Final Free For All Mailbag of the 2023 Season!

...but not really final final!

There will, of course, be more mailbags. It feels like this has been a fun and successful addition to the site this year, and I like having a place to interact with my free subscribers as well as the regulars. However, after today, I’m shuttering the Post Office window for a good month or so, and probably won’t feature more than one of these a month during the offseason.

It seems like the timing is about right, too, as many of your questions are looking towards 2024 and the future. There will be plenty of time to talk about that — nearly six full months of it here as the offseason content gets ready to roll out starting next week.

For now, however, let’s see what’s on your minds as the minor league season comes to an end…

East Coast Giants

What sort of future do you see for PJ Hilson and Alexander Suarez? They both have struggled to get over the hump in San Jose and have lost playing time to folks like Bryce Eldridge and Scott Bandura. Do you think they get the push to Eugene next year or stay in SJ and where do the above mentioned 2023 guys go to start the year?

Not to go off on too much of a tangent right at the very start of today’s mailbag, but let me go off on a bit of a tangent here. Earlier in the year, I had a conversation with a member of the Giants’ organization that I’ve found myself, just like Nick Carraway, turning over in my mind ever since. We were discussing the astonishing turnarounds and amazing ascents of Patrick Bailey and Luis Matos, and the tricky balance that player development requires between patience and urgency. While it’s oft-noted and clearly true that development isn’t linear and players don’t all just get better continually at the same rate, this person noted that that truism can also be a convenient excuse for overlooking or accepting a player’s failure to improve. It’s not a coach’s job to be patient, they said, it’s their job to help guys get better.

As everybody in this game knows, it’s a results-oriented world. Both P.J. Hilson and Alex Suarez are loaded with physical tools and ability. They’re hard working and well-liked by everybody working and playing with them. But it’s true that their progress at developing their games has been slow and, as you note, that they lost playing time when the draft class showed up in San Jose this year — essentially, Hilson and Suarez moved into a time-sharing role with Bandura and Eldridge playing every day. With almost all of these guys likely ticketed for a return to San Jose next April, that could continue to be the case next year (though I’d expect center fielder Turner Hill to move on up).

In Suarez’ case, his 2022 season could be seen as a year in which he made some progress in the second half to build off of. But when 2023 came, he didn’t really move forward, instead producing a year that was either the same or even worse in a repeat year. In Hilson’s case, he actually did show progress over the second half of the year (particularly in bringing his raw power into games), that was also coming off of four years in the complex league (where Suarez really had just one).

The real issue that unites the two is that the flaw in their game is a heavy tendency to chase balls outside of the strike zone (Suarez and Hilson both have chase rates above 33% this year, and whiff rates near the 30% line). That leads to low walk rates and high strikeout rates. Thou Shalt Control the Strike Zone is the #1 commandment in this organization, and neither of these kids have really shown the ability to make gains in that aspect of their game.

So, what sort of future does that leave for the pair? I suspect that means that both are working themselves into the position of having to earn their playing time. When they get opportunities to play — as they will — they’ll need to show improvements in their process and swing decisions, and they’ll need to have more success. Like everyone in baseball, you have to get better to keep moving forward. It’s a tough gig, but everybody in it knows the score.

In one sense, it’s about to get even tougher, as next year the domestic reserve list will drop from 180 down to 165, obviously cutting 15 active roster jobs from every organization. That probably means even more players landing on 60-day IL and “Full Season” injured list, but it also means that some players will get even less run before they fall victim to the cut line.

Small Winged Yeti

Not exactly a prospect question... would you expect Blake Sabol to stay with the big club next year (or most of)?

Yes, absolutely. I think the Giants have made it very clear how much they like and value Sabol — a player whom I described last December in my Rule 5 preview as “the type of player [who is] created in a laboratory with the specific intent of capturing Farhan Zaidi’s interest.”

I’ve seen a few fans opine that once the Rule 5 restrictions are off of Sabol, he will be sent straight to the minors and replaced with a more traditional backup catcher. And while I certainly understand how much the Giants value options and optionability, I think the fact that Sabol isn’t a traditional backup catcher is exactly what they like about him so much. The value he brings to the roster, in not taking up an entire roster spot just being a backup catcher, is the feature, not the bug. Along with his left-handed power and solid matchup bat, his versatility is the feature that will keep him on this roster if he can continue to provide close to a league average bat (or better). For what it’s worth, his barrel rate is by far the best of any of the Giants’ rookies, at 11.8%. That’s more than enough to make up for the various weak spots in his game. I also think they really like his personality and the way he fits in the locker room character. I would expect him to be a pretty steady part of the 2024 roster.

Joe Casitore

Why does the Giants’ front office not value Heliot Ramos…and please do not tell me that it is because he was selected by another regime. With all the player churn this current Giants brain trust goes through, it is obvious that they don’t care where potentially productive players come from!

I think that, first, I should push back a little bit on the underlying assumption there. To say that they put other players on the 40-man roster above him in their internal evaluations (which is clearly true) is very much NOT the same thing as saying that they don’t value him. Everybody on the precious 40-man is there because the organization values them and sees worth in them. If the Giants placed no value on Ramos, he wouldn’t be on this roster, nor would he be taking up any major league at bats, as he has done this year.

The question, then, is: why do they value (or trust) other players more highly than they do Ramos? And this, I think, is a really good question. When KNBR’s Danny Emerman was on my podcast, we talked about this issue at length, and Danny was clearly of the opinion that the Giants haven’t given Ramos much of a chance to impress. It was lost on neither of us that Ramos has never gotten anything like the full-throated, public plea for patience that Manager Gabe Kapler had at the time voiced for Wade Meckler, whose promotion in response to an IL setback for Mike Yastrzemski was a clear signal of the organization’s lack of faith in Ramos’ improvement this year.

The comparison between Ramos and Meckler is an apt one, I think, for answering your question. All of the things that Meckler does well, prompting his rapid ascent through the Giants’ system, are the things that stand out as weaknesses in Ramos’ game. Where Meckler’s success is based on not swinging at balls and hitting strikes, Ramos’ 36% chase rate is one of the higher ones in the system this year. Ramos’ tremendous strength allows him to make some of the hardest contact in the organization, and he’s made huge strides at improving his launch angle and getting that hard contact up into the air where it can do damage. But his swing decisions and his contact rate — both overall and in the strike zone — are exactly the kind of flaws in an offensive profile that the Giants’ front office distrusts most.

You’re absolutely right that the club doesn’t care where talent comes from. It makes no difference to them that Mike Yastrzemski and Thairo Estrada came to them from other organizations, rather than developing from within. Where the “previous regime” issue can have some relevance is when it defines an underlying philosophical difference. The Giants are happy to find talent anywhere, but they have a pretty specific idea of the kind of talent they’re looking for.

(Make up for my mistake of posting the wrong Ramos video last time! Not just the wrong video, the wrong Ramos!)

Jonathan

What's the long-term prognosis for Carson Whisenhunt? I read he's expected to make a full recovery and be ready for spring training next year which is fantastic, but how much does this increase the likelihood for a Tommy John down the road? Will Whisenhunt have to adjust as a pitcher in response if it does increase risk of an injury?

Whisenhunt was placed on the IL with what was described as an elbow sprain back on August 1. At that time, the Giants said they would reevaluate him in four weeks. I’ve made some inquiries since then, and heard he was progressing well and on track for a normal winter and spring. Alex Pavlovic, I believe, reported something similar at the beginning of the month. So far at least, it sounds like the worst fears that spring to mind when “elbow sprain” is mentioned have been avoided. In that sense, there’s nothing for him to make a “full recovery” from at this point. Elbow sprains are obviously worrisome issues for pitchers in that they can lead to other, much worse, diagnoses, but so far that hasn’t been the case for Whisenhunt.

I don’t really know how to answer your second question, other than to say that the likelihood of Tommy John surgery is something of a Sword of Damocles that hangs over every pitch of every pitcher’s career. It’s always hanging there, just above the mound, and nobody really knows when or if it will fall. The industry hasn’t really made much progress at determining likelihood or warning signs, other than a general understanding that increased velocity is the element that puts the most stress on the elbow, and, thus, is a primary element in pitcher injuries. The UCL is good until it isn’t anymore and when it isn’t anymore, it needs to get repaired. It’s the creepy crawly hiding underneath the bed that pitchers successfully put out of their minds every time they toe the rubber.

That said, current thought in the industry doesn’t seem to be inclining towards making adjustments to reduce risk. Quite the opposite. As I said, teams and players know perfectly well that increased velocity is a significant factor in pitcher injuries — but they also know that there’s a direct corollary between velocity and pitcher effectiveness. When it comes to the balance between risk and productivity, it’s crystal clear which is the path most taken, as the arms race to add velo marches on almost universally.

Anyway, I think all of that is somewhat getting ahead of our particular story. To the best of my knowledge, Whisenhunt is still on the rest and rehab train, and expected to be ready to compete for a plum assignment in the spring, and genuine worries that the club had of Tommy John have been put to bed for now — a bed that is hopefully creepy crawly free.

Dennis Touros

Do you think MLB made a mistake in designating the Northwest League as High A, given the weather, and limited number of teams? Not to mention the Giants' specific situation sharing the Eugene ballpark with the Oregon Ducks. Still hard to fathom that the venerable California League with the great weather and history would not be a better place to develop High A minor league prospects. And if MLB made a mistake, would they change it?  

I’ve never quite understood exactly why the Cal League was made the Low A league and the Northwest League the High A, though I suppose it simply had to do with the complicated logistics of trying to create four equal, 30-team levels. I have heard many times that MLB did propose to the Dodgers and Athletics (the two organizations which are part of the Cal but not part of the NWL) that they join the NWL. Both declined, preferring to keep their teams in the Midwest League. That creates obvious complications. If you want the Cal League to be High A, then what do you do with the Rancho Cucamonga (Dodgers) and Stockton (A’s) teams, since those teams already have High A affiliates elsewhere? Do you make the Midwest League a Low A league (as it used to be)? That obviously creates cascading problems for the other 10 teams in that league. It’s a puzzle, and, like schedule creation, it’s a puzzle in which every seemingly “simple” solution to one issue creates complicated problems everywhere else.

Speaking of the Midwest League, I do think that the weather element in the NWL is somewhat overplayed. Yes, it is cold and wet in the spring. However, the NWL is by no means the only league with serious weather challenges — and I don’t think it has much of an argument as the worst weather league in the minors to be honest. The Midwest League, which includes clubs in Michigan and Wisconsin, certainly can match the NWL for cold and rainy (or snowy) springs — and a midwest spring can really hang on into the summer. At higher levels, the Eastern League and International League both include clubs that play in the far northeast (Portland, Maine, for instance, or Rochester, NY), while the PCL includes a large handful of teams that play at elevation, many thousands of feet high in the mountains.

In July and August, when the northwest summer mellows into a long string of absolutely glorious nights of temperate, cool weather, basically every league east of the Mississippi River is played in a miasma of heat and humidity that saps the soul and makes a body question one’s will to live, much less perform at a high level of athletic ability. When everything is placed in the balance, the weather in the NWL doesn’t come off so bad.

Really, the fundamental issue was this: MLB wanted to create a more rational geographic setup for the minors. When the Nats, for instance, were left with a Triple A team in Fresno, they literally never sent any of their prospects to that level, instead populating it with a collection of minor league free agents they never used or cared for. It was just too much of a logistical hassle for them to try to transport players back and forth across the country at a moment’s notice. Think about the way the Giants shuttle players back and forth to Sacramento, and then imagine how complicated that would be if that Triple A club was located in Augusta, GA, or Richmond, VA.

Regional coherence is a good and worthy goal — and certainly furthers the emphasis on improving conditions for players, since moving back and forth across the country can be really hard on them in terms of rest, sleep schedule, and other important elements of being at one’s physical best. It’s also a goal that is vastly easier to achieve for teams in the eastern half of the United States — because that’s where the majority of minor league cities exist. There just aren’t that many towns that have proven to support minor league ball west of the Rockies — there are no Double A teams at all in the Western part of the US, which is why I get to watch the Giants’ prospects come through Richmond every year. The California League itself has been downsized by a third over the last decade, as teams disappeared and/or moved east. Creating a logical geographic affiliate structure is much harder for teams on the West Coast, and it is always going to be much harder. There’s just no way around it. The cities, the facilities, the fans needed to support minor league baseball just aren’t in large supply. That’s fundamentally why the west coast teams mostly play together in two tiny A ball leagues, while prospects on the other 22 clubs get a much broader diversity of competition coming up.

As to your final question — would MLB change things — I think it’s very clear what MLB’s desired solution for these issues is. They want to reduce the number of minor league teams further — as they’ve repeatedly requested in CBA discussions with both the major and minor league PA. At some point in the future, MLB is eyeing a 90-team affiliate structure (or 96 if MLB has expanded to 32 teams by them) that eliminates the High A/Low A distinction. When that day comes, I wouldn’t be surprised if the venerable California League ends up the winner of West Coast A level baseball, as you suggest it should be. But when and how we get there? That’s a tougher call.

PGBreaker

The international signings that included Luis Matos, Marco Luciano and Jairo Pomares, if you had been told that one of them would be a sometime starter on the big club, would you say that matched expectations? I know all of them have a decade or so of productive careers ahead of them, but if Matos is the only one of that class to make it (and stay a big leaguer), would that still be considered a good outcome? And would you say the 4th member of note from that class Victor Bericoto had a similar year to what we might have seen an uninjured Pomares produce?

If I had been told that one of them would be a sometime starter on the club by the age of 21, I would certainly have been pleased by the news! Thank you, traveler from the future, I’d say gratefully. Though greedy info hog that I am, I’d probably follow up with: “can you tell me about age 25?”

As players are seldom fully formed at the age of 21, I wouldn’t expect that the final word on the group has been written just yet. That said, anytime you get a major league outcome of any stripe out of a 16-year-old (and let’s not kid ourselves, these agreements were made significantly earlier than that even, so you’re talking about projections on 14 year olds or younger), you have to take it as a fantastic outcome. Getting two major leaguers (as I still suspect the Giants will, though I’ll admit I’d like to see Luciano swing and miss a bit less often) is a Shoot The Moon kind of outcome, and if Bericoto wants to add himself to the list as well, it would be a the kind of haul that makes careers. If three members of an international or draft class put on a uni and contribute in some way, it’s a tremendous outcome. Remember that, until very recently, players like Hector Sanchez and Francisco Peguero were jockeying for the honor of being called the second or third most productive players the Giants had developed internationally this century.

You can have all the scouting grades, projection models, and hopes and dreams in the world, but you can never really expect that a 16-year-old is going to turn into a really good major leaguer. The journey is too long, too hard, and too fraught with lurking dangers.

So, yes, while it would certainly be disappointing if Luciano failed to turn his prodigious abilities into a sustained major league career, getting one major leaguer out of any international class is a victory, no doubt about it (and cheers to Camilo Doval for carrying the banner for that Class of ‘15 so proudly!). Just to make an obvious comparison, the 2008 draft is accurately considered one of the greatest draft hauls in franchise history, and that legacy is almost (but not quite) entirely based on two players: Buster Posey and Brandon Crawford. One good major leaguer in a class is always a win.

With that said, from a prospect development and value perspective, there was a time when you could imagine Luciano ascending to the top of prospect rankings, potentially finding himself the top prospect in baseball. Things have not broken that way for a variety of reasons, and Luciano has generally trended downwards in most prospect rankings over the past couple of years (for what it’s worth, I dangled Luciano in a couple of trade offers in my fantasy league this year, and the amount of apathy his name generated was truly depressing for me). That won’t matter if he develops into an impactful major leaguer, but it’s been disappointing to watch nonetheless, and certainly has impacted the Giants ability to engage in some high-level trade talks (for Juan Soto, for example).

As to the final question, Bericoto came very close to a 30 homer season with half of those coming in Double A. He produced an above average batting line in Double A while being extremely young for the level. I don’t know that I necessarily would have “expected” such a Double A campaign for Pomares — who, after all, had a somewhat middling season in Eugene with a red flag 32% strikeout rate — but it would certainly have been a fantastic outcome for Pomares if he were able to reach that same level of power. Assuming Pomares is able to join Richmond in 2024, he’ll be in a different position, with regard to age vs level. Pomares was older than the rest of that class, due to the time involved in his flight from Cuba, and is already 23 years old. So he would be basically age appropriate to the level if he can start there next spring.

MikeH

Have you heard any early rumors/news re: International Draft and any 'significant' names?

Which leads us seamlessly into this question! Sorry to say, but I haven’t picked up anything on this year’s class. Last year I had heard about Arias very early (almost a year ahead, if I recall correctly), but this year, nothing’s come my way. They try to be pretty circumspect about that, so if you’re not actually in the DR looking at who’s on campus, it can be pretty tough to get that info. The Giants went shopping in the high-rent district in each of the past two years (getting decidedly different results thus far), and I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see them continue that trend next year.

rb

Maybe I'm late, but even though Bryce Eldridge was drafted as a 1B on the position player side, does his athleticism suggest he could play corner OFs (or even CF!! a la Cody Bellinger!)

Also, this is more speculative, but what major changes do you think the Giants make in handling prospects next year? This year they go a lot more aggressive with promotions.

I’m not sure you want to be making radical changes every year. Seems like a hard way to develop continuity and start to get a handle on what works and what doesn’t! And honestly, I’m not so sure that the kind of promotions we saw this year are really sustainable year over year if for no other reason than the 40-man won’t really permit it. Of the 11 rookies who made their big league debut on the club this year, five weren’t on the 40-man when the season started, and there’s only so much of that kind of addition a roster can handle. So I wouldn’t expect to see a whole new wave of players fly up from Richmond to San Francisco in this coming season.

The other major change that we saw this year was the handling of pitchers, and that I think we will see continue next year, with very few pitchers ever throwing more than 80 pitches or 5 innings in game, and that only late in the year. In each of the past two seasons, we’ve seen the Giants move college arms from Low A San Jose to Double A Richmond in the course of the year. I think the new model there is that once they’ve identified pitchers as having pitch shapes that will work in the majors, they want to move them quickly and not burn up arms.

But beyond those things, I think we’ll see a lot of the same stuff the org has been doing the last few years: focus on strength and conditioning for the body and data-guided preparation for the mind. The org believes in data collection to guide development plans — for instance, the Giants have all hitters use a device that measures their bat speed once a week during BP sessions and are starting to get into weighted bat training to help increase bat speed. They work on pitch shapes and grip experimentation with pitchers to try to help pitchers find an outlier shape that will give them an edge. All of that kind of thing will continue apace.

The bigger question (and this is something I’m curious about myself) is whether GM Pete Putila will look to bring in some of his own people this winter. In Farhan Zaidi’s regular Thursday conversation on KNBR last week, Zaidi answered a question on Gabe Kapler’s job security by saying, “not trying to punt on the question, but we’ve got a number of employees whose contracts are up this year — that’s always the priority.” That would seem to be pointing a finger at other departments of the organization, possibly including the player development group. So it might be that the biggest change in PD will involve personnel.

As for Eldridge, he’s been playing RF consistently this year and the reports on that would seem to be that it’s a work in progress, but doesn’t seem beyond his abilities given some time and work. Obviously, Eldridge has the arm for it. He’s still learning reads and routes and the intricacies of outfield play, and he’s obviously a very big kid, which suggests some limited mobility when he begins to mature. So far I don’t think the Giants have seen anything that has scared them away from playing him in the outfield, though certainly nobody is comparing his speed and athleticism to Cody Bellinger.

Joseph Young

I was surprised at a recent article in The Athletic that rated the Giants rookie class this year at the middle of the pack. Not a shock to see the Reds and Orioles rated higher, but half the league? I thought we were witnessing a generational wave hit the top club. I assume you read the same piece. Do you have a take?

As I suppose is true of my most people of my generation, my mom taught me not to say anything about somebody if I didn’t have anything good to say, so I’ll avoid commenting on the author of that piece, former Reds and Nats GM, Jim Bowden.

I was a little surprised at how low the Giants group was placed in that article, but I wouldn’t say I was shocked or outraged. I do think national pieces like that are important context for fans, who tend to live and die with their own clubs and suffer from some myopia when it comes to others. Those among you who play fantasy might realize that the Guardians have gotten more 60 high quality starts from rookie pitchers this year (Gavin Williams, Tanner Bibbee, and Logan Allen providing most of them), or that the Mets have a rookie pitcher in the Cy Young Award race (Kodai Senga) and a rookie catcher (Francisco Alvarez) who is going to get a lot of ROY votes, or how important Josh Jung has been to the Rangers’ offense, or even that the damned Dodgers have gotten a good deal more production (at least seen through the lens of WAR) from their rookie class than the Giants have. Indeed, Dodgers’ outfielder James Outman by himself has been a little more productive than all of the Giants’ rookies put together in fWAR’s estimation.

That’s true, too, of the D’backs, led by certain Rookie of the Year candidate, Corbin Carroll (5.2 fWAR), but also getting value from catcher Gabriel Moreno (1.6), an assortment of athletic outfielders, and a pitching staff that has gotten more than 60 starts from rookies (with not quite as much quality as the Guardians group). Even the Rockies team that handed out such misery this weekend has received a lot of promising rookie contributions — and I wouldn’t be shocked if Ezequiel Tovar proves a better player in the long run than most or all of the Giants’ group. He’s really good! If you’re just following your own team day by day, many of those outside stories stay stubbornly out of sight (until you blow up on twitter one day because you’re a Mets writer who doesn’t know who Patrick Bailey is).

Here’s the thing I think we have to understand about the very large class of rookies that have played such a large role in the Giants’ season: while they should hopefully represent the future direction of the club with at least some of them assembling into a core, in 2023, most of them have had rather limited value. If you base your judgement on Fangraphs’ version of WAR — and there are pros and cons to that, but it offers a useful one-stop-shop perspective — then only three members of the rookie class have really given the team significant value: Patrick Bailey (3.0 WAR), Ryan Walker (1.0), and Blake Sabol (0.8). Keaton Winn, whose two starts in the last week have moved him from essentially replacement level up to 0.5 fWAR would seem to be making a late case to join that trio. Tristan Beck’s 0.2 is slightly above what’s called “replacement level,” but the precision of that number isn’t really so fine as to make that a meaningful distinction (also, relief pitchers don’t always do well by that measurement). The same goes for guys like Marco Luciano, Wade Meckler (-0.1), and Kyle Harrison (-0.1), whose extremely brief time in the majors wasn’t really long enough to establish meaningful value.

Luis Matos and Casey Schmitt have a lot of potential to become good major league players in the future. But, according to WAR, they certainly weren’t that in 2023, when both actually provided negative value, -0.3 for Matos and -0.8 for Schmitt (that places Schmitt among the 20 or 30 least productive players in the majors this year). Brett Wisely, who also got an extended run of playing time, is right between that pair, at -0.5.

If you use Baseball Reference’s version of WAR, by the way, things get even worse, as it agrees with Fangraphs that most of the Giants’ rookies have been replacement level or worse, but also sees Bailey as far less valuable than fWAR does at just 1.3 (this is because BRef’s version of WAR doesn’t incorporate framing metrics — in the case of catchers, it’s best to trust Fangraphs, in my opinion). In fact, in BRef’s WAR, Walker has actually been the most productive rookie to play for the Giants this year. The sidewinder certainly has had a great season, but when a middle reliever is your most productive rookie player, then it probably hasn’t been a real breakout year for the group.

I don’t want to make this all about WAR however. There are plenty of other ways to view the Giants’ rookie class. They’ve generated much of the enthusiasm for this team that we’ve seen this year, and given the team itself a lot of energy. Bailey’s influence on the pitching staff and in controlling the running game (not to mention his penchant for clutch hitting) have had an outsized influence on the team’s fortunes, and I think Harrison and Winn can be real parts of the starting rotation going forward (Beck could possibly be part of that picture, too). But clearly, for this group to help the team compete in the near-term future, several of them are going to have to make significant improvements next year — which is the natural way of rookies coming up to the majors. It takes awhile to get up the learning curve. It’s no coincidence, for instance, that the Giants’ three-month offensive slump began during a stretch that saw the club penning lineups that included four or five rookies lined up together in the 5-9 slots. It simply became impossible for the team to sustain rallies with half of their lineup contributing minimal production with the bat (which isn’t to say that vets were exactly carrying the freight during that period either).

If Giants’ fans are going to look back at this season as one of those epochal shifts in fortune (the way I do now with the 2008 season), then it will be because these talented youngsters improved significantly in the coming years. Certainly, looking around the baseball landscape, there are, in fact, a lot of teams that got more “now” production value from their rookies this year than the Giants did.

To answer your question: promising wave? Yes! Wave that hopefully points to a better future? Yes! “Generational wave?” No. That’s for Baltimore to gloat about.

Scott C.

Roger, thank you so much for doing these mailbags. They’ve been appointment reading each week. Your thoughtful analysis is tremendous.

Let’s work off the idea that the Giants will try to trade for an established, above-average hitter or two to boost next year’s lineup. (Assumptions: they’re sorely lacking in impact hitters, it’s a weak free agent class sans Ohtani, and the team likely needs a playoff berth in 2024 for Farhan Zaidi’s regime to continue—so pursuing a trade seems prudent.)

In my view, the Giants need to be open to trading premium assets. So, I’m hoping you will handicap the potential outgoing players. Which Giants rookies and minor leaguers (say your top-20 prospects) do you suspect Farhan & Co. value more than trade partners might? Which players—even top-ranked guys—do you feel the brass doesn’t view as highly as other teams might?

Thank you very kindly, Scott. I’ve had a lot of fun doing them.

I’m sure they’d love to add impact hitters to the lineup this winter — just as they thought they were doing last year when they signed Michael Conforto and Mitch Haniger, who still might be the answer to your question. Of course, adding impact talent via trade is a lot easier said than done — teams typically like to keep the impact bats they already have, and most teams in the winter are looking to add to their major league roster, not subtract, so they’d be looking for big league help in return for anybody they shipped off. For that reason, I always tend to think that the most likely players to trade for major leaguers in the winter time are other major leaguers. J.D. Davis, LaMonte Wade, Jr., Mike Yastrzemski or, heaven help us, Thairo Estrada — those are the kind of players who can really help move needles in winter trade talks (and I could see both Davis and Wade being movable, given the current roster, even though the Giants clearly value both). If you want impact in the winter, you need to be prepared to give up current impact in return.

But I know that you’re looking for prospect talk, so let me turn attention there.

I’m not sure I’d frame things in terms of which players the Giants might value more than other teams, or which ones other teams might value more. Obviously, I wrote above about why the Giants might not trust Ramos as much as some other players, but I don’t want to leave the impression that they’re the only team that has discovered the magic elixir of swing decisions. EVERY TEAM is looking for players with good swing decisions, and they all look at basically the same numbers in determining those evaluations. The Giants probably hyper-focus on controlling the zone more than some other teams, but everybody does value throwing strikes and not swinging at balls.

Still, I do think Ramos and Joey Bart are two players who make a lot of sense to be included in trade talk this winter. Though both have pedigree, which means they will have their fans around the game, but neither appears to be high on the Giants’ trust list. Bart’s situation with the Giants is worse, because he’s out of options, but both have been bypassed on the organizational depth chart this year. If you’re looking at subtle distinctions in how organizations view players, Ramos does remind me of the type of player the Rays often seek to acquire — they have a long track record of liking players who hit the ball hard regardless of things like launch angle, ground ball rate, or even strikeout rate. So I could see some matchup there (although, beware to anybody who sells low on their prospects to the Rays!).

Beyond that, I think that the pressure is definitely going to be on the front office to improve next year, as you rightly say, and I think if the opportunity came to acquire real quality impact, especially if it comes with some years of control, they might be willing to move almost anybody from the farm. I wouldn’t be shocked to see them move Luciano, to be honest, even though the ceiling there has to be so appealing. If they could coax a 30 HR season out of him while keeping him at short — that would be incredibly valuable. Still, the strikeouts and the IL stints have to raise some concerns internally, I would think.

I think you could probably say something of the same about guys like Grant McCray, Aeverson Arteaga, Victor Bericoto, or Tyler Fitzgerald — all of whom might have enough questions in controlling the zone that the Giants might not prioritize keeping them in house. That’s not to say that the club doesn’t value these players, or think they’re future contributors at the big league level. But you don’t get talent without giving it in return.

But maybe it’s more likely that the Giants would dangle pitching as a sweetener in potential deals. It’s the clear organizational strength right now, and as they begin to stack up more candidates who look like big league assets, they might be willing to use some of the rawer, less refined arms as trade chips — guys like Gerelmi Maldonado, for instance, or Manuel Mercedes, even Hayden Birdsong.

To be honest, however, I’m not sure I see where a deal like this is really out there. The A’s bake sale appears to be shuttered for now, and I don’t know that anybody else out there is knocking down to the studs and has a young impact bat to deal right now. It could be that the real “go for it” move would be to try to swing a deal for Mike Trout, if the Angels indeed look to move that contract. That would be a deal where the Giants’ presumed financial flexibility would be a lot larger factor than their farm system, and that could end up being the best asset the club has right now.

Small Winged Yeti

From what you have seen or heard, what made Gregory Santos so much better this year?

The defense of Matos and Schmitt were so highly rated when they were in the minors, it surprised me that they kind of struggled in the big league. Should we consider this as normal growing pain or is it something more?

I thought Santos was pretty darned good last year, to be honest. When he was slinging 100+ mph fastballs and a slider that could break knees, he looked like a big league arm to me. His command wasn’t outstanding, but I don’t know that you could really see a significant difference between Santos’ ability to throw strikes last year and Camilo Doval’s in 2021. Santos also spent a bit of last year on the IL, which is probably an important part of the story.

What made him better this year? I’d say probably opportunity as much as anything. The ability to stick on the roster and go out there and compete for 60-70 innings is a very valuable master’s course. The fact that so much awful stuff was happening around him on the White Sox team that he could hardly fail to look good by comparison probably hasn’t hurt any either. Major league coaching is really good, even in a dysfunctional environment like the White Sox (whose pitching coach, Ethan Katz, was a member of Gabe Kapler’s original staff in San Francisco), and major league hitters are the best pitching coaches in the world. Sometimes (but not always!), all it takes for things to click is a little opportunity.

As for your second question, I think those are two different situations. With Matos, I really do think it’s just an adjustment to the level. Major leaguers hit the ball harder than minor leaguers, and the stadium environments are very different. Though Matos always plays with a swagger, I think there have been times this year where he’s maybe felt a little overwhelmed, as we can imagine any 21-year-old would be. I’d be surprised if the defensive issues he’s had this year were really indicative of future problems.

For Schmitt, I think it’s mostly the result of spreading him thin and playing him out of position so much. Without a doubt, I differ personally from the Giants on this issue, and equally without a doubt, the people who run that team are much smarter and more informed than me. Still, I’ve never really been a fan of Schmitt’s defensive fit in the middle infield. He has really good instincts and first step quickness, but middle infield really does require footspeed over longer ranges of space, and that’s where I think Schmitt falls short. That’s not a knock on him, playing out position will naturally expose some weaknesses. And I think the cascading effect is that in trying to get him up to speed at shortstop and 2b costs him time to work on his 3b defense so he hasn’t shown his real worth there either. The Giants philosophy is to push the defensive envelope so as to maximize offensive value at every position. That has made for a long difficult year for Schmitt, who has really struggled a bit on both sides of the equation.

I do understand the Giants’ desire to make Schmitt a middle infielder, however, because there’s always been a concern on the part of scouts as to whether his bat had enough impact for 3b (as I noted last year in my Top 50 writeup for Casey). If the glove can handle the SS/2b parts of the defensive spectrum, then the demands on his offense will be less. It’s really hard to be a good starting 3b without having real power and a bat that performs in the 115-130 range of wRC+. So I get the idea behind it, but I don’t think it’s ended up doing Schmitt any favors this year.

Daniel

Given Kyle Harrison's struggles in his past few starts (his lowered fastball velocity was concerning), is it safe to say the Giants' plan to monitor his innings closely so that he would be ready for the stretch run didn't work? Or did his injury play a role in their plan not working out? Furthermore, would you say the Giants' plan to limit innings for all pitchers proved effective overall?

You’re always hiking in a quagmire when you try to wade into the cause and effect behind pitchers’ wavering stuff. I don’t think there’s any doubt that Harrison’s ill-timed leg strain impacted the Giants plans for him. Missing an entire month of the second half certainly foreshortened the club’s ability to prepare Harrison for the stretch run and they certainly did ramp him up quickly, going from about 40 pitches in his first two Sacramento starts post-injury, to three consecutive 90 pitch efforts in the majors starting just 10 days later.

In the last of those, Harrison did see a drop in fastball velocity, and, more tellingly, a lot more foul balls and fewer swing and misses on the pitch. Some of that, as Harrison said, was mechanical — once he adjusted his arm slot in his final start, the velo ticked back up a bit. But it is very hard to avoid thinking that the fast ramp up had some effect on the life of his best pitch.

And certainly, as you say, whether its blameworthy or just the way things worked out, the Giants didn’t end up with the outcome they were looking for. On multiple occasions this year when asked about the handling of Harrison on KNBR, Zaidi emphasized that the team’s priority was to have him strong at the end of the year. In the end, that’s not what they got (at least not yet; there is still a slim chance for a final act in Harrison’s season). Whether that was a failure of plan, a failure of execution, or simple bad luck, the results weren’t what the team was trying to achieve (as can be said of so much this year). From “the best laid schemes o’ mice and men” to “no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy,” there’s a whole sub-genre of accumulated human wisdom on the ways that solid plans can come to naught. I’m sure we can all relate to the truth of that in our own experience.

On the broader question, I just don’t think that there’s any way to judge those efforts in a single year. This is an experiment that is going to play out over years and it will take that long to determine the efficacy. There’s a balance they’re trying to achieve: give enough reps to facilitate development without providing so many that health is compromised. They believe they can identify pitch shapes and quality that can have success in the major leagues, and once they do that, they don’t want to waste a lot of bullets in the minors.

Is that the best approach? Ask me in 10 years. For now, there are clear arguments that can be made on both sides of the issue, but I don’t know that we have anywhere nearly enough data to hazard a determination.

Daniel

In your opinion, should the Giants slot Kyle Harrison, Keaton Winn and/or Mason Black into the 2024 Opening Day rotation, rather than blocking them with underperforming veterans like Anthony DeSclafani and Ross Stripling? Do any of them have anything left to prove at AAA?

That’s probably a little aggressive. I don’t know that a rotation full of rookies is a strategy with a long track record of success in major league history. It would also set the team up for issues in the second half, when these young pitchers would almost certainly be running into workload restrictions. Consider that Harrison has thrown just 90 innings this year and Winn just 95. Setting them both up to be crossing the 100 IP barrier somewhere in July or August of next year might be a recipe for real trouble if the team has totally cast its fate behind an assemblage of young arms.

That said, I’d certainly love to see both Harrison and Winn play significant roles next year, and I think the Giants will bring both to camp with chances to compete for significant spots next spring. It certainly seems as though the Giants want to establish Harrison as a key member of the pitching rotation as soon as they can. But if I had to guess how things will play out, I can see more tandem starts and piggy-backing with Stripling, Desclafani, Tristan Beck, and potentially Sean Manaea involved to try to carry the load over the course of the year.

Black, to me, is in a different category, more akin to where Beck and Winn were at the start of this year (albeit without being on the 40-man). He’s getting close to big league ready, but I certainly wouldn’t consider him a clear major league starter right now. Send him to Triple A and let him build his case for being called up.

Do they have anything left to prove? Well, all three have ERAs in the upper 4.00s, so I guess they haven’t completely bullied the league just yet. It’s a tough league, but Tim Lincecum had an 0.29 ERA there! More important than what they have to prove, all have things they can be working on getting better at. Harrison has improved his strike throwing, but still can make strides there (and seems to have something he needs to figure out against big league lefties — potentially a tipping issue). Winn could still stand to find a third pitch with some lateral movement. Black needs to clean up his non-competitive pitches, get in the strike zone a little more frequently, and cut down on the gopher balls a little. There are always things to be improving upon in this game, and none of the three can quite call himself a full-time big leaguer just yet, though the time may be close…..

And that’s it, folks. The mailbag is being put away for a few weeks. I’ll probably open the post office again in about a month, and see what’s tickling your off-season curiosity. By that time, the Arizona Fall League should be up and running, and we’ll have other things to interest ourselves in.

For now, the Richmond club has a championship to pursue. So if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to a little post-season Batting Practice! See you at the ballyard! Since Thursday is going to be a dark day here, I’ll put up this week’s podcast on that day (plan to get some players today before the playoffs start). Next week I’ll probably have two pods, including another of my conversations with Kerry Crowley.

For those of you who are wondering, Richmond’s Game 1 starter is, as we had supposed, Carson Seymour. The team announced the entire pitching plan for the first series yesterday, and happily, we’ll see Birdsong for sure in this series as well.