Marco Luciano's yo-yo ride of a 2024 MLB season continued Wednesday when the Giants optioned him back to Triple-A Sacramento.
Outfield prospect Grant McCray was promoted from Triple-A. The 23-year-old will make his MLB debut against the Atlanta Braves on Wednesday night at Oracle Park. He is playing center field and batting ninth against right-handed pitcher Grant Holmes.
Luciano was recalled after the Giants traded designated hitter Jorge Soler to the Braves before the July 30 MLB trade deadline. The 22-year-old infielder has appeared in seven games -- six starts -- since being brought back to San Francisco but went 4-for-21 during that span.
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Luciano's defensive struggles at shortstop, combined with Tyler Fitzgerald's emergence, has limited the top infield prospect to starting as the designated hitter in the six games since July 30.
Overall this season, Luciano is hitting .289/.333/.400 with three doubles, one triple, one RBI and 14 strikeouts in 17 MLB games.
Luciano was expected to be the Giants' 2024 Opening Day starting shortstop, but he lost the spring training competition to veteran Nick Ahmed. San Francisco finally called the Dominican Republic native up on May 14, but he landed on the injured list with a hamstring injury at the end of May.
Once he was healthy in mid-June, Luciano was activated and optioned to Triple-A, where he had been until he was recalled after the Soler trade.
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McCray, the Giants' 2019 third-round draft pick out of Lakewood Ranch High School in Bradenton, Fla., had a breakout 2022 minor-league season in which he hit .289/.383/.514 with 23 doubles, 23 home runs, 79 RBI and 43 stolen bases in 120 games between Low-A San Jose and High-A Eugene.
This season, McCray is hitting .242/.330/.446 with 26 doubles, 12 homers and 52 RBI in 97 games between Double-A Richmond and Triple-A Sacramento.
McCray currently is the Giants' No. 11 overall prospect, per MLB Pipeline, but he peaked at No. 3 to finish the 2023 season, behind only left-handed pitcher Kyle Harrison (No. 1) and Luciano (No. 2).
McCray and Fitzgerald were the Giants' third- and fourth-round picks, respectively, in 2019. Now they will be teammates in San Francisco.
"It's kind of cool," McCray told reporters in San Francisco before Wednesday's game. "We had the COVID year right after we got drafted, so that kind of hurt us both as, like, just getting. But we've both worked really hard to get here and I'm really excited to be one of the second ones to get to the big leagues from our draft class."
Now, for the time being, Luciano and McCray have swap spots, the Giants hoping the latter can give them a boost during a pivotal stretch of games.