Two key San Francisco Giants coaches may not travel to every game this season
SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants are considering limiting the travel of two members of their major league coaching staff this season, but the decision has nothing to do with coronavirus concerns or MLB health and safety protocols.
Manager Gabe Kapler said Thursday the Giants’ director of pitching, Brian Bannister, and director of hitting, Dustin Lind, may not be full-time members of the team’s traveling party in 2020.
Bannister has been celebrated by many Giants as one of the most important additions to the franchise this year as his coaching influenced many changes pitchers implemented during spring training.
“There are a few that we’re discussing right now, like is it best to have Brian Bannister by way of example devoted to the Sacramento camp?” Kapler said. “His family is here in San Francisco, so he’s one consideration.”
Veteran free-agent signees Kevin Gausman and Drew Smyly cited Bannister’s addition to the organization as one of the reasons they were interested in joining the Giants while younger pitchers including Tyler Beede and Logan Webb made significant changes to their approaches thanks to feedback from Bannister during spring training.
“Bannister came in and he said with my arm slot, I have the perfect arm slot for this kind of two-seam and the cutter will work right off of that,” Webb told this news organization in February. “So I started messing around with it on flat grounds and it’s going really well.”
Webb said Bannister also taught him a new grip for a slider, a key off-speed pitch for the right-hander that now sweeps from right to left and features more horizontal break than it did a year ago.
A decision to limit Bannister’s travel would likely come with his approval as one of the primary reasons he left a position with the Red Sox organization in the offseason was to be closer to his family, which was based in the Bay Area before he joined the Giants organization.
There’s little doubt Bannister would still play a major role on the big league coaching staff, but given his eye for assisting pitchers with subtle tweaks that can maximize performance, it’s an intriguing option for the Giants to have him work with some of their less refined arms at the Sacramento camp this summer.
All Giants who are part of the team’s summer player pool but not included on the team’s major league roster will train at Sutter Health Field in Sacramento, which is the home of the Triple-A River Cats. The Giants anticipate promoting players from the pool to the roster as needed, so having a major league coach assist members of their minor league coaching staff with instruction could pay dividends.
Like Bannister, the Giants are also considering sending Lind to Sacramento for portions of the summer to aid with minor league instruction.
“Dustin Lind is similar in that he’s the director of hitting so he has a lot of influence at the minor league level as well as the major league level,” Kapler said. “We expect Dustin to travel for sure and Brian, maybe a little bit less, but the rest of our major league coaching staff will be traveling for us.”
Lind came to the Giants from the Seattle Mariners organization and has a background in exercise science and physical therapy, which immediately caught Buster Posey’s attention. Before electing to sit out the 2020 season, the Giants catcher expressed excitement about working with Lind in spring training because Posey felt his new coach could help players adjust their swings and prepare their bodies for competition over the grind of a 162-game schedule.
Kapler said at the outset of summer camp that all 13 members of his coaching staff planned to participate in the 2020 season. The Giants, like all MLB teams, are limited to having seven coaches in the dugout during games, but all coaches can participate in on-field pregame activities.
Assistant coach Alyssa Nakken, who turned 30 this month, will make history next week at Dodger Stadium when she becomes the first woman to coach in a major league game. Nakken is not expected to be among the seven coaches in the Giants dugout, but she’s been training as a first base coach.