The Giants elect to carry 13 position players and 12 pitchers, which I would argue is one pitcher too many, but almost all the teams do this now. It does limit the manager’s tactical flexibility during games, since there are fewer bench hitters/runners. This is mitigated somewhat in the Giants’ case by the decision to forgo carrying an additional catcher beyond starter Bengie Molina and starting-third-baseman-former-catcher Pablo Sandoval. It’s also a great tribute to institutional memory for the multipositional virtues of Bob Brenly in the 1980s.
Uribe as a defensive replacement for Sandoval at third or Renteria at short? OK. Aurilia as Travis Ishikawa’s platoon partner at first? I cringe. It’s cool that the well-traveled Andres Torres — a Quad-A lifer — landed a gig as the fifth outfielder, but if the Giants aren’t giving at-bats to Nate Shierholtz, I fail to see why they might have any for Torres.
