Weekend BP: Injury updates

Mar 18, 2023 - 12:00 PM

Happy weekend, San Francisco Giants fans. All you have to do is get through this weekend and the next one, and then that’s the end of your baseball-less weekends. Hooray for that!

On Friday, while losing a Spring Training game to the Oakland A’s, the Giants released a whole bunch of injury updates. Most notable is that the team updated the left side of the infield, which has been hurting lately.

According to the Giants, shortstop Brandon Crawford, who is dealing with left knee inflammation, is “feeling good and playing catch.” The team also notes that he’ll start “baseball work” over the weekend, which means that if all goes well, he should still be fine to be back on the field by Opening Day. But even so, it’s a bummer that the knee issue he was hoping is gone is still plaguing him. That kind of stuff usually doesn’t just go away.

Over at third base, David Villar is scheduled to play in Saturday’s game, so that’s good news. The Giants are completely unconcerned by his cold spring, which makes sense, but it would be nice to see him get some more playing time to get his timing and rhythm locked in before March 30.

Austin Slater’s situation is less optimistic, as the team’s update was simply, “is dealing with left calf and hamstring tightness.” One of the favorites to take his spot if he’s not available by Opening Day (or Mitch Haniger’s) is Stephen Piscotty, but the latest updates on him that he “is doing light baseball activity” and will be reevaluated at some point this weekend.

Reliever Cole Waites threw a bullpen and will throw another over the weekend, and looks like he may return next week. He could sneak onto the Opening Day roster despite missing the first month of Spring Training.

Go Giants. Or something.