Giants Youth Brigade Marches On

Breaking news broken by Andy Baggarly: The Giants call up Travis Ishikawa, Pablo Sandoval, and Ryan Rohlinger and send down John Bowker and Stephen Holm plus DFA's Jose Castillo.

The trio has been on fire in the minors, particularly after getting promoted to the next level. Ishikawa was batting .312, Sandoval owned a .339 average and Rohlinger was at .296, according to sfgiants.com.

Meanwhile, Bowker has been ice cold for a long while, Holm has never recaptured his early season shininess, and Castillo hasn't been good for a long while.

No, Thank You!

But thank you to Castillo for filling a hole in our roster for as long as he did. He kept the spot warm, essentially, until Rohlinger could figure some things out in the minors. And who knows, both Boston and Tampa are both missing 3B, perhaps they would be willing to throw us a prospect so that Castillo can stop-gap for them (though I had been hoping either of them would send us a decent prospect in exchange for Aurilia)

And Holm got to experience the big leagues for most of the season, something he most probably wouldn't have gotten to do if Alfonzo didn't have his problems then got suspended again for PEDs. I don't think he'll be making the majors again, barring injuries.

And thank you to Bowker for giving us Giants some early season hope in this transitional rebuilding year. He was actually not doing that well early on, despite all those homers against the Cards, but moved things up a giant notch in June, but just couldn't adjust back in July and August when other teams started figuring him out. Some think the Giants blew it by bringing him up too early, but given that he hit .325/.373/.584/.958 in June, with 4 HR in 77 AB, I think he was ready to come up, he just wasn't able to adjust back lately. I assume this is not the last we see of him, he will certainly come back up in September and will be in the mix at 1B and OF in 2009.

New Trio

Ishikawa, 24, first hit .291/.382/.462/.844 in AA with 8 HR in 234 AB (30 AB/HR) then was promoted to AAA and hit .310/.370/.737/1.107 with 16 HR in 171 (11 AB/HR). He takes over for Bowker in hitting against RHP at 1B and hopefully will see time against LHP as well.

Rohlinger, 24, first hit .285/.368/.419/.787 in hit happy Advanced A San Jose with 7 HR in 277 AB (40 AB/HR) then actually brought things up a notch at AA, where power goes to die normally, and hit even better, .296/.358/.497/.855 with 6 HR in 159 AB (27 AB/HR).

Sandoval, newly 22, first hit a scorching .359/.412/.597/1.009 in San Jose with 12 HR in 273 AB (23 AB/HR) then almost kept it going in AA by hitting .337/.364/.549/.913 with 8 HR in 175 AB (22 AB/HR).

So our young crew has been heating things up in the minors for much of the season, though I must temper any newbies thoughts that this all mean they will dominate up here, it is much different down in the minors than up here, there are actually pitchers up here who know how to pitch, unlike the minors, and they will expose you fast once they figure you out, much like Bowker, or Niekro before him, or any prospect ever. Here are their MLE's:

Ishikawa: .267/.319/.595/.904, with 12 HR in 176 AB (15 AB/HR) based on AAA
Rohlinger: .248/.297/.399/.696, with 4 HR in 164 AB (41 AB/HR) based on AA
Sandoval: .287/.309/.447/.756, with 6 HR in 177 AB (30 AB/HR) based on AA

So don't expect too much out of any of them right yet, though obviously Ishikawa would be the better bet based on his hot streak and MLEs. Still, it is a huge jump from even AAA to the majors, so you never know. Rohlinger got the start today and the other two should see action soon enough.