The Giants offense erupted for 5 home runs in support of shutout pitching from Logan Webb and bullpen. Key Lines:
Heliot Ramos DH- 4 for 5, HR(22). BA= .270. Ramos had an inconsistent second half but he also had a breakout season, fought through a league adjustment and successfully readjusted. At age 25 he's now a guy you have to hope is part of your core going forward.
Lamonte Wade Jr 1B- 1 for 3, 2B, 2 BB. BA= .264. OBP- .386. I see LMWJ as being what I think Joey Votto's numbers would look like if he played half his games in Oracle Park rather than Great American Park.
Michael Conforto LF- 1 for 5, HR(20). BA= .234. Speaking of Oracle Park, someone on X pointed out that Conforto has hit 17 HR's on the road vs 3 at home this season. His road slash line is .252/.320/.532. Home/Road split does not completely account for a combined BA of .164 in June and July but he's had a strong final 2 months, mainly in road games.
Patrick Bailey C- 2 for 4, HR(8), BB. BA= .235. Bailey's bat faded badly in the second half for the second year in a row, although he is the best defensive C in MLB by a healthy margin. Someone on X pointed out that Bailey had just 28 games and 120 PA's above A-ball when he was promoted to the majors last season so has had to develop his bat at the MLB level in addition to the standard league adjust/readjust roller coaster. I do think upgrading reserve catcher should be a front office priority this offseason to give Bailey more off days to help maintain strength deep into the season.
Tyler Fitzgerald SS- 2 for 5, 2B, HR(15), BB. BA= .287. FZ said in an interview today that upgrading defense at SS is an offseason priority(if he is running the offseason). I'm not so sure I would do that. Fangraphs grades him out as league average on defense at SS. I think I would take league average D for Fitz power/speed combination. Oh, and I spoke with a guy yesterday who says he will attend Tyler's wedding in a couple of weeks.
Brett Wisely 2B- 2 for 5, HR(4). BA= .230. Wisely's bat tailed off badly in the second half. The HR in this game was a monster shot.
Logan Webb RHP- 6 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K's, GO/AO= 10/3. ERA= 3.47. Webb passed 200 IP for the second season in row. Last Giants pitcher to do that was Jeff Samardzija and Webb is a lot more than just an innings eater. Alex P reports that Webb broke out a cutter in this game and hopes it gives him another pitch to use against LH batters.
Mason Black RHP tries to build his case for next season's rotation and goes for the sweep tonight facing Zac Gallen RHP.
In his interview today, FZ acknowledged that his job will be evaluated by ownership after the end of the season. I have mixed thoughts on FZ and whether he should be retained. To say this season is a disappointment is an understatement. Perhaps it's been even more disappointing than last season because expectations were higher. That's on FZ as much as anyone, probably more. On the other hand, FZ's situation and the Giants position as an organization reminds me a lot of 2008 and 2009 when about 90% of Giants fans were loudly calling for Brian Sabean to be fired but they had a young core of future stars rising rapidly in the farm system.
I personally think that Farhan is gone once the season ends and I could not agree with you more about Fitzgerald. I may be hoping against reason but I think that Schmidt can be a solid major leaguer and should be tried at second, since third is out. Defense will not be an issue and it will depend on his hitting, but I am curiuos about your thoughts on his future?
ReplyDeleteYoung Casey looks like a different player this time up. He's laying off pitches he used to swing at, working counts and drawing walks. Wish we had a little more time this season to see if he can sustain that. If he can I think he can turn into a heckuva player.
Delete7-3 last 10, 7-1 last 8, 5 wins in a row, 79-79 @ .500 for the first time since August, a shot @ 82 wins for the year, and a LOT to look forward to in 2025.
ReplyDeleteThe Farm is finally producing, especially pitching, the Core is Strong — Who in the World could the Giants bring in Now to replace FZ to attract a Top FA this off-season?
Good question. Seems like they finally established some forward momentum with young players and the farm system. Replacing FZ has potential to disrupt that.
DeleteCould add that all of the Giants losses since September 1 have been to teams that are either in the Playoffs: Milwaukee, Baltimore, and San Diego or still holding on (Arizona).
DeleteSF is over .500 for the last 3 months.
⅓ of their 24 losses have been by 1 run. Win just half of those and they would be in the Playoffs.
Agree good questions. I thought it was strange that FZ was even allowed to talk to beat writers with his job security in question talking about off season stuff. Doesn't seem right. If FZ is replaced,, you're also replacing alot of people working in the farm system.. Nothing would surprise me including adding another person to the front office. Maybe Chapman signing long term means he's ok with the direction of the team
DeleteFitz is gonna slime to second and batter Schmitty for starts. Kim is going to be our new SS.
ReplyDeleteNot so sure. Kim is currently out on IR and I read somewhere that he still can't throw. He's also had a down year at the plate. He does have a strong connection to Melvin and JHL, though so it's possible.
DeleteYikes, I hadn’t heard that! Apologies for the auto-finish above, I need to proof read better!
DeleteBoth of those young guys have a lot of defensive flexibility. Once the Eldridge Era starts, a bench unit consisting of Schmitt/Fitz, Wade Jr, and McCray/Matos is a lot of athleticism!
Meckler & Wisely can also factor into everyday player depth for team going forward (Sabol too?)
DeleteWilly Adames: just turned 29 yo, up year in 2024 but only 4th best of his career (OPS), 25 HRs/yr average (excluding 2020, but if scaled to full season, still 25), 21.4 career WAR — solidified infield with Fitz.
DeleteGo to the mat on this guy! Especially if Soto can't be pried away from the Yankees.
With Adames and Soto, Giants don't need Snell, although that would be nice :)
Bailey couldn’t hit worth a lick in the minor leagues. Joey Bart was also rushed up, he only had one minor league season where he showed potential but missed time with an injury that impacted his development Bd consistency. And Farhan rushed him up instead of trying to sign a FA for the short COVID season because of Posey opting out. So Bart also had to develop his bat in the majors which severely impacted his development. Bailey seems to get a pass from Giants fans because of the strong defense. But the guy can’t hit worth a lick and had more time in the minors than Bart did before getting throw in. And Bart still has the hitting potential and he couldn’t been a terrific compliment to Bailey. Signing the injury prone journeyman Murphy was such a dumb move. I get the idea of wanting to being in a veteran back up, but just because a guy is old and has been bouncing around the league for many years as a AAAA player/back up major leaguer doesn’t mean he’s going to fill the veteran void you think he’s going to fill.
ReplyDeleteI came this close to hitting the button on this comment. Your first sentence is demonstrably not true. Bailey did not hit for much of an average in the minors but he had a strong OBP and showed some pop with 12 HR in 325 PA in his second pro season. I agree Joey Bart's development was rushed and mishandled and I think he will haunt the Giants. Re. Murphy: I have liked his bat for a long time but was surprised at how bad his D was in a small sample. In retrospect, I think the "red flag" was his injury history. I think my biggest criticism of FZ's tenure is his apparent belief that injury history creates undervalued assets. Sometimes players bounce back from injuries but the biggest predictor of future injury is history of injury. If you depend on those players too much it will eventually bite you and hard.
DeleteIn 2020, Posey did not opt out until after the Covid suspension began, too late to do much of anything but push/rush Bart into the starting role after 2 good years at A and AA — no AAA.
DeleteBart had a good 2021 in AAA when Posey returned, but still wasn't ready to take over in 2022 when Posey prematurely retired with a year left on his contract.
In 2020, Giants took Bailey in the 1st round of the draft, perhaps with an eye on what was happening (or not happening) with Bart.
Bart had injury bugs and hitting woes in 2022 and 2023 and certainly did not look like the catcher of the future.
Bart's "outbreak" with the Pirates this year has been marred by 2 stints on the IL, and he has started but 12 games of the Pirates last 27, dating back to August 25th, striking out 27% of the time with 1 HR and a .662 OPS.
It's subjecture on how the #2 pick in 2018 would be backing up a younger and significantly better catcher.
It was time to cut ties and give Bart a fresh start somewhere else.
Incidentally, if you use the stathead.com comparison feature to pit Bart vs Murphy, you'll find the latter far the better in aggregate and percentage in every category and that's with Bart's good 2024.
https://stathead.com/baseball/versus-finder.cgi?player_id2=bart--000joe&player_id1=murphy004tom&request=1&utm_campaign=2023_01_wdgt_player_comparison&utm_source=br&utm_medium=sr_xsite&utm_id=murphto04
I do agree that replacing FZ has potential to disrupt the youth movement, but that’s no reason to keep a guy on the job running the ship when he’s obviously not the guy who want captianing your ship. I just would want ownership to make sure whoever the get to replace him, that they would get someone who’s vision is to ride with the youth movement and see who develops and build
ReplyDeletearound that.
I have always believed the most important job of a GM/POBO is to build sustained production in the farm system so if FZ has done that, and it sure looks like he has, he's the guy I want running the ship.
DeleteFZ and BM have 2025 to make something happen.
DeleteOwnership showed in 2024 they were willing to spend and will (probably) spend this year with so much money coming off the books — only $84.3M is committed (see Note at end), but no one but Snell is leaving that the Giants might want.
Fangraphs/Roster-Resource shows this somewhat differently: with the $257M luxury tax threshold in 2025, Giants have $136M committed, leaving $121M (per year) to spend before penalties.
At whom might the Giants "throw" some crazy money?
Surely, they will make a sky-high offer to Soto, but the Yankees have proven they will shoot higher for what they want, and SF will just bid them up.
Snell (like Chapman) is 31 yo, and the Giants threw 6 years at Chapman. Is Snell worth 6 years at $30M? No, but he'll probably get it.
Maybe a power IFer, especially since the Giants will most likely stick with Wade for another year, his last in arbitration which will get him a raise to $5M, +/-.
Would they go for SS Willy Adames (29 yo, 25 HR/yr): 7 years, $175M? That's similar to Chapman, 1 year longer for 2 years younger at a more premium position, but Chapman is better.
The Giants' late resurgence will make this an interesting off-season.
Note: Committed 2025 money (Chapman is not included in this so committed is ~$24M higher). See
https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/SFG/san-francisco-giants-salaries-and-contracts.shtml
Fangraphs:
https://www.fangraphs.com/roster-resource/payroll/giants
What do they do with the logjam at middle infield. Fitzpatrick, Schmidt, Wisely and Walton. (Sadly, I see Thairo as gone). If they pick up a SS on the fee agent market (Adames), then they one spot for 2B and one for a utility guy. I would go with Fitz and Schmidt.
ReplyDeleteKeeping Farhan would be good for continuity, but I’m just wondering if the whole over-swinging on second strike approach at the plate points to a larger problem. Possibly choosing someone like Kim Ng (or the Twins’ Thad Levine) might be a necessary reset for development within the whole organization. It still seems like the SF front office as it’s currently constructed likes playing mismatches and playing the percentages in terms of a long-ball dominated batting discipline way too much. If you’re going to keep Melvin, it would just seem to make a lot of sense to build an ops department fully on the same page as the coaches running things on the field. Right now, the club’s management of baseball operations just doesn’t seem well-aligned and fully coordinated. Thus, more players are bound to fall through the cracks.
ReplyDeleteIn FZ's defense, you have to wonder what this team looks like, and does, if he would have acquired one of the big fish he tried to land in FA over the years...Correa, Judge. Ohteni....he made a good faith effort to acquire all of them ( and technically did Correa). Put any of them into the mix, even at the expense of possibly another position FA signing, and the club looks different and it may have lead to other signings from those wanting to be on a more competitive team. Since ownership controls the purse strings, a case could be made that they could have stepped up their offers even more to acquire one of them. FZ isn't perfect but he has tried to build a team from the inside out with minor league talent, acquiring some "fillers" from FA and the churn, and then trying to swing for the fence with a big name. That's not a bad recipe to follow generally, just too much swing and miss in the big FA signing category.
ReplyDeleteBilly Baseball
Another chance this year: Soto
DeleteWas the game so bad yesterday that there will be no re-cap?
ReplyDeleteI retired last week so slept in a bit this AM. Just dropped.
DeleteAh, Happy Retirement, hope you enjoy yours as much as I have, now in my 25th year!
DeleteHappy retirement Doc! Hope you'll have more time to do the things you enjoy!
ReplyDelete