SURPRISE, Ariz. — Bryce Eldridge, the San Francisco Giants’ top prospect, told reporters earlier this week that his main goal during his first major-league spring training was to make a good impression. One game into Cactus League play and it’s safe to say he’s done so.
Eldridge capped off the Giants’ first game of spring training with a no-doubt, 450-foot, 110.4-mph homer as San Francisco defeated the Texas Rangers, 6-1, on Saturday afternoon at Surprise Stadium. There were no shortage of cameras to capture the moment — the Rangers’ did not televise the game — and Eldridge will need them to remember exactly how the moment played out.
“I honestly blacked out for that whole thing,” Eldridge said. “I really don’t remember it. I remember looking at the outfielder and he was acting like he was going to catch it. I was like, ‘I think I got that one.’”
Eldridge, indeed, got that one. But not before he got got in his first plate appearance, which ended on a four-pitch strikeout. The first baseman fell behind in the count, 0-2, during his second plate appearance, but felt himself slow down with each passing pitch. When the Rangers’ Matt Festa tossed a 92 mph four-seam fastball right down the middle, Eldridge didn’t miss his opportunity to clear the fences.
“I was thinking to myself in that at-bat that I just need to slow things down,” Eldridge said. “Progressing through that whole at-bat, all those three pitches, I kept getting slowed down and more slowed down, so it worked out for me.”
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Barring the unforeseen, the 20-year-old Eldridge will not make the Giants’ Opening Day roster out of spring training after hitting 23 homers with 92 RBIs and a .291 batting average last year across four different minor-league levels. Eldridge may have to spend more time in the minors before making his debut, but his home run on Saturday was further proof of how his power will translate at any and all ballparks.
“For a guy his age, he certainly looks very calm. Two strikes, trying to put the ball in play and he hits it 40 feet over the center-field fence. We’ve seen a lot of that in his at-bats in lives and (batting practice). He just looks very hitter-ish all the time. It’s nice that he gets off to a good start after his first at-bat. It makes you feel good, and it makes you feel like you belong.”
