Tuesday BP: Giants unlikely to trade a pitcher

Happy Tuesday, San Francisco Giants fans.

The trade deadline is this afternoon, and it’s starting to look like it might be a quiet one for the Giants. Last week there were a lot of rumors that the Giants might trade one of their pitchers, which made sense. While it’s true that the Giants had every reason to want to upgrade their rotation, they also had a lot of serviceable starting pitchers that other teams might want to try and plug into their rotation.

But the Giants have seemingly closed that door. With righties Keaton Winn and Anthony DeSclafani both landing on the Injured List, the Giants no longer have enough depth to trade away a Alex Wood or Ross Stripling type without potentially leaving themselves exposed. And Farhan Zaidi said as much before Monday’s game against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

It’s certainly worth noting that Zaidi included the recent injury to 2022 second-round pick Carson Whisenhunt in that statement, which suggests the team viewed him as a potential option to make the Majors this year before he suffered what will likely be a season-ending injury.

Zaidi also suggested the Giants are unlikely to add a starter, noting that the market has dried up a little bit and that they’ve had a lot of success piecing things together with what they have.

This is pretty sensible given the current market. The Los Angeles Angels just traded for Lucas Giolito, a rental of a starting pitcher who is having a season not all that much better than DeSclafani, and just commanded a prospect that Fangraphs ranked ahead of Marco Luciano.

It’s increasingly looking like the pitchers they’ve used are the pitchers they’ll continue to use. And with Kyle Harrison beginning a rehab assignment last night, and Stripling, Tristan Beck, and Sean Manaea looking better every outing, that might not be such a bad thing.

What time do the Giants play today?

The Giants and Diamondbacks play the second game of their four-game series tonight at 6:45 p.m. PT.