The Giants caught the worst of a spring training injury wave

Opening Day is less than a week away and it really can’t come any sooner. Craig Calcaterra of NBC Sports pointed out that Friday was a particularly nasty day for injuries across both the Grapefruit and Cactus Leagues. Ichiro took a pitch to his helmet, Chris Archer got hit by a grounder, and Yoan Moncada hurt himself sliding into third base. While those three players are probably going to be fine, one player who got seriously injured was Madison Bumgarner.

The Giants’ ace pitcher missed a massive chunk of the 2017 season due to an unfortunate dirtbike incident but this time, an on-field incident is going to cost him six-to-eight weeks. Bumgarner was hit in his throwing hand by a comebacker and it turns out that he’s got a broken pinky finger. It’s safe to say that both the Giants and Bumgarner were hoping to get things going in 2018 with a clean bill of health after last season’s injury woes. They’re already off to a bad start in that regard and the news got even worse for San Francisco at around the same time they got informed of Bumgarner’s status.

Jeff Samardzija suffered a pectoral injury on Thursday and the MRI results revealed that Samardzija will be out for three weeks-to-a-month. So that’s now two of San Francisco’s best pitchers who will be on the shelf for a significant period of time. Just like that, the Giants’ hopes of coming out of the gates strong for 2018 have taken a major blow. It would be a stunner if the Giants were as bad in 2018 as they were last year but for now it appears that their rotten luck has carried over into the new season.

While injuries can happen anytime and anywhere, it has to be considered a bigger bummer that all of these incidents occurred during exhibition games. We’re probably not going to see spring training curtailed anytime soon but it’s clear that at this point, everybody is ready for the regular season to start — if only because that means that the dangers of exhibition injuries can finally go by the wayside.

• The Save America’s Pastime Act is bad news for minor leaguers and Grant Brisbee thought it was very weird that Congress cared about a non-issue enough to make it into an issue.
• This happened on Thursday but it’s so absurd that it has to be covered now. Rob Refsnyder hit a fly ball to center field that landed in a hole in center field. He should have been awarded a grand slam right then and there.
• MLB recently concluded its investigation of Miguel Sano and an alleged incident of sexual assault. According to MLB, there was “insufficient evidence” to suspend him, so Sano will play on without any disciplanary measures.
• Meanwhile, MLB did find enough evidence to punish Steven Wright of the Boston Red Sox. He’ll be serving a 15-game suspension, which is basically three games for a starting pitcher.

• Joey Votto is still as good as ever and FanGraphs recently interviewed him in an effort to try to figure out how long the Reds’ superstar can avoid declining.
• Our season preview already made it clear that this is the Year of Tanking and Sam Miller of ESPN went in-depth to discuss how teams are deciding that the best way to win is to start losing a lot.
• If you aren’t up-to-date on the latest baseball uniform news, then Paul Lukas of ESPN’s Uni Watch should have you covered.
• Speaking of uniform news, we have yet another case of a video game leaking out new uniforms before they’re officially unveiled.
• According to Ballpark Digest, the Nationals have the worst player development facilities in all of baseball. Meanwhile, the Angels came in 29th place and Halos Heaven is concerned.