. He played in 10 games and took 37 plate appearances, batting .107 without a home run. Eldridge took seven walks but struck out 13 times.
A 6’7″ power bat, Eldridge popped 25 homers in the upper minors last year. He combined for a .260/.333/.510 batting line across 433 trips. Eldridge spent the majority of the year as one of the youngest players in Triple-A. There’s immense physical upside, but he’s clearly far from a finished product. Eldridge struck out in more than 29% of his minor league plate appearances.
The whiffs have remained an issue this spring. Eldridge has fanned in 19 of his 50 exhibition plate appearances. He’s second (behind former Giants first-round pick James Tibbs III) in strikeouts among Spring Training hitters. It’s understandable the team feels he’d benefit from more reps against Triple-A pitching.
While Eldridge is surely disappointed not to have made his first Opening Day roster, it’s not exactly a career setback. Most hitters his age aren’t in consideration to break camp. He’ll very likely be back up at some point this season.
The demotion will probably have service time implications. He has 14 days of big league time, meaning he’d need to spend 158 days on the MLB roster to reach one year of service at season’s end. That won’t happen unless he’s called up before the end of April. It’s not a case of service time manipulation, to be clear. If the Giants were primarily concerned with that, they wouldn’t have promoted him last season (earlier than they needed to select him onto the 40-man roster).
The Giants are likely bypassing the chance at getting a Prospect Promotion Incentive draft pick, though it’d technically still be in play if they recall him within the first couple weeks. The PPI pick is conditional on awards voting, though, and Eldridge’s strikeout rates are concerning enough that he’d have an uphill path to winning Rookie of the Year. The primary focus is what the team thinks best for his development.
Rafael Devers will be the primary first baseman. The Giants don’t have a set designated hitter with Eldridge in the minors. There’s now more of a path to carrying both Luis Matos and Jerar Encarnación on the active roster. Both players are out of options and would otherwise need to be traded or exposed to waivers.
Casey Schmitt and a backup catcher (likely Rule 5 draftee Daniel Susac) are going to have bench spots. That’d leave one position player spot available between Will Brennan, Drew Gilbert, Christian Koss or a non-roster invitee. Corner bat Victor Bericoto and speedy outfielder Jared Oliva are among the minor league invites who have impressed this spring.
Great potential
Very young
But not ready for the majors
Very little discipline at the plate
I don’t see the potential. I see a tall, lanky fellow that’ll never be able to hit consistently.
Time will Judge
He crushed it in the minors at a rly young age and at high levels. Arguably the best power of any prospect today.
Buuut he strikes out a ton. And didnt do much in a late sept call up. Probly not gonna hit more than .250. Playing in a pitchers park 81 games doesnt help either. But maybe 30 hr at some point?
Jerar will hold his spot on the roster until he slumps, or Bryce forces the issue.
A 40% strike out rate is a hard no.
Yeah that’s tough. He probably makes it even if that k% would’ve been cut down to 30%.
Bryce and Jackson seems to be a very popular name these days. I’ve seen a lot of Cade’s and Kaden’s too.
Waiting for the day we see a player named Jackson Bryce (last name here)
It’s the right move. No need to rush him (like Luciano and Matos) and spoil his development.
Teams that relentlessly promote guys so they’re “two years younger than their level” and the like, pay the price often. Eldridge has always had a big K problem, and pure TTO hitters like him just don’t produce enough to be an elite MLB first baseman. He’s not close, and Giants fans are delusional if they think he is.
F he was my first pick in fantasy league this year!
Your 1st pick was Richard First and we all know it.
Richard Fitts. Autocorrect fixed that for me three times before I could get it right.
In other rather surprising former Giant news Wilmer Flores signed in Mexico for this season just today. I’m kind of shocked nobody ended up offering him a big league deal but I’m guessing he will try to mash down there and get some better offers mid season.
Tyler Fitzgerald just has not shown back up his soft hitting wont play well — he should go to that Driveline to hit harder
Maybe Eldridge should too they may be able to correct his whiff rates