Carlos Rodon Reacts to Hitting Key Contract Incentive

Left-handed starting pitcher Carlos Rodon has been a big reason behind the San Francisco Giants' 48-44 start to the 2022 MLB season. The 29-year-old is on pace for one of his best seasons to date and things got even better after reaching a specific season milestone for his contract.

Rodon recorded his 110th inning of the season against the LA Dodgers on Thursday, reaching an incentive that turns his 2023 contract into a player option. When asked about how the incentive made him feel, the Miami, FL native revealed that it wasn't necessarily at the forefront of his mind.

Carlos Rodón, asked about reaching 110 innings to turn next year’s contract into a player option: “That's not all I wanted to do. You still want to keep pitching. That was just the first start of the second half. There's a lot more games to be won.”
— Andrew Baggarly (@extrabaggs) July 22, 2022

San Francisco Giants News

Hitting incentives is something to celebrate, but Rodon told reporters that achieving his player option was "not all I wanted to do." He acknowledged that he's still focused on pitching and that the Giants have "a lot more games" to win in the second half of the 2022 MLB campaign.

The truth is that Rodon is right: the Giants need to focus on winning more games. San Francisco has gone 8-11 in its last 19 games and while that's far from the worst record over that stretch, the club sits outside of the NL Wild Card race, three games behind the San Diego Padres for the final spot with the St. Louis Cardinals and Philadelphia Phillies between them.

With Rodon continuing to pitch the way he has can help the Giants make up some ground. He's 8-5 through an MLB-high 19 starts so far, pitching to a 2.95 ERA and 1.136 WHIP. One man can't turn the whole season around, but he could inspire his teammates to step up.

The Giants own the 12th-easiest remaining schedule, according to Tankathon, so they do have an opportunity to turn things around. Having said that, they have a combined 25 games remaining against the San Diego Padres, Atlanta Braves and Dodgers, meaning things aren't as simple as they appear.

Giants World Series Odds

The Giants' inability to consistently win games lately has hurt their championship aspirations. FanDuel Sportsbook currently has them available at +6000 odds to win the 2022 World Series, ranking 16th-best across the Majors.

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Devon Platana is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Devon Platana also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username PepeSilvia0. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in their articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.