It's the "Big Move Has Come!" Edition of the Free For All Mailbag

Photo credit: Richmond Flying Squirrels

Before I dive into this week’s bag, I want to revisit one question from last week. I went out of my way to throw a big bucket of cold water on one of my loyal readers’ questions about acquiring a good young hitter, saying that teams don’t trade good young hitters, they lock them up and keep them safe. However, one of the categories that I suggested teams do trade from is young hitters who don’t quite fit their current roster or whose welcomes have maybe gotten slightly worn. AND, I should have added, sometimes one team’s worn welcome is another team’s good young hitter.

Wow did Buster Posey do his best A.J. Preller imitation in taking his very first big whack at the trade market as head of baseball operations. This mailbag mostly went to print before you could rush me very many questions about it, but we can’t avoid the big topic entirely, so, let’s get to the bag!

Small Winged Yeti

Roger, wonder what's your take on the trade. Also, how would you or the industry rank Kyle Harrison, Hayden Birdsong, Landen Roupp, and Carson Whisenhunt?

I’m just getting around to watching Season One of Andor, so what’s really running through my mind is Intelligence Officer, Dedra Meero’s line in the wake of the burgeoning rebellion’s daring theft of an Imperial Payroll delivery:

They’re treating Aldhani like a robbery!

What would you call it?

An announcement!

This trade was an announcement! And it was really shocking in every possible way, from the timing (both on the calendar and on the day), to the target, to the scale. Posey let the first third of the season play out, identified a core strength and a core weakness, and then went after a solution for that weakness. It was bold, daring, and in every possible way a statement of purpose for a first time PoBO making his first real trade.

He didn’t wait for the deadline to see how the market developed and what opportunities it might bring. He did convince ownership to take on a large, long-term contract — that, like all large, long-term contracts, might well age poorly. He didn’t let questions about positional fit dissuade him. And he didn’t balk at the cost — which was considerable, but not I think harmful.

Mike Krukow said on KNBR last week that Posey had asked him which of Harrison, Birdsong, and Roupp he would most value — which was, in retrospect, a pretty good indication that a critical point in decision making was being reached. As my mailbag readers have been overwhelmingly suggesting (and I’ve been gently pushing back on), they used the depth of quality pitching arms as an organizational strength, and chose the ones they wanted to keep and the one who would bring back the most value that they were willing to let go. How Boston (or the industry) would rank these arms is hard to say, but I think we can surmise that inside the Giants’ front office, they ultimately wanted to keep Birdsong more than they wanted to keep Harrison. And, I would say, as much as I’ve been a cheerleader of Harrison’s over the years, I would probably have made that same call. Birdsong’s development has shown real aptitude for gaining new strengths, while Harrison’s search for quality secondaries has not progressed as quickly over the years as I would have guessed.

I still think he’s going to have a fine career, and won’t be at all surprised if he becomes a star at some point. Harrison has true outlier traits on his fastball (ironically, he’s going to an organization that uses fastballs less than any team in MLB, and uses breaking balls nearly 50% of the time in the minors, far more than anybody else). And he’s going to a very good development org, topped by old friend Andrew Bailey, who should help get the best out of him.

But, if push came to shove (and possibly it did here), I probably would have chosen to protect Birdsong, and swallowed hard on Harrison. And I do mean swallowed hard. I really like Roupp and Whisenhunt, but I think if you’re looking forward to guys being real stoppers, real front of the rotation type pitchers, then Birdsong and Harrison are a separate tier of pitcher than Roupp and Whisenhunt, who I think are likely to be solid, good, strong, but maybe not “special.” Tibbs I really did expect to be part of some trade package this summer, if the opportunity arose. I kept going back to comments that Posey and GM Zack Minasian talked about in the winter of having complete players who helped the club win in a lot of different ways, and I imagine that they might prioritize the Dakota Jordans and Bo Davidsons of the system more than Tibbs — even though Tibbs’ approach and skills at the plate are really in a class of their own among the org’s outfield prospects. He’ll probably be a very good hitter (though he’s now joining an org with a fairly crowded outfield depth chart).

But Rafael Devers is already a good hitter — maybe a great hitter. As much respect as I have for Posey’s career (I look forward to driving to Cooperstown to watch his induction in a few years), I think you could make a persuasive argument that Devers is the best, and most intimidating, impactful hitter that the Giants have had since saying goodbye to Barry Bonds. Now, they’re going to have him for his decline years — maybe for his DH only years — and they’re going to pay a lot for that. But they got the most talented player in this trade — a player who may be a 400 or 500 HR hitter before his career is finished — and there’s very good reason to believe they obtained the best career in this trade from this point forward. That’s a good position to be in when you’re done shaking hands.

I know there’s been a lot written about his contract aging poorly, being underwater, etc. I guess we’ll see how that part goes. The market keeps trending upwards, and contracts that seemed gargantuan at one point are almost quaint now (Bryce Harper’s for instance). I would say that Devers has been a more consistently outstanding hitter in his career than Vladimir Guerrero, Jr., who just signed a deal that will pay out nearly twice as much as the Giants took on. Kyle Tucker will likely sign for three times as much. Inflationary pressures could well make the tail end of Devers’ deal look better, rather than worse. It is certainly true that the Giants under Posey have now taken on a lot of financial commitments to players who will be in their 30s with Devers joining Matt Chapman and Willy Adames — and they’d better develop young, dynamic talent to fit around those vets in the next half decade.

Posey identified a need and he filled it with a big, whopping answer. He didn’t look at the Dodgers and think “we’ll be the pesky little things nipping at your ankles.” He looked at them and said “I want to beat you.” And you can start to see a roster coming together that might do just that.

He also just told the baseball world that Preller isn’t the only gun slinger in town any more. That’s an awful lot of things for one deal to accomplish!

Will Ladyfield

Perhaps this will be covered in this week’s pod, but the ACL team is heavily, indeed almost entirely international. What do you think next year’s San Jose team will look like/how do you think the Giants have or will balance the playing time of domestic and international players at the lower levels?

This is a leftover question that came in just a little late last week, after I’d sent the mailbag to my editor, but it’s a good question, so I wanted to get back to it. The changes that Will has pointed to here are very real — and they’re real for every club. This is a structural change that has come to rookie ball thanks to changes in the dates of the MLB draft and the complex season.

Consider the case of Heliot Ramos. When he was drafted back in 2017, the first round of the draft took place on June 12, and the Arizona Complex League (then known as the AZL), didn’t start until June 24. Which means that when Ramos signed his deal and got plugged into the Giants’ lineup (in just their sixth game of the season), he still had a full rookie ball campaign to look forward to. Ramos played in 35 games that year (along with the other two top picks from the Giants’ 2017 draft, Jacob Gonzalez and Seth Corry), and helped lead the club to the AZL Championship round (where they lost in a winner-take-all final game with Corry on the mound).

Now, the draft has been pushed to the All-Star weekend, as MLB seeks ways to turn it into more of a prestige event, and the ACL season has been moved forward a month. This year’s draft runs from July 13-15, and the ACL season ends on July 24. This has been done very intentionally to keep teams from having to put the newly drafted players on the rookie ball roster — it’s a way of managing around the 165-man domestic reserve maximum.

But one result is a major change in the makeup of rookie league rosters. While they used to be chock full of newly drafted players, particularly out of the high school ranks, now those players are conspicuously absent — unless, as was the case of Walker Martin last year, they are deemed to be a little behind in their development and are held back in their second summer. That really leaves only two types of players to take part in the rookie ball season: 1) players up from the Dominican; and 2) rehabbing players from higher levels.

If you looked at this year’s ACL Giants’ roster a week ago, its 29 active players included 25 players who were signed through the international scouting department (most of whom have played previously in the DSL), two high school draftees who hadn’t made it off the complex level (Puerto Rican catcher Nomar Diaz, and outfielder Andy Polanco, who was raised in the Dominican but went to high school in Florida), one rehabbing pitcher (Nick Zwack), and one lower round college pick from last year’s draft who didn’t have a spot on the crowded San Jose roster (Jeremiah Jenkins). Diaz and Jenkins actually got assigned to San Jose this weekend, and I assume Zwack is close as well, which will leave you pretty close to an all international squad.

But, while this transition is new, it’s been coming on for a few years now, so we can see how the Giants have handled it. Without a doubt, the international players have to clear a higher hurdle to make the jump to full-season ball. First, the cutback from two to one ACL team gives them fewer opportunities to come stateside, and then they can have real troubles getting out of the complex. Ramon Peralta, for instance, is in his third ACL season, as is Mauricio Estrella. Ryan Reckley has bounced back and forth, as have guys like Jose Ramos and Javier Francisco. Others, like Derwin Laya, never did make it out of the complex level before being released.

It’s definitely a tough road for these kids — they’re competing for playing time against good American college players with much more experience. Only the best of them will survive in that competition. This year we’ve seen Carlos Gutierrez, Lisbel Diaz, Jean Carlos Sio, Elian Rayo, and Juan Perez make the San Jose squad and grab playing time (Jose Ortíz, if he could ever stay healthy, seems in line for a position as well), along with Gerelmi Maldonado on the pitching side. Last year some of those same players, along with Guillermo Williamson and a couple of since departed outfielders (Estanlin Cassiani and Cesar Quintas) made the team, along with pitcher Brayan Palencia (who has since climbed up a level).

There is no doubt that the current setup makes it a bigger challenge for these international players to work their way to opportunities. But, I think it’s fair to say that the best among them do get shots, and we’re almost certain to see Jhonny Level, Argenis Cayama, Keyner Martinez, and others from this year’s talented squad grab hold of San Jose roster spots in the next year. For others, it will take more time in the complex to earn their stripes.

Jason S

Is there reason to be optimistic about the depth of prospects coming up with how dominant the DSL and ACL teams have looked? It seems like the DSL, ACL, and even San Jose teams have put up very strong records in recent years, but that has faded away by the time those guys end up in Richmond and Sacramento. I guess my question is how much do the records of these teams matter or act as an indicator of things to come?

That’s a great question, Jason, and one that I’ve asked a lot of people from various organizations that I’ve spoken with. We can certainly create an appealing and comforting narrative. The Giants’ affiliates won a LOT in the 00s — San Jose and Salem-Keizer pocketed four league titles apiece, and there were many others and other levels. And those titles led conveniently to the greatest run of success in San Francisco Giants’ history. CONNECTION!

But, it’s also entirely true that the playoff rosters that threw water at each other and ripped their jerseys off in happiness were made up primarily of players who never sniffed the major leagues. Even the legendary San Jose 2009 title team, which included Madison Bumgarner, Buster Posey, and Brandon Crawford, sent a very talented group of players out for those playoff games — Roger Kieschnick, Thomas Neal, Nick Noonan, and others — but not a lot of guys who were going to end up playing meaningful games in the big leagues. So, is it really a connection?

I wonder.

I do think that we see the best player development organizations win a lot — the Rays have literally put every affiliate they have into the playoffs in a single year in this decade, and the Dodgers’ affiliates are dominant over and over again.

I think the way to square the circle is that deep and productive farm systems have the depth of talent beyond the guys who are going to be future Poseys and Crawfords — just like the Giants did when Neal and Kieschnick and Noonan and Charlie Culberson were the depth of their rosters, not the top end. And that level of talent — good enough to get to the majors but not stay there — is usually what minor league championship rosters have dotted all over. It’s also true that the Giants have historically skewed towards college players in the draft, which often leaves their lowest-level rosters on the older side — that’s a distinct advantage in Low-A (and previously in short-season ball) that helps explain some of those titles as well.

I suppose it goes without saying that championship rosters are more meaningful the higher up the level they are. The Giants’ 2015 DSL championship team was fun to follow (and Sandro Fabian, their best player, very happily has made an appearance in the majors and been an outstanding hitter in Triple-A), but it wasn’t ultimately a meaningful omen of a strong farm system in the later 2010s. The Tigers’ Double-A squad in Erie has been a dominant presence in the Double-A Eastern League the last several years….and lo and behold, that’s a pretty good club they’ve got in Detroit now. And, as Jason implies, the same can certainly not be said for the Giants’ Double-A affiliate in Richmond, which is in a pretty sorry state this year.

In the first half of this decade, the Giants were fairly dominant in the Cal and NWL leagues. And there are a lot of players who were parts of championship squads on both levels. A lot of players from those teams are already gone, released before getting much further. Many others will turn out to be the Kieschnicks and Neals of this generation — possibly even players who raised our hopes the highest, like Luis Matos, Marco Luciano, or Grant McCray. But those teams also included Patrick Bailey, Casey Schmitt, Kyle Harrison, Randy Rodriguez, Landen Roupp, and Hayden Birdsong. Teams that have a solid base of future up and down guys and strong org guys, with a tiny sprinkling of future big league regulars, are going to do really well in a minor league setting.

I guess I’d say that there’s both signal and noise going on here. It’s certainly good to have the kind of deep depth of high end and moderate level talent (say that 30 grade area) that tends to push clubs through playoff runs. That kind of depth of usable player has all sorts of value. And it’s absolutely true that most of the core members of the Giants’ dynasty — Tim Lincecum, Madison Bumgarner, Pablo Sandoval, Sergio Romo, Buster Posey, and Brandon Crawford — were part of title teams in the minors, and most of those guys played crucial roles in championship series. In the long run, it’s the depth of talent being developed that matters most. Still, the joy on the faces of the kids who do “win it all” certainly tells of a deeper meaning to their experience as well.

Lucio Nieto

I know it is still somewhat early in the season, but do you see any improvements to the Giants farm system year over year. Any names that could sneak into top 100 lists ?

I think that James Tibbs III could certainly be a part of Top 100 lists next winter — OOPS, edit that bit out!

Lucio, I don’t know that I see anybody likely to sneak onto Top 100 lists this winter, but that is not to say that there haven’t been improvements. This has been a pretty exciting year on the farm system front I feel with a lot of positive developments, though, as is often the frustrating case, a lot of them are coming in the lower levels.

If you’re looking for the type of players to climb up national lists, I’m not sure there are any real candidates right now. Carson Whisenhunt probably belongs in the conversation, but he hasn’t risen to that level in the past couple of years and he’s not making major development leaps beyond what he has been. So, I assume he’ll most likely remain in that 100-150 group. Which is to say, a very good prospect who isn’t really all that distinguishable from the ones who do sneak onto the back end of lists, but without the cool designation on his Baseball Reference page:

I do think there are candidates for Top 100 prospects in the nearish future, mostly coming out of the international development group — Josuar Gonzalez is probably a couple years away from that discussion, but Level and Cayama are closing in on possibly being candidates if they continue to progress, and I wouldn’t sleep on Martinez or even Luis de la Torre making big leaps up either, if their gains in stuff start to be matched by gains in other areas. Above that complex level group, Dakota Jordan and Bo Davidson are the best hopes for a jump up into that tier of prospect, though I suspect that wouldn’t happen without a full repeat of their low level success in Double- and Triple-A (similar to Casey Schmitt sneaking onto BA’s Top 100 literally days before he made the majors). There’s always reason to be skeptical of low-level performance numbers. And then, of course, there’s everybody’s favorite prospect: draft pick #13.

That’s a “maybe next year” response, but I do think there’s a lot more percolating on the lower rungs than we’ve seen since around the 2019-2021 period.

HaakAway

Question on comparing levels of play with college and Minor League system. For example: Last year Dylan Carmouche playing in Eugene had a K-BB% of 22.6%. The year before he was at Tulane and had a K-BB% of 14.9%. That seemed like a big improvement to me. How much tougher are the hitters in A+ vs. NCAA? I guessed 50% better.

David Wright

I’m curious at what comparative level DSL league is? A D-1 college team? D - II or Juco team?

I’ll be honest — I never like answering these kinds of questions. That’s not because they’re bad questions at all. Mostly, it’s because I have some issues with the way these questions are being framed, but I have trouble articulating the source of my disagreement. But it seems to me that when questions like this are being asked, the underlying assumption is that organized baseball is something like a stairway, with some even and predictable steps up that we can define as “levels of play.”

But, to me, the crucial thing that separates types of organized baseball is not the degree of talent in a certain level, but what I would call the compression or decompression of that talent.

Let me pose a ridiculous thought experiment for you. Imagine a scenario in the major leagues, where on the getaway game of every series, a batting practice pitcher replaced the starting pitchers for each team. I think we can all easily imagine how that would impact hitters’ statistical records, but I think it’s much harder to describe how that would impact what we would define as MLB’s “level of play.” (There is a less cartoonish test case for this scenario, of course, in the various waves of expansion that MLB has had, which tend to be accompanied by offensive records, though I don’t think anyone’s ever bothered to consider what they meant to MLB’s “level of play” because we always know that it will level out eventually).

I don’t want to impugn any athlete’s ability, but the D1 college game and lower minor leagues have something of the flavor of my thought experiment about them. You can face extremely high levels of talent, elite talent, even. But you can also face amateurishly (I guess literally in the case of college) low levels of talent. The lower the level, the further the spread of that talent gets, and the more often players will tend to encounter the lower band rather than the higher. It’s not a smooth and predictable climb from step to step. The steps are all shapeless and spread out and bumpy and have unpredictable inclines.

A hitter playing in the SEC is going to face an incredibly talented pitcher on Friday night with reasonable frequency, and maybe a decently talented one on Saturday night if the opposing team is a strong one. But on Tuesday night, Wednesday night, Sunday afternoon — the drop off is likely to be pretty extreme. Imagine facing Paul Skenes firing 100 mph fastballs at you one night, and an anonymous arm chucking it in the 80s who will never pitch a pro game in their life a couple days later.

The thing about the major leagues is that the compression of talent is really very tight. Even with the great, great players. It may not seem that way when we watch, but the difference between Shohei Ohtani and a productive major league role player, say Mike Yastrzemski, is, I would argue, not so great as the relative difference between the best and worst players in a college conference or an A-ball league. And therefore, defining the “level of talent” in those different environments is quite hard to do. And I don’t think that cross corollaries, like “KBO = Double-A” or whatever, are really very useful for helping to wrap our minds around what the playing environment is really like (just to take that example, the KBO is known for having relatively low average velocity from pitchers, while you can often find better velocity in Double-A leagues than in Triple-A most years lately. So, where’s the point of comparison?).

The best I can say is that levels of talent do become more compressed every step you go up. The best college teams will have just a handful of players who are drafted into pro ball. Every Low-A and High-A and Double-A roster has players who will never rise above that level. The bottom quarter or so drops off at every step up. And, of course, once players reach the major league level, there’s nowhere to step up to, so there the jobs must be taken by a show of superior ability — a supremely difficult thing to accomplish.

Taking your example of Carmouche, I’d say that in the NWL, he is facing the most concentrated or compressed talent he’s ever gone up against from the top to bottom of any lineup. But it’s entirely possible that none of these NWL lineups will force him to go up against the best hitter he’s ever faced in his life, or even handful of hitters. Another major difference between the two settings is that, in college, he was always facing his own peer group, while in the minors (and majors), players can and do go up against others much older or much younger than themselves. When Carmouche was dealing in the Cal League last year, he got to face a decent number of teenage hitters (mostly from the Dominican or Venezuela) who had limited experience against left-handers of any sort, much less ones who threw an advanced changeup. That’s an advantage that he leaned on in San Jose and Eugene, but it will abandon him at upper levels, where he encounters more experienced hitters. Put all of that together, and yes, I would say that performing better in the NWL than he did at Tulane does represent a significant improvement — but then, that’s what players are supposed to be doing in the minors! College instruction has gotten very good — but it’s not professional instruction!

David, as for your question: the DSL is full of skinny 17-year-olds with sketchy nutritional histories and very rudimentary game skills at best. I was recently chatting with someone who watches a lot of DSL games and told I was planning to go later this summer, he said to me: oh, get ready for some awful baseball that goes on for just hours!

That person also gave me one of the funniest quotes I’ve heard in years — and one I suspect I’ll keep in mind for a long time: people who work in the game watch tens of thousands of hours of bad baseball, so that fans can get to see Matt Chapman and Aaron Judge perform at the top of the pyramid.

Maybe that’s the best answer I can give to these sorts of questions.

Patrick Karraker

Playing off the Craig Kimbrel debacle in which the Giants were indirectly involved last week — and the way Buster Posey has made it a point to talk about continuity and stability being in the best interest of the players — is it time for MLB to take a page out of the NFL’s playbook (three one-game practice squad elevations allowed per season) or from the NHL (30 days/10 games allowed in the NHL before a player has to go through waivers again) in the next CBA to minimize chaos for out-of-options players? Feels like the Braves, Dodgers, Red Sox, Orioles and a few other organizations have gotten into this practice of calling up or signing veteran players and then DFAing them after a single appearance to maximize freshness, which doesn’t seem fun for the players or the fans of those teams (especially when it’s a guy like Kimbrel who people are emotionally attached to).

The whole Kimbrel thing kinda was definitely odd, and it’s hard to understand how the Braves didn’t see that they were walking into a PR and clubhouse disaster. If you just need “generic player X” for a day, don’t try substituting in “beloved franchise icon Y” instead. That’s why the Giants invited Nick Ahmed to their camp last year instead of Crawford. Farhan Zaidi didn’t want to be remembered as the Giants’ executive who DFA’d Craw. Seems prudent.

Anyway, Patrick, I have to say that it bends my mind a little bit trying to imagine retrofitting some of these other sports administrative regulations onto baseball. I can certainly see what you’re getting at, and, there’s little doubt that these sorts of situations can have really complicated human costs.

Still, I feel confident in saying that it is decidedly not time for the things that you’re suggesting — not because they aren’t good ideas, though. Rather, the reality of the situation is that the upcoming CBA is going to be a total bear. There will be a lockout. There will be much sabre rattling. There will be hard and caustic words thrown from both sides. And there will be vicious battles (both between the two sides and internecine fights within ownership ranks) about splitting up billions of dollars of revenue. There will probably be a countdown to losing regular season games.

All of which suggests to me that neither side is likely to have the stomach or the patience for trying to reimagine a century’s worth of administrative marginalia and roster management procedurals. There are just going to be much higher stakes taking up their collective energy, and those stakes are going to suck up pretty much all of the oxygen in the room, I would guess.

Does the waiver wire shuffle cause some pain and confusion and even suffering? Almost certainly yes. Is this the time when people are going to focus their minds on trying to solve that? I doubt it.

For what it’s worth, I recently did speak with a player who went through exactly one of these situations — Raymond Burgos, who spent exactly one day on the Giants’ major league roster last year before being DFA’d again. And, while there was certainly an element of the bittersweet to his recollections, I’d say that, with the benefit of hindsight, his memories of that experience were primarily joyous and grateful, however. That is an incredibly high mountain to climb and he was a big leaguer, if only for a day.

Since his thoughts on the matter are much more valuable than mine, let’s see what Burgos thinks of his experience:

Chet Brown

Buster Posey 2009 (A+ & AAA)

115 games, 497 PA
.325/.416/.531
31 2B, 18 HR, 62 BB, 68 K

Brandon Belt 2010 (A+, AA, & AAA)

136 games, 595 PA
.352/.455/.620
43 2B, 10 3B, 23 HR, 22 SB, 93 BB, 99 K

Bryce Eldridge 2024 (A, A+, AA, AAA)

116 games, 519 PA
.291/.374/.516
27 2B, 23 HR, 59 BB, 132 K

How would you compare Belt’s and Posey’s first full minor league seasons to what Eldridge did last year?

Obviously, Bryce will never be what Buster was (and still is) to the Giants, but if you were a betting man, would you bet that Bryce ends up with better or worse career offensive numbers than Belt?

.267/.357/.460, 194 HR, 125 wRC+

There’s really no way to meaningfully compare the experiences of a 19-year-old coming out of high school and players with three years of the best D1 college play in the country.

Belt’s year was, in my opinion, the single best offensive performance in the Giants’ farm system this century. It was so sensational, it vaulted an unheralded 5th round college player into final consideration for Baseball America’s Minor League Player of the Year (and looking back in the fullness of the various careers of that final group, I wonder if they’d like a re-rack on that vote), and a place in the upper quarter of the Top 100. Posey’s season only barely comes in second from an offensive perspective, on top of making huge strides at maybe the most important defensive position in the game.

So, I won’t make a comparison between Eldridge’s debut and those years, but I will make this comparison: in my Top 50 post on Eldridge, I wrote that I believed he had had the best performance of any high school hitter drafted by the Giants since Jack Clark back in the mid-70s. From an oranges to oranges perspective, Eldridge fits very well with Belt and Posey as the first among his peer group, which is certainly mighty impressive.

Belt’s major league career was too good to be flippant and predict Eldridge’s bests it, so I’ll split the difference and say: more SLG, less OBP; more homers, maybe less average. From my keyboard to God’s ears….that would be a pretty great career. So let it be written…so let it be done!

David Wright

What else does Bo have to prove? Do you think he gets promoted after the 2025 draft?

Also, given the success of the lower minors specifically ACL and SJ, do you think the Giants will start moving players up after the 1st half ? Specifically Carlos Gutierez, Zander Darby, Dakota Jordan, Jakob Christian to Eugene, then promote Jhonny Level, Dario Reynoso, Ramon Peralta to SJ? Then put Bo in Richmond! Sorry, as you can see I’m impatient trying to get the talent closer to the bigs!

As fans, I think it becomes really easy to focus on the batting line. The single most evident aspect of a players’ development — and yes, the most important element of succeeding. But I know from talking with player development officials that that really is a tiny part of the consideration for making major promotions. There are so many other parts of the game outside the slash line that teams are looking at. That includes other elements of game play including the whole range of defensive development and also mental acuity — are they making mental or fundamental mistakes on defense or running the bases.

But even that doesn’t get to a major part of the decision that has nothing (directly) to do with game play. Players are at the stadium from morning until nearly midnight, and a lot is going on in all that time. How players “go about their business,” how they prepare, how hard and how smart they work (from lifting to studying to BP and bullpen sessions), that’s a huge element in club decisions to promote a player. And then there is maturity. As we’ve discussed a lot, failure management is a core element of baseball success, and that’s one that comes with emotional maturity. All of that is being judged and evaluated and goes into decisions to promote.

And then finally, I would say you have the things that can only be “proven,” to use David’s term, with the fullness of time. Davidson has done almost nothing but succeed so far this year in Eugene, so we haven’t gotten to see how he responds to a slump or a difficult spell. We haven’t really seen him have to problem solve and adjust yet in the NWL. And, we haven’t seen how he responds to what is hopefully going to be a full 100+ game season — can he push through when fatigue sets in?

All of these are areas where I’d guess you could say it’s possible to prove things. And, for what it’s worth, I do recall (and readers may, too) that when I interviewed Dennis Pelfrey in the Arizona Fall League last November, he did mention that there were some areas of Davidson’s play that wouldn’t fly once he got to Richmond. That was a vague comment, and certainly mild enough of a rebuke, but it may have hinted at areas where Bo does have things to prove to his evaluators.

Do I think he’s in Richmond after mid-July? Hm….Schmitt arrived in Richmond on August 10 in 2022, following a very similar (so far) year in Eugene. I’d say Bo is either in Richmond by then or he’s not coming until 2026.

As for the bevy of moves you’ve suggested at the lowest levels, I would be surprised if all of those players moved this year (and I’d definitely curb your enthusiasm for some of the names on your list), though I think some of them certainly will. Obviously the Tibbs move does open space in Eugene, and San Jose’s roster is very crowded, so we might see bodies start to move this week. However, I suspect they’ll want to keep Davidson and Jordan separated so that both can continue to get reps in center field.

I know you’re impatient, but development always comes on its own timeline. I’ve written this before, but it’s an aphorism I believe in: you can’t promote your way into development; you have to develop your way into promotion.

Jonathan

Anything on Keaton Winn? I know he was put on the 7-Day IL in April but haven’t heard anything since.

The way he was moving and massaging his shoulder that night he last walked off the mound for the River Cats, I was deathly afraid that by now any word of him would have been surgical. But that doesn’t seem to be the case, as the Giants would have announced that in one of their periodic medical updates to the beat writers. That’s good news!

It would seem, then, that we’re in the “rest and recuperation” phase of the game. I would assume that, if he resumes baseball activities, and surely if they’re planning to have him rehab in the ACL, the Giants will announce that through official channels. With 40-man players, the word always comes from HQ.

Josh

I was going to ask this a week ago until he started showing some signs of life, but still curious - have you heard anything about Rayner Arias, and why his power has taken so long to come back to him? Is he still not 100% from his repeat wrist injuries?

On the other end of the performance spectrum, how seriously do we need to be taking Cayama? He seems to be mowing straight through the ACL and I've heard pretty positive reviews on his stuff.

Two things are important to hitters: hands and reps, and Arias has had some pretty serious knocks against both in his young career. I don’t think I’ve had to listen very hard for explanations — it was evident to the eye when I saw Arias last summer that his swing was longer, slower, and loopier after the second wrist fracture than it had been before, when he snapped it through the zone with whip-like ferocity. He also looked like his pitch recognition had regressed a bit — or at least, it had gone from being ahead of his peer group to maybe a bit behind them.

We are beginning to see some power re-appear for him of late though, and that’s a hopeful sign. A lot of the things that the Giants liked about him — a powerful frame, good athleticism, excellent baseball IQ — are still there. But he’s been knocked onto a different timeline now from the one we might have imagined two years ago, and we’ll just have to see where it leads him and how long it will take.

As for Cayama, well, I’ve already tabbed him above as someone who could conceivably put himself into Top 100 conversations at some point in the future, which I suppose says we should be taking him very seriously, indeed! You should take Martinez and de la Torre seriously too. They’re really good arms. The Giants haven’t had a group of international arms like this since…I don’t know… Kervin Castro, Camilo Doval, and Gregory Santos shared a few teams, I think. We’ll see in the fullness of time whether that’s a facile comparison to make or not.

Daniel

What do you make of Tyler Fitzgerald’s season to this point? For how fast he is, he hasn’t displayed great instincts as a baserunner. I’d be curious to hear if he was this way in the minors, or if he’s become more hesitant at the major league level. Also, his total loss of power has been notable. It seems to me like if he continues to play as he is, he will be more of a bench piece than everyday starter next year.

I would have to say that it’s been something of a disappointment. Fitzgerald’s promise comes from his blend of power and speed, and we just haven’t seen enough of either so far this year. Given his propensity for strikeouts, he needs to create production through his ability to impact the ball for extra bases, and when he gets on base, he needs to give the team a dynamic presence on the basepaths. The power just hasn’t been there at all — the DFA’d Sam Huff has as many home runs as Fitz this year — and, as you say, the speed hasn’t played consistently.

At this point in the year, I’d say that the front office is almost certainly thinking about 2b as a potential upgrade opportunity for the second half. Whether that comes from say, making Schmitt the starter once Chapman comes back, or looking to the outside for help will depend on the opportunities that come on the trade market. The Rays’ typical modus operandi will make Brandon Lowe the topic of many rumors next month, and it’s hard to look at him without seeing a player who could help any number of issues with the Giants’ lineup. Do you think Posey has more surprising tricks up his sleeve?

Bryan P

Thanks as always for your work! I've got two questions I'll leave here, feel free to answer either or neither at your leisure:

Is there any way that a player can agree to add options to a minor league contract? It feels so weird that Matos & Luciano, as young as they are, are teetering dangerously close to the precipice of the waiver wire shuffle. In the event that they find themselves minor league free agents before they turn 25, could they agree to a contract with a team that has an option or two so that they can try and make it work in one place instead of bouncing around the league? Or would that actually be worse for the players in ways that I'm not seeing?

Well, that’s an easy one Bryan: no. Players cannot unilaterally circumvent the administrative rules of the CBA. That said, if Matos or Luciano were to find themselves minor league free agents in the next couple of years, options will no longer concern them, as they will have already had to pass through the DFA and waivers process — possibly numerous times (note that their former San Jose teammate, Alex Canario was DFA’d multiple times this past winter, and is one bad month away from another one, as is the case with all players in his situation).

If Matos or Luciano go through all of that over the next couple of years and are forced to sign a minor league deal at some point, they’ll be in the same situation as Jerar Encarnacion found himself in last year: trying to play well enough to be added back to a 40-man and active roster…with no options left. When options are gone, they are gone and can’t be brought back.

(Other Giants who are now in their final option year include Brett Wisely and Sean Hjelle. Schmitt, were he to find himself in the minors at some point this season, would also be working on his final option year).

Bryan P

Do you think there is a deficit in modern baseball of developing "hit first" type of players? When I think of the ideal outcome for players like Matos, Meckler and even JHL to some degree, I think of Joe Panic & Matt Duffy circa '14-'15, spraying line drives all over the field with a bit of pop added in. You've written convincingly about the need for strength & explosiveness in the modern game, but I can't help but feel prior FO did Matos (& maybe Meckler) a disservice by asking him to add strength & bulk up instead of leaning into his natural skill set. Every time Matos yanks a homer to left, I wince a little because it feels like he'll be trying to do it again the next 20 at bats, only to end up weekly rolling over ground balls on pitches he should be trying to lace the other way. Luis Arraez is living proof that modern metrics don't quite explain everything about hitting - how many years in a row can you be towards the bottom of the league in things like bat speed & exit velo but still comfortably exceed your expected batting average before we acknowledge it's a distinct skill & not random BABIP luck.

I actually think that the industry is moving back somewhat towards a focus on contact hitting. There was a fascinating Eno Sarris article in The Athletic earlier this spring looking at bat speed numbers across the majors, and one of the conclusions he came to is that a lot of hitters seem to be looking to gain more contact this year, and bring the point of contact with the baseball back a little closer towards home plate (which in part, slows down bat speed).

That said, the rise in strikeout rates and the corresponding drop in things like hits, singles, and batting average, make the logic of prioritizing power obvious. As it has gotten harder and harder to string together, not just hits, but any contact at all, players and teams looked to maximize what contact was being made. And when guys are throwing 100 mph breaking balls — as, for instance, we watch Camilo Doval do regularly — it’s going to be pretty danged hard to make contact, no matter what type of hitter you are. At the same time, advances in defensive positioning (and, I would say, defensive ability and athleticism) make what line drives are getting sprayed around often just impressive outs.

It’s a tough conundrum. To some degree, we have a model for what you’re talking about, however. For several years, Cleveland has fielded a club that has mostly eschewed power and instead prioritized more “hit first” type players — they’re everywhere in the Guardians’ system every year. One of those hitters, José Ramirez — the one who both hits and powers — is going to be headed to the Hall of Fame someday, and has probably been the least appreciated superstar of his age. Cleveland has done well in this era, winning a host of AL Central titles and making one oh so close run to a World Series title. But they’ve also done that primarily on the backs of their pitching, and have mostly struggled to score runs — a trend that has continued this year.

That’s a lot to cover for one day — but it’s been an exciting week. Today, the introduction of our new star slugger, tonight the debut. Pretty exciting!