It's the All Star Break Edition of the Free For All Mailbag

Hello, All Stars! Tonight is one of the jewel events of the MLB season, and, for the first time since 2016 (when both Buster Posey and Brandon Belt logged at bats), there’s a chance that we could see two Giants take part in the Midsummer Classic. The fact that both are homegrown Giants makes it all that much sweeter. Did you know that there was a solid decade between Rod Beck in 1997 and Brian Wilson in 2008 when the Giants didn’t have a single All Star representative who had come up through their farm system? Things have gotten a lot better on that score since then, as 13 home grown players have been named a total of 32 times to All Star teams between 2008-2024.

That makes this a pretty happy occasion for a There R Giants’ mailbag — are there future All Stars discussed herein? Perhaps! And that’s where the fun is. I do think that the general tone of mailbag questions has turned towards the positive after a rough first couple of months, which makes them more enjoyable for me to answer — though whether they’re any more enjoyable for you to read I can’t say.

But speaking of reading, all this week I’m celebrating the All Star break by offering annual subscriptions to new There R Giants’ subscribers at 30% off the normal price (that’s just $49). If you want to read much, MUCH more than I can fit in these mailbags, why not join? I’ll have Mid-Season All Stars, a new look at the prospect rankings, draft coverage and more coming this week, and I’d love to send it all to your Inbox!

And with that, let’s crack open the bag and see what’s inside…

Kent Iverson

Hi Roger,

Thank you for the very informative draft primer! You have provided comments about this in different pieces over the year, but I would be interested in reading your interim assessment of the Giants' 2023 draft.

Hi Kent. I do think someone asked me this just a couple of weeks ago, so I’ll give you the thumbnail version of my answer this time.

My long-held belief has always been that the single most important aspect of any draft is to nail the top of it, and the Giants certainly appear to have done so in 2023. Bryce Eldridge has been little short of a human up arrow since the Giants took him with the 16th pick last year. That’s good! And Joe Whitman has looked every bit like the steal that the Giants thought they were getting in the 2nd round. Walker Martin has had his struggles in his first season, but is still a very impressive and imposing young man and athlete. And then you get some interesting tools in later rounds from folks like Maui Ahuna, Josh Bostick, and Jose Ortiz — not necessarily any late round breakouts on the scale of Hayden Birdsong or Landen Roupp yet, but definitely good building blocks.

For a year in which the team had neither advantageous drafting position not a big bonus pool to work with, that seems like pretty great early returns. Now we’ll see what happens as they cook.

Scott C.

There’s been much discussion in the last couple of years about the org’s challenge of developing starter-level hitters. I think it’s fair to say that was an alarming deficiency. Now the Giants have two home-grown pieces in the middle of the lineup in Heliot Ramos (age 24) and Patrick Bailey (25). Has the narrative shifted in your mind? Or do you feel the jury is still out about whether this regime has what it takes to produce capable bats?

In an early mailbag this year, somebody asked me about the Giants’ poor record developing hitters and I believe I ended my answer by saying “it only takes one or two successes to change that narrative.”

And, yeah, I think the significant improvement we’ve seen from Bailey and the emergence of Ramos (along with Brett Wisely, whom you didn’t mention) should definitely be enough to get that shift going. Ramos is a first-time All Star and I believe Bailey should be joining him at some point in the coming seasons. How many clubs are there in MLB that have more than two homegrown position players in their lineups putting up that kind of production? It’s a shorter list than you might think! In addition to which, Tyler Fitzgerald is having a pretty strong year as well — and this is a guy that I used to get a lot of negative responses about when trying to talk him up as a prospect!

I will say, however (and I think I have made this point before), that that narrative always did rely on refusing to give them credit for helping develop players like Mike Yastrzemski, LaMonte Wade, Jr., and Thairo Estrada into productive players — just because they came from elsewhere doesn’t mean that the significant improvements they made within the Giants’ organization shouldn’t go on the ledger.

Of course, we still have to remember that: 1) this is an art, not a science; 2) every path is different; 3) failure is still the most likely outcome; and 4) development depends primarily on the player. Just because we’ve seen great success this year, doesn’t mean that other prospects will inevitably succeed as well. Nor does it mean that there won’t be bumps in the road for Ramos and Bailey as their careers proceed.

As much as we want to put people and organizations in neat little buckets, the game will always evade simple explanations.

Jason S

What do you make of Brett Wisely’s success and how sustainable it might be?

Wisely has a very long and consistent track record of being an excellent hitter with a simple, repeatable stroke and a strong understanding of the strike zone — a very Giantsy type of player acquisition. He’s been a strong performer at every level of the minors, and he now appears to have gotten over the biggest leap in any player’s development — believing he belongs in the majors.

Wisely was a victim of the Rays’ glut of middle infield talent two years ago — a glut that has somewhat shockingly dissipated in a hurry, and you have to wonder if they’d maybe like a do-over on the decision not to protect him on the 40-man.

Wisely reminds me a lot of the type of player that earned the St. Louis Cardinals their “Devil Magic” reputation. Which is to say, he’s always been considered a “nice” player but never a particularly outstanding one. Growing up in baseball-rich Florida (Panama City), he couldn’t get a scholarship to a four-year college and headed to JC. He can hit, but wasn’t ever considered an elite hitter. He has some pop, but doesn’t hit for much power. He has athleticism, but has never been considered a primo athlete. He’s a good fielder but not a great one, etc etc etc. Basically, if you look at the scouting grades on his card, you see a lot of 40s. But he’s hit and hit and continued to hit some more every step of the way. And when the bat will play, they’ll find a way as the old saying goes.

One thing that I think that goes underappreciated about players with a steady track record of hitting — and here I’m talking about actual production on the field, rather than the more ephemeral “bat to ball skills” or “hit tool” — is that they are showing aptitude and learning skills and an ability to make adjustments within the flow of a baseball season that is even more important than numbers they produce. It’s the secret sauce of big leaguers — their ability to make constant, successful adjustments to what is happening to them on the field. Players who produce something like the same numbers every year are actually showing growth and problem solving and improvement in those interims, because they’re figuring out a lot of little ways to ensure they don’t fall into the prolonged slumps that are the bane of most minor league hitters. If you can hit velocity, recognize spin, and make adjustments, you have the basic building blocks to be a big leaguer.

Wisely’s bat has carried him to the top, and he’s now proving to be useful in a wide variety of ways all over the field. I don’t know that Wisely is particularly a long-term starting shortstop candidate — he’s always been considered a little stretched on the left side of the infield, and plays to his right in the ol’ 5.5 hole are hard for him. But, more and more, he tends to remind me of a Tommy Edman-type player. Maybe you don’t want to play him at short every day, but you won’t hurt yourself putting him there part of the time. Maybe you don’t want to put him in CF every day, but you won’t hurt yourself putting him there some of the time. Maybe he’s not a great hitter, but he’s a good one who comes with a ton of versatility. It is, as Edman and a few other Cardinals Devil Magic players have long shown, a pretty attractive package. I’m not sure if Wisely will ever get to Edman’s double digit power, and that’s an important distinction, but it’s certainly possible that he simply “smarts” his way into 10-12 HR in some years.

I don’t think the Giants should let Wisely’s presence stop them from exploring other, more impactful long-term solutions at short — or anywhere else on the field — but I have a feeling they will often have cause to be grateful he’s on the roster to serve some need or another over the next few years.

SlightlyOff

Kyle Harrison, Mason Black, and Hayden Birdsong all received various amounts of praise during their minor league stints for their fastballs. You yourself stated in the past that Black’s fastball gets by on its good shape, and called Birdsong’s “electric”. Not trying to phrase this question as any sort of “gotcha” with that, just providing context for where my question comes from. Which is: why do stuff models hate them all then? Harrison’s FB not being the whiff monster it was in the minors has been a talking point all season, but I feel like Black and Birdsong are even more striking to me from a dev standpoint. Stuff+ thinks both of Black’s fastballs are bad, and it rates Birdsong’s worse, even with the velo difference. I’d say the pitches have generally performed like that too- Mason’s fastballs got crushed in the majors, and Hayden is already throwing ~50% non-fastballs three starts into his major league career (though also surely because his non-fastballs are filthy).

So I’m left wondering how these prospects had so much genuine success and garnered (varying) levels of hype on fastballs that turned out to have what we seemingly think are sub-optimal movement profiles. Do the Giants just see fastballs that much differently than consensus?

This is really a great question. And, though I know you don’t mean this in a “gotcha” way, let me own up to things here before getting around to your question. I’m always trying to fine-tune my approach in a way that allows me to appreciate and advocate the efforts of these players without gearing up unrealistic expectations in them for my readers. That’s a tough balance and I know I fail at it often. I want to give an understanding of what skills these young players have that they might leverage into a big league career, but also convey the challenges that are waiting to trip them up — without coming off as overly negative or close-minded (or mean!). It’s tricky. And I’ll also say that I probably would benefit from getting to more major league games with good seats to make sure my eyes are recalibrated from time to time — having a sense of what a good fastball looks like in the majors, as opposed to just Double-A, would probably serve me well in some of these discussions.

That said, on to your very valid question: all three of these players have fastballs that at least the most famous Stuff+ model (from The Athletic’s Eno Sarris, featured on Fangraphs’ site) seems to dislike. Harrison’s grades out the best, at 96 (with 100 being major league average), though that is a decline from where he was last year, when the fastball was at 104 on Sarris’ model. Both Black and Birdsong are actually down in the 70s, which, in Birdsong’s case, is mindboggling to me.

To backtrack, Sarris’ Stuff+ model looks at the way a pitcher’s different offerings work off of each other, with the four-seam fastball considered the baseline pitch. It looks at things like release point, tunneling, and movement profiles in addition to velocity to judge the value of each individual pitch (there are also separate grades for command and overall pitchability). In general, the model has proven to be significantly predictive (much more so than things like ERA or FIP) after as few as 40 pitches. So what gives here?

I think the easiest to tackle is Black, who clearly has the least impressive fastball of the three. I feel like I’ve been fairly forthcoming about that over the last year. Neither his four-seam nor sinker have average velocity for today’s game, and though both move decently, neither is, on its own, a standout pitch. Black really needs to use the different movement profiles of the two pitches off of each other to make both more effective, by giving hitters two different choices to make once they recognized the fastball (eg: up or down?). In the majors, I thought Black went a little sinker-heavy and lost that ability to play with hitter’s expectations. Regardless, neither of these are great fastballs in the current environment, and could ultimately cause him to move to the pen, especially as the two sliders have similar movement profiles of their own. That said, one place where Sarris has said that his model can get confused is on the four-seam/sinker dichotomy, as HawkEye isn’t great about recognizing sinkers. So it’s possible the model is overly down on the effectiveness of those pitches simply because it doesn’t always recognize which is being thrown. Just for instance, Stuff+ also dislikes Camilo Doval’s sinker greatly — and has never graded his four-seam since he started throwing the sinker, so I think there’s some model confusion going on there.

As for Harrison, Sarris essentially did an entire podcast talking about his fastball, which I wrote about in my Top 50 profile of Harrison last winter. If you really want a deep dive into why Stuff+ doesn’t like his fastball you might want to listen to that podcast in full, but the fundamental issues are that the pitch lacks elite Induced Vertical Break (IVB) and vertical movement, and sits in what the model feels is the “dead zone” movement-wise. I have countered with my theory that the combination of Harrison’s delivery, armslot, and release point create something like elite IVB for hitters trying to deal with the pitch, without actually having a measurably high IVB. This is just a theory, but it’s always made sense to me when I watch hitters swing under that pitch. Maybe it’s the experience of having watched Madison Bumgarner succeed with a delivery that had some similar deception in it.

One thing that is curious about Harrison’s development over the last five years is that his velocity went down, rather than up, from where it sat in his first professional season, at 19. He was hitting 97 fairly regularly back then, but has predominantly been in the lower 90s ever since then. I actually talked with him about that back in 2022, and he wasn’t certain what was causing it. But a reasonable guess might be that it’s connected to throwing longer outings as he has risen up the ladder, and that, particularly this year, when he’s been so cognizant of the need to soak up innings, he’s focused more on staying in the strike zone rather than blowing guys away.

With Birdsong, I honestly don’t know what to say. His Stuff+ grade on his fastball right now is an almost comically low 73 — which is significantly below Black’s. One thing I feel like I can say with utter certainty is that Birdsong’s fastball is better than Black’s! And I think that’s true both in terms of velocity and shape. It’s true that he doesn’t get a lot of swing throughs on the pitch, but it does have good carry up in the zone, which sets up a lot of his nasty breaking balls, which are the real bat missers. Still, I can’t believe that Birdsong’s fastball is really 30% below average for a major league pitcher. Something weird is up there that I simply don’t have expertise to explain. But I will reach out to Sarris and ask him about it to see what he thinks.

But before I leave this excellent question, I do want to get to Slightly’s final comment, because I think the answer there is a resounding “Yes.” The Giants do look at fastballs in a unique manner. That much is very clear. If you’ve read The Athletic’s outstanding series on MLB’s obsession with missing bats, you know that a primary insight that has driven front offices over the past decade is that the difference between “no contact” and “contact” is much more significant than the difference between “poor contact” and “good contact.” But that does not seem to square with the Giants’ approach to pitching. Led by Logan Webb, who is probably the least K-dependent ace in baseball, this is a club that likes contact, so long as it is on the ground. They seem to be more concerned with home run suppression (something they’ve been elite at in Zaidi’s time in charge), and therefore go heavy after ground ball pitchers.

One thing that series gets at is the extreme shift in the game from being a “fastball league” to a “breaking ball” league, and that is a shift that the Giants have been on heavy from the beginning. Indeed, two of the real intellectual leaders of that shift, Brian Bannister and Andrew Bailey, made up the Giants’ pitching brain trust for the Zaidi Era prior to this year. Both Bannister and Bailey have talked at times about “wanting to kill the four-seam fastball,” so it’s not surprising that so many pitchers in the Giants’ org have been switched to sinker-heavy approaches over the last five years, and away from the “high-carry” four-seamers that were dominating the game a few years ago.

That could be part of what is going on here. Still, when you have a pitcher like Harrison who is performing reasonably well with very little other than a fastball (he’s thrown his fastball more than 60% of the time this year), I think you have to conclude that the model might be missing something about what makes that pitch effective. For what it’s worth, Baseball Savant has Harrison’s fastball run value as 90th percentile among major league pitchers this year (Birdsong’s is around 50th percentile and Black’s is…well, don’t look at that one).

Michael

I’m hoping you’ll do a little future analysis and comparison, Roger. If we fast forward to a point beyond the careers of current players, how do you feel the years of amateur talent acquisition in recent Giants history will have stacked up against each other? Draft and international combined in a calendar year — so the 2023 group includes Eldridge and Arias. I’d love to see a ranking/projection of years with the most value to least.

Michael, can I defer my answer by some 20 years or so, so as to provide perfect accuracy in my answer?

No? Ok…..well, prepare for some crappy answers clouded by real-time ignorance. Let’s take the last 10 years — which is already problematic, since we know much more about the outcomes the further back in time we go. For instance, my inclination as I line up these years is to push 2014 further and further to the top, despite the fact that it has produced the fewest useful players, simply because the one guy they really hit on that year is Logan Webb, who has already produced far more value that most anybody else in any of the other years is ever likely to equal. By the time we get to the end of this season, Webb is already going to be right around a 20 WAR player for his career, and that’s a pretty good bird in hand, isn’t it? I can really, REALLY like Bryce Eldridge, without quite being able to assume he’ll make that difference up in the future.

That makes this an incredibly tough exercise, because there are extremely asymmetrical levels of certainty involved here. But with that weasley little caveat set aside to begin things, this is how I see it:

• 2018 (Already in MLB: Keaton Winn, Luis Matos, Marco Luciano, David Villar, Ryan Walker, Sean Hjelle; Significant other prospects: Jairo Pomares, Victor Bericoto, Alexander Suarez; Busted: Joey Bart). I’ve long maintained that his final year under Bobby Evans would prove to be the most important year of amateur talent acquisition of the decade, and I’m not ready to back off that position yet. I don’t know that any single player here is likely to have individual brilliance of some of the classes we’ll get to further down the list, but there are a lot of players to provide value here (Walker looks like he could easily become a quality closer, for instance), and Matos, Luciano, and Winn still have strong starter potential. Getting virtually nothing from Bart certainly hurt.

• 2014 (All Stars: Logan Webb, Already in MLB: Austin Slater, Significant other prospects: no longer in Giants’ org, but Sandro Fabian?, Busted: Tyler Beede, Aramis Garcia; Trade Value: Sam Coonrod was turned into Carson Ragsdale). The opposite of 2018’s quantity of quality, 2014 moves up to the top almost entirely due to the brilliance of Webb, though we shouldn’t overlook the importance of turning 8th round pick, Slater, into a highly useful player for many years.

• 2020 (Already in MLB: Patrick Bailey, Kyle Harrison, Casey Schmitt, Significant other prospects: RJ Dabovich). This was the toughest call of all, and probably 2020 will end up looking better than 3rd place on this list. That’s where the certainty of having Webb’s 20 WAR already in the bank came into play for me. Bailey’s improvements on the offensive side certainly make him look like a future All Star and Gold Glover, which, along with Harrison’s hoped-for advances could, in the end, make this the best acquisition class of all. But there’s enough uncertainty associated with catchers’ long-term outlooks that I waffled them down into 3rd place.

• 2017 (All Stars: Heliot Ramos, Already in MLB: Randy Rodriguez, Bryce Johnson, Significant other prospects: Juan Sanchez, Seth Corry, Busted: Jacob Gonzalez). If you’d have asked this same question back in February, this year would have received a very different placement. As it is, it’s entirely carried on the strong back of Ramos and the strong right-arm of Rodriguez, both of whom have made incredible strides this year and look poised to be important members of the Giants for years to come. Things change! I’ll just reiterate that already having some results (and thus certainty) for 2014 and 2017 is what makes this a reall difficult exercise. The group we’re moving on to has a lot of players with serious potential, and if two or three of them hit that potential they’ll swoop that class upwards over this year, which is based entirely on two guys at this point. But becoming the first homegrown All Star OF in 40 years has to carry some weight!

• 2023 (Top 100 prospects: Bryce Eldridge, Significant other prospects: Walker Martin, Joe Whitman, Rayner Arias, Lisbel Diaz, Maui Ahuna, Jose Ortiz). This group is still starting out, so there are many more names to keep an eye on — but, as we know from the older years, those names always winnow down eventually. Still, this is a real lottery ticket class and it could absolutely blow up in the end. Eldridge has monster potential, so some might argue to move him up — but Ramos is on a 40-HR pace this year while playing strong outfield defense in the corners and credibly covering center while the team is in need. A best-case outcome for Eldridge is then something like what the team is getting right now from Ramos while playing 1b. Bird in hand for the win!

• 2022 (Already in MLB: Hayden Birdsong, Wade Meckler; Top 100 prospects: Carson Whisenhunt (also Birdsong); Significant other prospects: Reggie Crawford, Ryan Reckley, Juan Perez). Birdsong’s incredible rise helps offset the continuously frustrating attempts to keep Crawford healthy and on the field. With Whisenhunt, Crawford, and Arias, there’s significant chance this year rises well above this, but also sky-high risk potential involved all around.

• 2015 (All Stars: Camilo Doval, Made MLB: Steven Duggar, Phil Bickford, Tyler Cyr, Andrew Suarez, Kervin Castro, Significant other prospects: Ismael Munguia; Busted: Chris Shaw, Lucius Fox). Like the year preceding it, 2015 is carried almost entirely by one All Star pitcher. But Doval can’t quite hold an entire class on his shoulder the way Webb does, as closers’ careers tend to be quite mercurial and short-lasting. Indeed, we’re seeing plenty of regression from him this year (in terms of command).

• 2019 (Already in MLB: Tyler Fitzgerald, Cole Waites, Significant other prospects: Trevor McDonald, Grant McCray, Hunter Bishop, Aeverson Arteaga, Adrian, Sugastey, Onil Perez, Manuel Mercedes). Fitzgerald’s rise from a player who hit .229 in Double-A to a guy producing a 121 wRC+ in his rookie year in MLB is incredible, and Waites could still be a late-inning arm. But injuries have done a number on this class, and it’s looking at this point like a complementary player or two will be a good outcome for Farhan Zaidi’s initial class.

• 2021 (Already in MLB: Mason Black, Landen Roupp, Significant other prospects: Will Bednar, Diego Velasquez, Gerelmi Maldonado, Eric Silva). The Giants went all-in to improve pitching depth in the org in ‘21, so maybe it’s not too surprising that injuries have wreaked havoc here as well. Bednar is finally back on the field, which helps, and Roupp, when on the field, looks to have amazing potential for a 12th rounder. Still, this looks like a pretty modest haul, in part due to coming with the worst draft position this decade and a less impactful international group.

• 2016 (Already in MLB: Alexander Canario, Gregory Santos (trade acquisition), Caleb Baragar, Matt Krook, Trade Value: Bryan Reynolds was turned into Andrew McCutchen). This class had structural issues set against it from the beginning as well. The top of the draft was sacrificed to free agent signings and the international class was serving an MLB penalty for the massively overslot signing of Fox the year before. So, it’s not surprising to find it at the bottom of the barrel. Still, this will always be remembered by Giants’ fans as the All Star that wasn’t. Brian Sabean always said a team should never miss on an internal evaluation, but his group had two big misses in its time. They didn’t see Luis Castillo as a starting pitcher candidate, and they thought Reynolds was a tweener who lacked the speed to play CF and the power to profile in a corner. They were right about CF, but Reynolds developed much more power than the Giants anticipated, making his deal for a (partial) year of McCutchen a serious regret.

Andy

I know you don’t like speculating on injuries, but have you heard anything on Logan Wyatt, Will Kempner, or Dariel Lopez. All have been MIA this year. Sadly, Spencer Miles has disappeared too.

I really have no idea at all what happened to Wyatt this year (and the people who do know haven’t been talking). He went onto the IL in late April and hasn’t been seen since, but I never heard what the injury was. Obviously, it’s been a significant one, as he’s lost more than two and a half months and still isn’t to rehab status yet.

Kempner had a foot injury in the off-season that required surgery. He’s on the 60-day IL, rather than the Full Season Injured list, which means the Giants have some hope that he’ll return at some point in the second half. If so, he could end up being a good candidate for the AFL this fall (along with some others in this same category, like, say, Aeverson Arteaga).

Lopez missed all of 2023 after dislocating his kneecap in the LIDOM the previous winter. He’s continued his rehab from that traumatic injury this year, and he, too, is on the 60-day, rather than the Full Season list. I can tell you that Lopez is taking BP at this point (as is Arteaga). So we should see him at some point — again, maybe in the Fall league.

Miles, indeed, seems to have had a setback in his recovery. The right-hander missed all of the 2023 season with a back injury that ultimately required surgery, and got a late start in 2024 due to a forearm flexor strain. His first appearances in the ACL, Miles displayed some electric stuff, hitting 98 with his fastball with some wicked breaking balls. However, in his final outing on June 26, the velocity was down, and now he’s disappeared for a few weeks. That’s a bit of a bummer! But setbacks, or sideways complications, are not at all uncommon with pitchers returning to action. We’ve seen that from plenty of pitchers coming back from various injuries.

I’ll give you one for free Andy, since I couldn’t answer on Wyatt. Adrián Sugastey was hit by a pitch in late June, and broke his hand.

totalfan62

Really enjoying your great content, Roger. I especially like your interviews with players, media and scouts. Thank you.

Looking at the Giants rotation for the balance of 2024 and into 2025 (at this point), we have Webb, Harrison and Jordan Hicks (if he can stretch out to 150+ innings in a season). We have Blake Snell, Robbie Ray, and Alex Cobb either in the rotation or close to being active, but all three are likely not in the Giants rotation in 2025.

My question: how would you rate the potential of our corps of young starters now working their way to MLB (or have already appeared) to establish themselves as part of the 2025 rotation (or staff, as reliever/spot starter)? Birdsong has been impressive, and Harrison appears to be growing into a viable middle of the rotation starter. That leaves this group we've seen or heard about: Tristan Beck, Keaton Winn, Black, Roupp, maybe Spencer Bivens? Possibly one or more of the "Carsons" (Whisenhunt, Seymour, Ragsdale)? Anyone else you think might be close? If not in the Giants’ rotation, maybe a good trade piece to add a much-needed young bat? Thanks in advance.

Thanks, Fan!

Cobb is heading for free agency, and it certainly does seem likely that he’ll be elsewhere next year (though I suppose a very small one-year safety net deal for Cobb for his age-37 season isn’t entirely out of the question). But both Ray and Snell have options to return and big decisions to make. I don’t think the mega-deal that Snell was hoping for this year is really out there for him, even if he has a big second half, so that $32 million for next year could be hard to turn down, especially the way this season has gone. The same could apply to Ray. It’s unlikely, but I wouldn’t be shocked if both were back in 2025.

But that’s not your question, is it? For me, the only members of this group who I would feel really good about seeing significant starter time in 2025 are Birdsong and Whisenhunt. That’s probably not too surprising, because Whisenhunt was the only one (along with Harrison), whom I gave a 50 FV grade to this winter, and Birdsong (whom I gave a 45+) has taken real strides forward. So those two, along with Harrison are the top of my depth chart personally.

Beyond that, there are a couple of “if they could stay healthy” types in Winn and Roupp. I think both have the stuff and the strike throwing to make excellent starting pitchers, but both have been constantly beset by health issues whenever they start to get fully stretched out. Availability being the best ability, that makes them both a little hard to pencil in for big chunks of innings. I’d really like to see both of them surmount this issue, but wonder if the bullpen will end up being the best place. I definitely think the pen is ultimately the most likely and productive place for Beck, Seymour, and possibly Black, and certainly Bivens is not a starter (despite his heroic effort as an opener recently). Ragsdale is a trickier case. I think he has a chance to start, but really needs to find a more reliable third pitch to get there.

Starting in the majors is incredibly difficult and demands a lot in terms of physicality, repertoire, smarts, competitiveness, stamina, and command. It’s a very high bar to reach. In fact, I think the way I’ve lined things up, if both Ray and Snell do leave in the winter, I would say the Giants might need to look for a replacement for one of them, because going into 2025 with Hicks and Harrison as your best cases for #2 starter might not be a strong enough opening roster.

As for trades, the same comments apply. Harrison, Birdsong, and Whisenhunt are seen as the likely starters, so they’d have the most trade value. I think Winn, Black, Ragsdale, and Roupp also would be valuable chips, but not so valuable that anybody would give up a young hitter who profiles as a starting position player. Teams don’t often give up starting hitters even for pitchers they are certain will be starters (because the greater volatility of pitchers dings their side of the value equation), and they certainly don’t trade young hitters for arms they think will more likely end up in the pen.

Scott C.

It feels like the There R Giants community should celebrate Heliot Ramos at the All Star break, so I’ll toss this into the mailbag. It’s really thrilling that the Giants have a 24-year-old All Star center fielder. What a huge development on several levels. I keep marveling at how the ball is jumping off Ramos’ bat, particularly to the opposite field. He’s just punishing pitches with a swing that looks easy. How did he develop this elite-level pop? And does his production look sustainable to you?

Well, I totally agree with you, Scott. We should celebrate Ramos. I think ultimately we’re going to see him move back to a corner where he fits better in 2025 (when Jung-Hoo Lee returns), but his emergence has been the best thing about this year so far.

Ramos has always been a thick, barrel-chested athlete — even back when he was 18, you’d walk by him and think, “that’s not how 18-year-olds are supposed to look!” As he’s matured into a young man, those big muscles of his have granted him incredible strength. The answer to the elite-level pop is — partly — sheer, massive, man strength.

And I think there’s a real lesson to be learned there about hitter development. Back in 2022, when Ramos had an incredibly poor year — by wRC+, he was the least productive hitter in the PCL — there were still really impressive data points in his hit profile. His 90th percentile Exit Velocity (EV90) that year (106.7 mph), as was his 91-mph average exit velocity. His max EV that year, just a hair under 114 mph, was top five in the system. That continued to be true last year, when his EV90 was even higher, at an incredible 108.7 mph, and his max was 114.5.

The problem seemed to be that that thick build of his locked up some of the mechanics of his swing — he talked of being tight in his swing, and needing to loosen up. The result of that “tightness,” was a tremendous number of balls on the ground as well as line-drive outs to right field, on balls that had traveled very deep in the strike zone. Over the next couple of years, Ramos patiently worked on both his swing and his body, getting more flexibility and loft into his swing. Once he was able to get balls in the air more often, that tremendous strength — and all of those great EVs that were lying under the hood of his poor performance back in 2022 — were still there to do damage. (These lessons might be equally applied to Luciano, who likewise has a long history of producing extraordinary exit velocity data).

As for your final question — is it sustainable? — the answer lies in his ability to continue getting to that home run power. Ramos continues to be a player who runs high strikeout rates — that’s almost certainly why the front office continued to be skeptical of his ability to transition to the big leagues. But, given how hard it is to hit big league pitching, the league is getting more and more into a place where hitters can survive and even thrive with strikeout rates in excess of 30% — a number that used to represent a death knell to careers. Giancarlo Stanton, Nolan Gorman, Tyler O’Neill, Cal Raleigh, Elly de la Cruz, Brent Rooker, Oneill Cruz, Michael Busch and others are having productive seasons this year north of that line. The key is that all of them get to their power often enough to offset the empty calories of all those strikeouts — that’s the main component that an offensive player has to have in this environment, when making any contact at all is so difficult.

Ramos is doing that — given his pace, he could make a run at ending the franchise’s 30-HR hitter drought in addition to putting a stake through the homegrown All Star outfielder curse. I don’t know that we’re going to see him continue to hit .300 — there’s certainly plenty of room for regression built into that .376 BABIP — but with the home run power and the walks that are starting to come with it, there’s more than enough there to continue to drive his offensive value, even when he eventually moves to a corner next season.

It’s maybe a lesson for folks who looked at Luis Matos as a safer bet to develop because of his advanced contact ability. That’s a good building block for offensive success as well, but maybe not as valuable a one as the natural ability to hit the everlasting crud out of ball and put it on the opposite site of a fence.

And with that, let’s close up the bag for this week and settle in for some All Star baseball!

Don’t forget to check out my Draft Day two wrap up, DSL game action, and the weekly stats review in the Tuesday Post-Pourri. That will all be coming your way in about an hour.