Congratulations, everyone: you did it. You made it through the long, cold, winter months, and emerged onto the glorious other side, where baseball awaits you. The offseason is over. The preseason is over. San Francisco Giants baseball is here, in all her glory and looming disappointment.
After Tuesday’s camp cuts, the Giants Opening Day roster really started to come into focus. And now we have the full 26-player roster, as announced by the team.
There’s nothing surprising, based on what we knew going
into the day, though plenty is surprising relative to what we knew when Spring Training started six weeks ago. The biggest news is something the team had been trending towards all offseason and preseason: outfielder Luis Matos was designated for assignment. San Francisco has been pessimistic about their chances of sneaking Matos through waivers, but they waited until the last possible moment to increase their odds. It probably won’t work, but we’ll see.
As had become increasingly clear in recent weeks, speedster Jared Oliva made the Opening Day roster, a remarkable achievement for a 30-year old NRI with just 26 MLB games to his name, and none since 2021. The Giants were enamored with his ability to come off the bench and steal a base, and didn’t feel the need for a stronger hitter given their everyday players in the grass.
Daniel Susac, a Rule 5 pick and little brother of Andrew, did as was expected and made the team as the backup catcher. Critically, his main competitor in camp, veteran Eric Haase, was released, not reassigned, which means Jesús Rodríguez is now the next man up behind the dish.
There seemed to be two spots in the bullpen for three righties: Keaton Winn, and NRIs Caleb Kilian and Michael Fulmer. The Giants thankfully went with stuff over veteran experience, opting to keep Winn and Kilian, while reassigning Fulmer to AAA Sacramento. To make a space on the roster for Kilian, lefty Reiver Sanmartín was placed on the 60-Day Injured List.
And finally, as we knew was going to happen but couldn’t officially be done until today, the Giants placed right relievers Joel Peguero and southpaw reliever Sam Hentges on the 15-Day IL.
Here’s the full roster that will take the field tonight at 5:05 p.m. PT against the New York Yankees. It’s a balanced bullpen, but a bench that doesn’t have a left-handed bat:
Catchers (2)
Patrick Bailey
Daniel Susac
Infielders (6)
Willy Adames
Luis Arráez
Matt Chapman
Rafael Devers
Christian Koss
Casey Schmitt
Outfielders (5)
Harrison Bader
Jerar Encarnación
Jung Hoo Lee
Jared Oliva
Heliot Ramos
Starting pitchers (5)
Adrian Houser
Tyler Mahle
Robbie Ray
Landen Roupp
Logan Webb
Right-handed relievers (5)
JT Brubaker
José Buttó
Caleb Kilian
Ryan Walker
Keaton Winn
Left-handed relievers (3)
Ryan Borucki
Matt Gage
Erik Miller
Your 2026 Giants, everyone!
