Jeff Samardzija is entering Year 2 of the five-year contract he signed with the Giants following the 2015 season.
With spring training underway, what is the hardest part about getting his body and mind prepared for the upcoming campaign?
"The pitching aspects of things, the older I get, the more they kind of just fall right in line with feeling my mechanics out," Samardzija explained on KNBR 680 on Wednesday morning. "For me, it's probably the cardio (laughter). The older I get, the more I realize that you put more weight on in the offseason, then it's a little harder to get off.
"You hear about it, right? You hear about it all the time when you're younger ... and my offseasons, I like to have offseasons. I don't watch my calories. I don't watch my intake (I don't really watch any of that anyways). But the offseason -- I have fun, I relax ... then you get working out again and usually those first five or six poles, two-mile runs, camelback hikes -- they're always pretty interesting the first couple times."
The former college wide receiver is listed at 225 pounds.
Samardzija turned 32 years old in January and is entering his 10th big-league season.
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He went 12-11 with a 3.81 ERA over 32 starts last year.
Over his final 10 starts, he went 3-3 with a 2.45 ERA.
"The splitter came back for me there toward the end of the year," Samardzija said. "I kind of brought the curveball in to not replace, but kind of take up some of the space of the splitter that wasn't there.
"And then come September, the splitter showed up and then we had the curveball and we ran with it from there."
