Your 2018 Giants: Signs FA Tony Watson for $9M

The Giants have agreed to sign free agent Tony Watson, former teammate and buddy of closer Mark Melancon (he apparently tried hard to recruit him even when he was briefly with the Dodgers;  he pitched very well for them in the playoffs).  Two years at $9M, plus games played escalators that easily push the contract to $14M, but all in 2019, none in 2018, plus a player's option for 2020.

To stay under the CBT penalty, his agent, Scott Boras (of course, he was the sneak that cost us a Top 10 pick in Matt White, when he found a loophole that made him a free agent; I won't fully forgive him unless Bryce Harper signs with us next off-season :^) ), helped figure out a way for the Giants to sign him, given their interest in him once the news that Will Smith would miss at least the first month of the season in his recovery from TJS.  Apparently for the CBT, because it is a two year contract with a third year player option, for AAV purposes, it counts as 3 years, but because only $9M is guaranteed over the first two years of the contract, you divide the $9M by the 3 years.

Boras' financial accountant earned his salary with that move, and this might break the log jam of free agents, as other teams try to do similar contractual gymnastics to sign other free agents.


ogc thoughts

Exciting move today.  As I've been noting, the Giants under Bochy likes having lefties in the pen, and hence all my talk about Blach and then Snelten taking one of the opening day spots, especially after Smith was declared out at least for the month of April.  This essentially replaced Smith with similar abilities, and then when he returns, he won't need to be as good as hoped, he could just be a loogy for this season, as Watson has strong experience and performances being a setup reliever.

This also means that all the estimates I've seen about how much the Giants had below the threshold to spend were incorrect, because most had $4M when the Giants signed A-Jax, which would mean nothing much left.  However, even after Watson, the talk is that the Giants have enough to take on the major league vets who are currently on minor league deals with the team, and still stays under.

Furthermore, adding Watson probably adds another win, roughly, to the WAR projections, which pushes them out of a tie for the second wild card.  Of course, as we saw last season, projections can go horribly wrong, but you got to start somewhere.  Add in the lowered projections for Bumgarner and others due to injuries not likely to repeat, and the Giants are pretty close to the Dodgers for the NL West Division Title.  I'll take that right now given how bad 2017 was.

In addition, this means that the Giants could have signed Jarrod Dyson instead of AJax and Watson.  As much as I was rooting for signing Dyson, I prefer having Watson in the bullpen, we need that more than we need another OF (albeit, great defensive OF).  We have a lot of decent OF prospects in Parker, Williamson, Slater, who can step in and stem the loss of a Pence or McCutchen, so that all hell don't break loose if there is an extended injury.

Bullpen Outlook:  Looking Good!

Now we have Melancon, Dyson, Watson, Strickland, Gearrin set in the bullpen, with all the young prospects battling for the last bullpen spot (also Derek Holland, but I think he'll either be the last starter after Bumgarner, Cueto, Samardzija, and Stratton, or the long reliever).   Also, given that it's early in the season, the Giants could select another short reliever instead of a long reliever, and just have a bullpen game to fill in, should a disaster start happens.

I think Holland will win the last starter spot (I'm assuming Stratton delivers a strong enough spring) because he showed off great talent early in the 2017 season.  So it is a matter of the Giants getting him going again, like they did with Dyson.  I don't expect him to be low 3-ERA immediately (or ever), but I expect the Giants to make enough progress that they would rather keep him up with the team and work out the final kinks, since they can option Blach to the minors, and recall him back and forth.   Depending on how good he shows off, either last starter or long relief.  But my bet is on starter.

I also bet that with Julian Fernandez and Derek Law around, the former because of his triple-digit stuff, Law because of how well he has done previously, they will want to go with them in the final two bullpen spots, and go without a long reliever initially, in order to hold onto Fernandez.  It is a lot to expect an A-ball pitcher without great numbers to jump to the majors the next year and do okay, but the last time they did something close to this, they brought up Jonathan Sanchez quickly through the minors before planting him in the majors.  I expect him to do well enough that the Giants are very intrigued and would keep him in hopes of keeping him later.

I can see the Giants trying to work out a trade with the Rockies, but I assume that they would not give up such a good asset that easily and would force the Giants to hold onto Fernandez at least for a couple of months.   By then, if he's good, the Giants are keeping him, and if he's bad, the Rockies might be willing to take another player in trade.  If he's only okay, I think that's an impasse then, as both teams see that he could still develop more.

Overall, our bullpen looks pretty good now.  Melancon, Dyson, Watson, and Strickland is a pretty good foursome.  If Smith can return to his prior goodness, then we have an awesome quintent, plus Gearrin has elite spin rates himself, so I wonder if he's underrated by most.  Add in either Law or Fernandez providing good middle relief, and the Giants got an awesome bullpen.  Even just those first six would be pretty awesome, most of them have experience and success in closing and setup, going an inning at a time, meaning Bochy won't need to mix and match as often as he had to the past few seasons after the Core Four retired.