{"id":454787,"date":"2026-09-05T19:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-05T19:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/454787\/"},"modified":"2026-09-05T19:54:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-05T19:54:09","slug":"sf-giants-prospect-jackson-flora-starts-pro-career-on-positive-note","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/454787\/","title":{"rendered":"SF Giants prospect Jackson Flora starts pro career on positive note"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Now that Jackson Flora\u2019s professional career has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlb.com\/giants\/news\/giants-2026-first-round-pick-jackson-flora-pro-debut?t=mlb-pipeline-coverage\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">started on a positive note<\/a>, the San Francisco Giants pitching prospect will likely get the chance to compete in a game with greater consequences.<\/p>\n<p>Flora, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mercurynews.com\/2026\/07\/29\/sf-giants-jackson-flora-buster-posey-pleasanton-foothill-draft-pick-introduction\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the No. 4 overall pick<\/a> in the MLB draft in July, threw a scoreless first inning for Single-A San Jose<a href=\"https:\/\/www.milb.com\/gameday\/giants-vs-grizzlies\/2026\/09\/04\/821361\/final\/box\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> in its 8-5 win<\/a> over Fresno on Friday at Chukchansi Park. With a fastball <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/MLBPipeline\/status\/2096063532853014679?s=20\" rel=\"nofollow\">that touched 98 mph<\/a>, the right-hander Flora, a Walnut Creek native who grew up a Giants fan in Pleasanton and attended Foothill High School, struck out two and allowed a double and walk in his pro debut.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.milb.com\/player\/jackson-flora-814176\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The 6-foot-5 Flora<\/a> struck out Ashly Andujar looking on a 3-2 fastball to lead off the bottom of the first inning. Then with two on and two outs, Flora got Ronny Ugarte swinging on a 2-2 slider to end the threat.<\/p>\n<p>Flora threw 28 pitches in the inning, 14 for strikes. Before Friday\u2019s game in Fresno, Flora last pitched on Aug. 29 in the \u201cBridge League,\u201d which bridges the gap between the end of the Arizona Complex League and the beginning of instructional camps.<\/p>\n<p>Now it appears Flora, 21, will get the chance to pitch for San Jose in the California League playoffs, which begin next week.<\/p>\n<p>San Jose, which <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlb.com\/milb\/standings\/california-league\/first-half?date=2026-06-18\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">won the first-half title<\/a> with a 37-29 record, will finish the three-game series with Fresno on Sunday to end the regular season and will face a still-to-be-determined opponent in a best-of-three series, with Game 1 on Tuesday on the road and Game 2 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.milb.com\/san-jose\/ballpark\/excite-ballpark\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">at Excite Ballpark<\/a> in San Jose on Thursday. A Game 3, if necessary, would be on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>As a junior at UC Santa Barbara, Flora went 12-0 with a 1.06 ERA and 133 strikeouts in just 102 innings. He was awarded the College Baseball Hall of Fame and Perfect Game pitcher of the year awards.<\/p>\n<p>KUHNEL ADDED<\/p>\n<p>A day after claiming right-hander Joel Kuhnel off waivers from the Brewers, the Giants added him to the active roster and optioned right-hander Ryan Walker to Triple-A Sacramento. In 35 appearances this season, 25 with the A\u2019s and 10 with the Brewers, Kuhnel was 1-3 with a 4.84 ERA over 35 1\/3 innings, with six saves and 22 strikeouts.<\/p>\n<p>Staff writer Justice de los Santos contributed to this story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Now that Jackson Flora\u2019s professional career has started on a positive note, the San Francisco Giants pitching prospect&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":454788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[389,184,7,390,392,332,32099,402,181,3834,1334,2650,101,4820,103,102,104,106,105,94685,127,398,1689],"class_list":["post-454787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-alameda-county","tag-bay-area","tag-california","tag-central-contra-costa","tag-contra-costa-county","tag-east-bay","tag-giants-alert","tag-inside-sports","tag-latest-headlines","tag-major-league-baseball","tag-mlb","tag-pleasanton","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news","tag-social-alert","tag-sports","tag-tri-valley","tag-walnut-creek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/454788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}