Giants in no rush to bring top prospect Arroyo to majors
Third baseman of the future likely will spend one more year in minors
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Every year at the July 31 trade deadline, when looking for hints as to what the Giants might do, nothing generates more intrigue than a Brian Sabean spotting.
It could be Kauffman Stadium or Wrigley Field or Great American Ball Park. If the Giants’ executive vice president is in the stands for a personal scouting trip, you know he’s sizing up a potential acquisition.
That’s what made last summer’s deadline so unique. In the days leading up to it, Sabean was nowhere near a major league ballpark. Instead, he hunkered down for a week in Richmond, Virginia, watching the Giants’ Double-A affiliate. He paid special attention to infielder Christian Arroyo, the organization’s top hitting prospect, who had just begun to transition from shortstop to third base.
The Giants didn’t trade Arroyo. They cleared the way for him. They sacrificed popular third baseman Matt Duffy to the Tampa Bay Rays in the deal that brought Matt Moore to a rotation that badly needed a boost.
Arroyo, 21, isn’t a candidate to be on the Giants roster on Opening Day. But as he settles into another big league spring training, it’s easier than ever to see his day on the horizon.
Not that he was happy to see Duffy go.
“I talked to him a lot about the mental side of the game, and I still keep in touch with him,” Arroyo said. “So for me, it was sad to see a guy like him go. It’s a personal thing. It’s a friendship. I texted him and said, ‘Thank you for everything you taught me.’ And, hey, he’s in my neck of the woods now.”
Arroyo was born in the Tampa area and lives there in the offseason, but he’s hoping to be on the West Coast more often this season. His numbers at Double-A wouldn’t appear to scream for a promotion — he hit .274 with a .316 on-base percentage and just three home runs in 474 at-bats — but he said he felt it was a better year than the statistics would indicate. Sabean had the same assessment. “Even though you didn’t see the home run power, mostly because of the ballpark and the league, he hit (36) doubles. That’s how you gauge what the next step is. He can hit, and once there was more around him in the lineup, you saw him take it to another level.”
Arroyo, the Giants’ first-round pick in the 2013 draft, doesn’t like to hear that he was one of the youngest players in the Eastern League. To him, that sounds like an excuse. The dreaded Double-A turn presents its challenges for all hitters and weeds out its share of prospects.
But in a game as mentally taxing as baseball, and over the grind of a full season, there is such a thing as learning how to fail. It’s a lesson Arroyo never really had to confront until last year.
“It was exactly what I thought — a lot better pitching and really good bullpens,” Arroyo said. “I could have done a better job of shortening those stints of failure and extending those stints of success . ... But I’m glad I got to experience it early in my career because it’ll happen in the big leagues.”
Arroyo went on a tear in July but struggled to a .239 average after Aug. 1 while playing through some left hip soreness. He said he benefited from some of Richmond’s second-half veteran additions to the roster, none more enjoyable than former All-Star closer Joe Nathan.
He played 48 games at shortstop, 48 games at third and 19 at second base. He contacted Duffy for some advice, knowing Duffy also converted from short to third.
“The biggest thing he told me is when you move over, you have to slow yourself down,” Arroyo said. “You want to field and throw like at short, but you have to remind yourself that you have more time.”
The Giants won’t rush Arroyo to the big leagues. They plan for Eduardo Núñez to be their every-day third baseman, although he’s a free agent after this season. Conor Gillaspie will get starts as well.
And although the Giants aren’t sure what to expect from Jae-gyun Hwang, whom they signed from Lotte of the Korea Baseball Organization, Sabean said that Arroyo likely did enough to graduate to Triple-A Sacramento.
“He should be knocking on the door within a year,” Sabean said. “I wouldn’t want to perhaps bring him up this year, because I think he still needs some more development time. That might be rushing things. But nothing would surprise me.”