The Giants gave it a shot and missed! No shame in that.
Dear Buster Posey and San Francisco Giants Baseball Associates LLC,
You tried and you failed. That’s okay. It happens. I fail more in 30 minutes than any of you will fail in your entire lives. You are the most successful, wealthiest, awesomest, best human beings to ever live, but when it comes to the 2025 San Francisco Giants roster, you came up short and that’s why you have no choice but to sell off as much of the roster as possible at this year’s trade deadline.
The “build while competing” model hasn’t worked out very well in either building or competing, and so if it’s not going to be abandoned entirely, it at least needs retrenchment. It was only a year ago that I wrote in affirmation of the practice to never tank, never surrender, but this season presents a unique set of circumstances that a savvy investment group with a beloved figure as the face of the organization should utilize. A “Get Out of Tanking Free” card, if you will. Here’s why:
- Disinterest in the team is already pretty high. I’ve been getting ticket discount emails all season long and when I watch the team on TV, McCovey Cove is rarely that full. Fans from visiting teams are louder and more obvious than at any time than I can remember in Oracle Park’s history. You have failed to capture the imagination of the casual fan or made the team worth the trip to San Francisco.
- The record. 54-52, 3 out of Wild Card #3, 20% playoff odds? Those are just numbers, and you got rid of the numbers (and the computers that generated them) to focus on being a player-focused organization. Well, the players have told you what to do — just look at the numbers (zany face emoji)! After starting the season 24-14, the Giants are 30-38. They’ve been swept by both playoff-bound teams they’ve faced coming out of the All-Star break. If you want to keep breaking this down: they’ve lost 9 of their last 11, they’re 9-12 since Buster Posey picked up Bob Melvin’s extension, and 14-24 over the last six and a half weeks. And, just in case this needs some context: that’s the second-worst record in MLB over that stretch, tied with the Twins and behind only the Washington Nationals (12-26). The Pirates (16-21) and Rockies (15-23) have been better! While it’s true that the Yankees (16-23) and Tigers (17-21) have struggled over this same stretch, they can do something your team can’t: score runs! The franchise has had a below average lineup for three and a half seasons. The die is cast, unfortunately.
- A sell-off would be pretty painless. Matt Chapman, Rafael Devers, Willy Adames, Logan Webb, and Jung Hoo Lee aren’t going anywhere for a variety of reasons, which gives Zack Minasian a pretty solid safety net. The team is already going to have to figure out how to adequately replace Wilmer Flores and Mike Yastrzemski in the offseason, two players the team has already struggled to supplant — and while the Giants don’t spit out quality arms in the way we convinced ourselves they could back in the championship era and early in the Farhan Zaidi run, relievers are mostly fungible and shouldn’t be untouchable.
- Buster Posey is the face of the franchise. As you know, this is the best thing you have going for you (hi, Buster!). If Buster Posey gets on NBC Sports or goes on KNBR and says, “We gave it our all, but it just didn’t come together, we’ll go back to the drawing boards and get pumped up to attack 2026” then the exact fans you fear losing will stick around about as much as they will watching this team slowly die (as it is right now). If that doesn’t seem like the right message, then he can always play the “I’m not mad, I’m just disappointed” card and this would give fans the appropriate relief valve for their frustrations watching the lineup flail nightly, setting historic marks in fecklessness. The man can sell anything.
- It’s “cool” to save money. Admit it! Last year, you let Farhan Zaidi clear Jorge Soler and Alex Cobb because you knew that it wouldn’t upset the fans too much. Zaidi might’ve held on to Blake Snell (and before him, Carlos Rodon) because the right move wasn’t there, but you have the option to pressure the front office to sell guys for 70% of their “value.”
I’m sure you perused Susan Slusser’s piece in this morning’s Chronicle in which she mentions the tradability of Robbie Ray, along with Tyler Rogers, Casey Schmitt, and Ryan Walker (who has recently regained his elite fastball velocity). I’d add Flores and Yaz to this mix, too, even if they won’t bring back much in return except salary relief (along with, possibly, a pair of PTBNLs). Justin Verlander will probably want to pitch for a postseason team and I don’t see why the Giants should prevent him. Camilo Doval can be somebody else’s question mark, too. Add up these remaining salaries in 2025…
$8.6MM — Robbie Ray
$5.2MM — Justin Verlander
$3.2MM — Mike Yastrzemski
$1.2MM — Wilmer Flores
$1.8MM — Tyler Rogers
$1.6MM — Camilo Doval
… and that’s about $21.5 million in savings, and that’s coming in a season when you traded for Rafael Devers and signed Willy Adames to the largest free agent contract in team history. This year’s squad won’t come anywhere close to being the competitive and financial loser that it was last season, either.
There’s also a version where Buster & Zack sell and buy at the same time and the savings are minimal but the upside is significant. Susan Slusser suggests a trade for Seattle’s Luis Castillo (former Giant farmhand!) who has an expensive AAV ($24.15 million) the next two seasons which would certainly be another big financial lift (even if it fits well within the budget, according to Cot’s MLB Contracts), but would have the effect of giving the team some help this season (though, not eliminating the innings issue entirely) while setting it up for a more competitive 2026.
And that’s the whole point, right? You want to project an air of confidence about the team being competitive. Well, it’s not. And it hasn’t been for quite some time. The season is four months old and the Giants have had a winning record in one of them. In fact, they’ve had a winning month in just 7 of their last 21 months played.
And even if you want to ignore the past and focus on this season, the only reason not to SELL SELL SELL is because the Giants are “only” 3 games out of a Wild Card spot. There are 9 teams (Dodgers, Mets, Phillies, Cubs, Brewers, Padres, Reds, Giants, Cardinals) competing for 6 spots. At least a couple of those teams are bound to fade, and all the Giants have to do is get hot at the same time, right?! But that’s just hope. Hope has been The Strategy for years. This isn’t the 2010s. It’s certainly not 2021. Hope is not a strategy.
It’s time for a new plan, even if it’s just a slight modification of the current one.
Obnoxiously yours,
Bryan Murphy