The Giants have agreed to bring left-hander Joey Lucchesi back on a minor league deal, Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports. The CAA client will head to big league camp and be paid $1.55MM if he makes the roster. He has another $300K available via incentives.
Whether the Lucchesi signing was already in the works when fellow left-hander Reiver Sanmartin suffered an injury or whether this signing comes in response to that injury isn’t clear. However, via Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle, Sanmartin’s recent MRI revealed a severe hip flexor strain that’s expected to sideline him for at least three months. Sanmartin, Erik Miller and Matt Gage were the only left-handed relief options on the Giants’ 40-man roster, and Miller has been slowed by a back injury in camp.
Lucchesi, 32, was effective for the Giants in a middle relief role last season. He appeared in 38 games and tossed 38 1/3 innings of 3.76 ERA ball. His 18.8% strikeout rate was well below average, but Lucchesi’s 7.3% walk rate was strong and his 53% ground-ball rate was excellent. In 433 big league innings between the Padres, Mets and Giants, Lucchesi has a 4.07 ERA with roughly average strikeout, walk and ground-ball rates. He worked primarily as a starter before last year’s bullpen success. The Giants chose to non-tender him in November.
Sanmartin, 29, came to the Giants via waiver claim back in November. He’d spent his entire big league career with the Reds, appearing in parts of four seasons from 2021-25. In that time, Sanmartin pitched to a 5.66 ERA with plenty of grounders (53.6%) but a strikeout rate, walk rate and average fastball that were all worse than league average.
Despite that modest track record, Sanmartin was one of the Giants’ only bullpen additions of the offseason. San Francisco signed relievers Jason Foley, Sam Hentges and Rowan Wick to major league deals knowing none were likely to be healthy for Opening Day. Sanmartin was claimed off waivers, and the Giants signed Michael Fulmer to a minor league deal. Outside of that, their bullpen had gone largely untouched this winter — despite trading Camilo Doval and Tyler Rogers back in July and losing Randy Rodriguez to Tommy John surgery in September.
Assuming the Lucchesi deal is finalized soon, he should have enough time to build up and be a candidate to break camp in a similar single-inning relief role to the one he had last year.
