Giants Prospect Ryan Murphy Reemerges with Coveted Fall League Honor

After injuries pushed him off the radar, the former Top 30 prospect is healthy again — and just earned Arizona Fall League Pitcher of the Week.

Ryan Murphy has reemerged as a Giants prospect to watch after winning Arizona Fall League Pitcher of the Week. | Arizona Fall League

Ryan Murphy has pinned his name back on the map in the Giants organization — though he was never supposed to be there to begin with.

Five years ago, in the truncated 2020 draft headlined by Patrick Bailey and Kyle Harrison, the club used its seventh and final selection on Ryan Murphy — a Division II pitcher out of Le Moyne College and the first D-II player taken that year.

Bailey and Harrison entered the system as instant Top 10 prospects, joining a rankings tier topped by Marco Luciano, Joey Bart, and Heliot Ramos. Murphy didn’t even make the Top 30.

One year later, the unranked D-II arm was suddenly the Giants’ No. 12 prospect.

The climb was powered by a breakout 2021 season in which Murphy finished third in the Minors with 164 strikeouts and posted a 2.52 ERA over more than 100 innings. Buzz quickly began to build that the Giants had uncovered a late-round gem. By year’s end, he was an organizational All-Star.

But just as quickly as he’d put himself on the fast track to Oracle Park, his health sent him on a detour. Over the next four seasons, Murphy would eclipse 100 innings only once — in 2023 — and bottom out this year with just 19.1 innings between Single-A and Double-A.

But this fall in Arizona, the climb finally resumed — and in Scottsdale, the version of Ryan Murphy the Giants saw in 2021 showed up again.

Ryan Murphy Named AFL's Pitcher of the Week

The 25-year-old proved that lost time doesn’t equal lost ability, dominating a collection of elite offensive talent during the Fall League’s fourth week.

Congratulations to our week four NFP Hitter and Pitcher of the Week! Sam Petersen hit .421 this past week with a 1.318 OPS and two homers and Ryan Murphy threw 7.2 scoreless innings in two starts striking out six batters without a walk pic.twitter.com/0zRbHCsXQY

— MLB's Arizona Fall League (@MLBazFallLeague) November 4, 2025

Murphy’s Fall League opened with a stumble — five runs in under two innings on October 9 — but since then, he’s been dominant as he was four years ago. Over his last four outings, he’s 2–1 with a 0.73 ERA and 10 strikeouts.

"The biggest thing has been establishing the fastball in the zone," Murphy said. "Early on in the season, I was having trouble establishing the fastball. Now that I've made a mechanical adjustment, I've been able to throw more strikes, and that breeds more confidence."

Murphy capped his week with his best outing yet — four shutout innings against Peoria on November 2, walking none and striking out three. He helped anchor a night owned by Giants arms, as he, Ricardo Estrada, Juan Sanchez, and Jose Perez teamed up for eight innings of one-run, 10-strikeout dominance in a 4-1 win.

The box score shows it. Murphy feels it. Now the Fall League gives him space to trust it.

"The pitcher in me still hasn't fully healed," Murphy acknowledged. "I'm still trying to get back into feeling things I need to feel - like being in sync, timing issues, stuff you don't realize can subconsciously affect you. Your mind is still recovering even though your body is feeling a lot better."

The road back has been long and winding, marked by more rocky valleys than panoramic peaks. But what has survived the detour is a pitcher who not only kept his stuff, but refined his approach into a more deliberate, more effective rhythm.

Even when staring down Top 100 prospects and first-round sluggers, Murphy has leaned into that rhythm. The results have come with it.

"My biggest problem in the past has been trying to do too much and falling behind in counts after getting ahead," Murphy said. "Or pitching myself out of positive situations by trying to be nasty or whatever. So just trying to understand the flow of the game, be efficient, put up zeros, not let anyone score."

The Long Road Here

Murphy’s return looks a lot like his rise: improbable, unlikely, and earned. Pitching careers often get buried by injuries. Division II pitchers often never get noticed at all. Murphy has beaten both odds.

Murphy knows that part of the journey well. Before he was a Top 30 prospect — before the breakout season, the organization All-Star title, and now the Fall League comeback — he was a Division II right-hander at Le Moyne College just hoping for a chance. The 2020 draft wasn’t a choice between school and signing, he explained. It was a question of whether he’d even be selected at all.

“It wasn’t really much of a ‘do I go back to school’ thing,” Murphy said. “It was more like, ‘am I even going to have the opportunity to play professional baseball?’ Especially coming from D2, the odds are already stacked against you.”

Murphy credits former Le Moyne teammate Josiah Gray — now a Major Leaguer with the Nationals — for bringing scouts to campus and putting the program “a little bit on the map,” but even then, he knew the window could be brief. He pitched just four games in his final season before the pandemic shut everything down, but he’d shown enough to stay on a few draft boards.

"I remember when the season ended, my coach pulled me and my dad aside in the parking lot and told us a few teams had interest," Murphy recalled. "He said, 'If you get the opportunity, you have to take it. You don't know if you'll get another shot.' Once I knew there was an actual chance, I was all-in on going pro."

The setting has changed, but the dynamic hasn’t. At Le Moyne, scouts came for Gray and left with Murphy’s name in their notebooks. In the desert, they arrive for Top 100 prospects — and wind up circling a former DII arm carving through them.

There’s already plenty of conversation about who could round out the back end of the Giants’ rotation in 2026. Logan Webb and Robbie Ray are locked into the front, Landon Roupp looks like a strong in-house candidate, and a reunion with Justin Verlander remains a possibility.

Murphy, who has yet to pitch above Double-A, would still be a longshot compared to internal options like Carson Whisenhunt, Hayden Birdsong, Carson Seymour, and Trevor McDonald.

Rule 5 eligibility means the Giants have a choice to make. A year ago, the detour looked permanent; leaving him unprotected felt inevitable. But a month in the desert has put Murphy back on the map — and now the Giants must decide whether the comeback is real enough to protect.

If the map has changed since 2021, so has Murphy — and that may be exactly why he fits on it again.