San Francisco Giants Shutting Down Former Top Pitching Prospect

The San Francisco Giants are hoping they can find some late-season magic to get into the playoffs.

After deciding to hold onto the majority of their tradeable pieces instead of moving them, the front office still clearly felt this team had the capability of getting hot down the stretch to earn themselves a Wild Card spot.

Their work is cut out for them, though.

Entering Tuesday, the Giants trail the Atlanta Braves by 3.5 games for the final spot in the playoffs as only the New York Mets have a better record among those National League teams who are on the outside looking in.

But as San Francisco gears up for their final 35 contests of the year, they have been dealt a huge blow to their pitching staff.

According to Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic, the Giants are shutting down reliever Randy Rodriguez for two weeks after he was diagnosed with a a flexor strain over the weekend. Following this stretch of not throwing, he will be “re-evaluated” to see how his elbow feels.

San Francisco called up their former Top 30 prospect to the Majors on May 4, and even though he’s ridden the rollercoaster of promotions and demotions, the right-hander has put together a solid rookie season with a 3.93 ERA and 52 strikeouts across his 33 outings and 50.1 innings pitched.

Unfortunately, Rodriguez now faces the possibility that his year is now over.

Getting shut down for two weeks before getting checked to see how his injury has progressed doesn’t inspire much confidence they think he’ll be ready to return.