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Happy Monday, San Francisco Giants fans.
In case you missed it, Sunday was a glorious day. The Giants broke a frustrating two-game losing streak with a 13-3 win over the Chicago Cubs that featured a pair of home runs from both Joc Pederson and Thairo Estrada, a pair of doubles from Casey Schmitt, and some delightful pitching performances.
But the image we’ll always remember: the long-awaited pitching debut of Brandon Crawford.
Crawford notoriously starts his Spring Trainings by throwing off the mound, quick to remind everyone of how good of an amateur pitcher he was, and even quicker to state his case to pitch in an MLB game. It wasn’t quite Brandon Belt reminding everyone at every turn that he was so high on the Texas prep pitcher prospect lists that he was ranked above Clayton Kershaw, but it was close.
The day finally occurred for Crawford on Sunday. After having spent his entire 13-year career at shortstop, Crawford played a new position for the first time. And it went beautifully. After throwing six straight balls and allowing a bloop single to put two on with no outs, Crawford settled in and retired the next three batters. He hit 90 with his fastball. He mixed in a curveball. He got a swing and miss.
It was awesome.
Crawford was clearly giddy, though after the game he admitted that it was bittersweet. A celebratory mound appearance meant that he’s no longer on the list of MLB players to exclusively play shortstop — a list that he was fourth all-time on, behind only Derek Jeter, Luis Aparicio, and Ozzie Smith.
After years of waiting, Crawford said he was "a little bit torn" when Kapler finally told him he could pitch. He's very proud of only being a shortstop in the big leagues, but added, "I doubt many guys have played only shortstop for 1,600 games and pitched one game."
— Alex Pavlovic (@PavlovicNBCS) June 12, 2023
Also:
EXCLUSIVE TO ME FOR https://t.co/EpYnQRYIsP: I texted Belt and asked for his reaction to Crawford's scoreless inning, and getting the first shot among the two to pitch in a big-league game. "Yeah, that's great," Belt said. "But I would have pitched an immaculate inning."
— Henry Schulman BLUE CHECK MARK (@hankschulman) June 12, 2023
With the scoreless outing, Crawford is now in a 26-player tie for the best ERA in Giants history, and an 11-player tie for the best ERA in San Francisco history. He shares that list with a franchise legend (Pablo Sandoval), a current teammate (Austin Slater), a few people you forgot were Giants (Chase d’Arnaud, Tyler Heineman, and Heath Hembree), one of the members of the Alou family (Matty), one of the most famous streets in America (Mul Holland), and a few names that sound like what chatGPT would come up with if you asked for old timey baseball names (Whitey Miller, Firpo Marberry, and Youngy Johnson).
What a guy.
RHP DJ BC RAW 4EVER.
What time do the Giants play today?
The Giants kick off a road series against the St. Louis Cardinals tonight at 4:45 p.m. PT.
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