Giants 2B Marco Scutaro could be out for remainder of 2013
By Brad Rowland
It’s been a lost season for the San Francisco Giants, and to make things worse, they may be shutting down one of the lone bright spots from their season.
Second baseman Marco Scutaro left Sunday’s game with a finger issue, and he has documented problems with a pinkie finger that can be tracked to early June. With that in mind, Andrew Baggarly of CSN Bay Area is reporting that the Giants are seriously contemplating a shutdown of Scutaro for the remainder of the season.
According to Baggarly, Scutaro underwent an MRI on Tuesday, and while the results are unavailable at this point, there is little to be gained by bringing him back. San Francisco is out of the playoff race at 70-81 on the season, and there is no use for risking future damage to his finger with nothing on the line.
Scutaro has a .297 average with a .357 on-base percentage on the season, and while the power isn’t immense (2 home runs in 547 plate appearances), he’s been a valuable player for the Giants this year. At 37 years old, it’s tough to “build around” a player like Scutaro, but he is still owed nearly $14 million over the next 2 seasons, and San Francisco will certainly need him in the lineup for 2014.