Giants promoting stud pitching prospect nicknamed ‘Tugboat’

The San Francisco Giants underwent a full-blown rebuild at the MLB trade deadline. Therefore, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that the team is promoting youngsters. In fact, the National League West team just promoted a pitching prospect named Matt Wilkinson. The lefty has the nickname “Tugboat” and sky-high expectations surrounding his major league career. Jeff Passan reported the news.

Wilkinson was a 10th-round pick in 2023 out of junior college by the Cleveland Guardians. He made his way to the Giants’ farm system by way of the Patrick Bailey trade earlier this season. That trade was one of many that saw the Giants depart with veterans this season.

At the trade deadline, San Francisco moved on from Heliot Ramos, Luis Arraez, Robbie Ray, and Tyler Mahle in some of the biggest trades of the year. Considering the Giants are 3-7 over their last 10 games, they clearly haven’t done much winning since the fire sale, and trying out potential future contributors makes sense.

Wilkinson is a 6-foot-1, 250-pound southpaw who has a 3.40 ERA during time split between Triple-A and Double-A this season. However, he had some rough outings at the top minor league level, so it is unclear how he will translate to major league ball. Tugboat is not currently on the 40-man roster, so the Giants will have to make a succeeding move before the southpaw can take the bump at the major league level. The big-league promotion also protects Wilkinson from the upcoming Rule 5 draft.