SAN FRANCISCO — When the Giants broke camp this spring, the only expectations they had for their most recent top draft pick in his first full season of professional baseball was to “get him out there, get him up to speed and get him adjusted,” farm director Kyle Haines said in March.
Safe to say, Bryce Eldridge has blown past that forecast and put himself on another pedestal of prospect status.
Still 19 years old for another two months, Eldridge will finish the season one step away from the major leagues, in Triple-A Sacramento, where he was promoted on Saturday. In just over a year since being drafted 16th overall out of Madison High School in Vienna, Virginia, Eldridge has moved through four levels of the minor leagues, from Single-A San Jose, to High-A Eugene, a brief homecoming for Double-A Richmond and now, for the final week of the minor-league season, with the River Cats.
With a rise that rapid, could the teenager be ticketed for San Francisco by the end of the season?
“I haven’t heard that,” manager Bob Melvin chuckled before Saturday’s game against the Padres. “I mean, it’s been a pretty quick ascent. I don’t know that it’s going to be that quick.”
Melvin mostly focuses on the day-to-day machinations of the major-league team. Still, he could understand the reasons why the Giants wouldn’t want to add another stop to Eldridge’s itinerary, as tempting as that might be. Besides the fact that Eldridge spent all of nine games at Double-A, there’s no reason to get a head start on his service time clock while occupying a 40-man spot that could be used to protect another prospect from the Rule 5 draft this winter.
There is, however, one more item the Giants will put on Eldridge’s plate. When he celebrates his 20th birthday on October 20, he will play for the Scottsdale Scorpions in the Arizona Fall League. Not exactly a gap year after high school graduation.
“We know those high school kids are going to go through ups and downs,” Haines said this spring. “It’s pretty rare when they don’t.”
So far, though, Eldridge is looking like the exception to the rule, and it’s hard not to envision his 6-foot-7 left-handed swing sending baseballs into McCovey Cove sooner rather than later. Even in his first stop at San Jose, Eldridge was two years younger than his average competition, and the gap only widened as he climbed the minor league ladder.
He spent 51 games with San Jose, slugging 10 home runs while batting .263 with a .801 OPS, and managed to not only hit a speed bump upon being promoted to Eugene but took his play to another level. He racked up 12 homers in 48 games and displayed an increased maturity in his approach, drawing 35 walks to 52 strikeouts in 215 plate appearances after striking out 61 times with 17 walks in 229 trips to the plate at San Jose.
Last week, Eldridge hit his first home run at Double-A Richmond, and after batting .270 with a .785 OPS in nine games, was already on his way to Triple-A.
“I think that just speaks to what the organization thinks of him and what he’s ready to do,” Melvin said. “You’re seeing some guys get to the big leagues a little bit quicker right now. That kid in Milwaukee (Jackson Chourio). It’s not like they don’t think he can handle it. It’s only going to be a short period of time here at the end, but just getting him a look at Triple-A pitching I think will be important for him.”
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Melvin hasn’t interacted much with the 19-year-old but has seen his left-handed swing on tape.
“I like it,” he said.
“He’s got an advanced approach,” Haines said this spring. “Hits live drives to all fields. He’ll hit for power one day.”
It can’t come soon enough for the Giants, who have gotten some of the least offensive production out of one of the spots traditionally expected to provide thump to a lineup. Led by LaMonte Wade Jr. (six), their first basemen have combined to hit 12 home runs this season, tied for the second-fewest in the majors.
“I think the hamstring injury lingered for a while,” Melvin said of Wade, who missed most of June after straining his left hamstring. “You could see at times that he was getting his at-bats but maybe not really driving the ball. Now, he’s into his legs a little bit more. I think a lot of his season was affected by the hamstring.”