Your 2019 Giants: Another Two First Names: Tyler Austin

The Giants traded for Tyler Austin, firstbaseman/OF, from the Twins, for OF Malique Ziegler, who has been a prospect that some prospect hounds have liked (I could go either way, had not any feelings either way).

Austin, an extreme power hitter (17 homers in 244 AB) but poor OBP, looks to be the starting LF once he gets the chance to practice out there again, since he's been mostly playing 1B this spring.  Eventually, it sounds like Austin in LF, Duggar in CF, and Pillar in RF, but for now, it's Austin at 1B, Belt in LF, Pillar in CF, and Duggar in RF.  And, apparently, Austin batting 2nd vs. LHP.

Below is what I wrote in The Athletic about the trade, with usual caveat (that I continually tweak...).

ogc big picture thoughts

I like the trade, and I like what Zaidi's been doing with the roster.

The trades might not make much sense on their own, nor the churn of players, which seems to be the main complaints, but this is the way I see it.

Zaidi Waits for the Market to Come to Him

Zaidi, unlike before, is unwilling to compromise just to have a high floor lineup. Before, Sabean and Evans loved the bird in the hand, so that when experiments failed in spring, there would be a veteran sitting by who provides an okay floor so that the starting lineup on Opening Day isn't embarrassing or unusual, it would look quasi-competitive.

Like the signing of AJax, when Duggar failed to take the starting job, when he was expected to make it, AJax was the veteran floor. This year, Ferguson and Williamson failed, as well as the veteran, Cameron Maybin (though I would note here that he's not like prior vets, he was here as NRI, minor league deal, like Juan Uribe was, not MLB deal like AJax, which gave Zaidi leeway to drop him easily). Zaidi had no MLB contracted floor, but that gave him flexibility, which has been his mantra.

Instead of forcing things by overpaying another team for a proper MLB LF and RF, instead, he made deals for interesting prospects (Reed and Joe, who their teams gladly accepted a prospect, as they had expected to lose the prospect via waivers anyway) who would be given the opportunity to show what they can do in the majors, and get assessed by the Giants brain trust. Meanwhile, he kept his phone busy talking with other teams about OF's on the edge of their 25-man roster, until he got Pillar and then Austin.

This is not a knock on Zaidi's predecessors, more a view of how the two regimes operate differently.  I liked having a floor, but often the floor that was available was not worth getting (like AJax, or even, before Span), and so that's an area that I hope to see improvement on from Zaidi.

Waiver Roulette Tactic for Adding Assets

I also like his Waiver Roulette tactic, which is "exhausting" for some fans.  The churn of on-the-outer-edge roster players is simply his way to add tradeable assets into the Giants farm system. For example, his churn netted him Andreoli, who he was able to flip for Reed, another interesting prospect, who he was able to keep. As well as a bunch of other guys sitting in AAA, who will get a chance to show what they can do, until maybe he uses them in a trade, or maybe they get a shot, like Reed and Joe did. Maybe he works out a deal for Joe too (unlikely), but if he somehow pulls that off, he's got another interesting prospect (that he likes, unlike the guys he has traded off).

It's a hard ruthless truth, but they are just cattle he's collecting on the fringes, using the MLB rules to fill his empty trading coffers with some assets. If one gets taken away, he'll grab another one in his relentless Waiver Roulette tactic.

Zaidi Quote and Implications

Still, gotta love the way Zaidi defended Connor Joe here, he viewed Connor as the worthy prospect that he is:

A darn thoughtful explanation from Farhan Zaidi when I asked if he had seen enough to evaluate Connor Joe, or if roster needs outweighed the ability to carry him: pic.twitter.com/bwp435OkRx

— Andrew Baggarly (@extrabaggs) April 8, 2019

Zaidi Quote Implications:  No Full Rebuild

Also tucked into there:  the Giants are not in full rebuilding mode.  Which has been clear to me, but something that people keep on interpreting the Giants to be in, as they think that Bumgarner, Posey, Belt, Smith, and others will be traded away, at some point this season or next, and the roster is decimated via the trades.

In fact, his words from his introductory press conference was roughly this: it's not a rebuild or a reset, we're going to improve the Giants, move by move, where some moves don't seem like much, but could pay dividends later. He recognizes that some moves are 51/49 and that's okay. 

Which says to me that the trades people expect are not happening.  Trading our vets for young players is highly unlikely, unless we have a ready replacement coming up, because it appears that Zaidi is laser focused on improving the team, by incremental moves.  And trading for young prospects means a step back for the team, competitively, unless there is someone ready to step up and take over that production.  Hence why there are so many good relievers on the team right now, he expected to trade off one or two, and ended up unable to trade anyone to fill holes in the roster.  They also have Blach, Black and Adon, and potentially Suarez, Anderson and Beede as well, stashed as potential relievers. 

Posey does have a replacement with Bart coming up soon-ish, but he has a full no-trade clause, and while he might like to play for the Braves in front of family and friends, he already does that with road trips there, and I would note that he bought a mansion here in the Bay Area, he has roots here, and I don't think he's going anywhere.  And again, he's earning his money, even last season which was reduced by his hip problems, so any trade should result in a loss of competitiveness.

In addition, I would note that the only major studies of free agency and trades was both done by Matt Swartz, for BP and FG, and he found that teams know what they are giving up when they trade, there are usually legitimate problems with anybody you sign or trade for.  So if you are trading solid players like Bumgarner, Posey, and Belt to another team, you can expect to take a hit on the value you get back, because they are legit good players.

People like to bad mouth the Giants contract situation, but the fact is that there were only a few bad contracts, as Longoria earned his money, as well as Belt, another player fans like to beat up on, but Cueto, Samardzija, Pence, and Melancon didn't, among the big contracts.  Posey, Belt, Crawford, McCutchen, Bumgarner, and Longoria did, however.  It's a big payroll, yes, and it hasn't been winning, but they have been earning their contracts, which is what the point is.  They just need younger contributing players.

Wonder Anti-Twin Righty Power!

Overall, I like the OF now, as I view the two acquisitions as matching book ends. Before it was very much an experiment (Zaidi did not like this term, and I understand why, per his quote above, but by any definition of the word, it was an experiment), an experiment, I would add, many have been begging the Giants to do for years now, as both Reed and Joe were very interesting prospects.   They just couldn't afford to continue the experiment.

Though I would note that my suspicions are that Pillar and Austin were the types of players he was looking for, the ones that he referenced as deals he was working on during the off-season, but just could not close the deal until now.  And because the returns to their original teams are so small, it looks like it was the other team finally giving up on these players, and not that the Giants finally upped their offer in the trade.  De Paula and Ziegler are interesting lower tier prospects, but not likely to ever develop in a good major leaguer, and Hanson and Law were assets that Zaidi had available for trade, and he's building up these assets in AAA, which is causing an overflow to AA (with Shaw moving back there).

Back to the players, each of the two - Pillar for his offense, Austin for his defense - appears weak on their own. However, while Pillar and Austin both have strong weaknesses as major leaguers, their strengths kind of balance each other off in the roster, and provide value if you view them as a package deal: Pillar is weak on offense (but okay for bottom of lineup), but superior defensively; Austin is weak on defense (and OBP too, can't have everything on the cheap), but superior slugging and particularly against LHP.  Austin just greatly boosted the offense against LHP, and not a moment too soon, as we are facing SD's lefties again. And both are RHH, helping to balance the lineup at 4 LHH and 4 RHH.

Viewed another way, both are offensive improvements over what we had in 2018.  Giants LF hit collective .621 OPS, CF hit .673 OPS.  Austin is projected to hit .758 OPS by ZIPS, Pillar .688 OPS, both better than what we got from last season.  Meanwhile, Pillar is an excellent fielder, and in spite of his decline, still contributed dWAR of +0.3 in 2018.  Whereas Austin is probably not all that good, especially if he's moving to LF.  And thus, combined, is negative, which is evened out by how good offensively Austin is (he's almost 3 wins better hitter, per his projection, I doubt his defense is so bad that he would negate that). 

Good OF Solution

And, overall, they provide a good OF solution, all for a little more than $6M.  And Zaidi controls Pillar for two seasons cheaply and has Austin for five seasons, if he should continue to produce at the same offensive rate, while improving in his defense.  This is very reminiscent of the seasons where Sabean said that he could not look short term, that he's looking for longer term and younger solutions, and Zaidi delivered the goods with Pillar and Austin, I feel.

And LF should be good for Austin.  Not sure why he hasn't been tried there before, as he has played a lot of RF, but he's been rated an average runner (and many statues are put in LF) and, in particular, with a good arm (probably why he's been used in RF so often), and that would definitely play in LF, if he can develop some instincts for playing there.  But if not, there's the Burrell route, with Parra coming in late for defense, and the CF and Crawford at SS would help to limit his exposure in LF (somehow the Giants positioned their fielders well enough to make Burrell, who was long derided for his poor defense, about average value defensively, so they should be able to do the same with Austin in LF).

And Austin was not that bad against RHP, just not even average. He's fine batting 6/7 even with his poor RHP stats, because most teams are bad down there too. As long as he can continue to hit like he has in his career, he's a fine hitter down 6/7 because power (SLG) is worth more down there (two of the top SLG run values in the lineup calculator is 6/7; meanwhile, 3 of the lowest for OBP runs are 6/7/8).

We (Now) Got the Power

The main reason why we need to give Tyler Austin a good try out is his power potential.  

In 2018, he hit 8 homers in 89 AB (roughly 11 AB/HR ratio) against LHP, which is roughly a 60 HR seasonal pace, and he hit 9 homers in 155 AB (roughly 17 AB/HR ratio) against RHP, which is still roughly a 40+ homer seasonal pace. So he was hitting at a 40-50 homer season rate, combining LHP and RHP.   Of course, that rate will go down in the Giants park, as well in certain NL pitchers parks, like in LA and SD, but the point here is he has legit power.  

Of course, they probably skipped him against tough pitchers, both LHP and RHP, but when you got a hitter that shows that much power, on a pretty powerless team, he's got to play full-time so that we can see what he can do (and hopefully our hitting coaches can work with him to improve some, as well). 

Especially when Parra is not all that great offensively or defensively, it seems to me to be a given that Austin should start full-time except for tough RHP, and especially against LHP.  And he gives the team another double digit homer guy (Belt, Longoria, Crawford, and now Austin and probably Pillar, and maybe Posey if he can find his stroke back, which I think he can; and you never know with Panik).  

So I'm hoping that the Giants plans for Austin is that he's going to get most of the starts, with Parra giving Austin and Pillar breaks against tough starting RHP. I see him kind of like in the same spot as Blanco when he joined the Giants: he's been passed around enough that he's probably not ever going to be a good player, but he has shown enough that he maybe could be an average player, which is still valuable for a team like the Giants.

And if Austin can achieve that, Zaidi added 2 wins per each (Pillar is around average, or two wins, too, in recent seasons), for a total of 4 wins added for the two players. Which is a significant jump over 2018, where only McCutchen was valuable (roughly 2 wins), and the sum of the rest was that their deficiencies cost the team 2 wins (in any case, even with Cutch, the OF overall added up to -0.1 bWAR). So that's a six win swing from 2018, vs. the OF we had, assuming that Duggar can match or beat McCutchen's 2 wins contribution (I view that as likely, as Duggar produce +1.1 bWAR in almost 40 starts in 2018, which worked out to a seasonal rate of roughly 5 bWAR).

Even if Austin fails, Zaidi seems to have many other teams on his regular dial, and he'll try another guy. And really, for me, he's buying time for Mac to continue to work on his swing, I haven't given up on him yet, and I don't think the Giant did either, else they probably would have trade him for someone else's project failure, instead of taking the calculated risk (which worked) of putting him through waivers now, and get him safely back into our farm system, where we can continue to work with him.

Thoughts on Mac Williamson

People forget, but he head rolled into that hard cement wall under a year ago.  He had horribly bad concussion symptoms all summer long, and it's been less than a year.  I dare anyone to watch that over and over, and not flinch every time he hits that wall.

I would guess that he's not fully recovered yet, that it takes at least a year (really, look at the video again) and I love that the Giants get to hold onto him to see if he can fully recover and then find his stroke again. And he's good defensively, so I can see the Giants DFAing Parra for Mac (assuming he finds his stroke), when the time comes, assuming Austin is hitting okay, as Parra isn't all that great either, but he allows Zaidi to make moves that has little payroll consequences.

I feel bad for the players, but I love the moves he's been making, to improve the team, bit by bit, move by move. The lineup is actually getting nearer the median team in 2018, which should be enough, once it gets going, to win many games with this great defense (pitching+fielding).

Zaidi's Lineup Influence

If we didn't need more proof that Zaidi is greatly influencing the lineup, Austin's first game was an eye-opener: he was batting 2nd in the lineup. Traditionally, guys who make good contact and have some speed or good base running instincts bat 2nd. Panik is from that classic mode, and why Bochy batted him there a lot. He also liked to put his best hitter 3rd (Bonds, Posey, Belt), even though studies find that wastes their production there. 

But this season, we've been seeing Longoria a lot more in spot he belongs (3rd, due to his low OPB, high SLG), as well as Belt batting 2nd, which many studies have found that it is best to use your best hitter there (which Belt arguably has been for years now, and especially with Posey still searching for his swing). And now Austin batting 2nd.

That makes no sense based on his career .291 OBP or career .760 OPS, but it makes a ton of sense based on his batting line against LHP: .281/.356/.602/.957. Probably only Posey has a better career OBP than that, in this lineup, vs. LHP. And he's still looking for his swing.  Austin is clearly our best hitter vs. LHP.

And he delivered in his first start, getting on base twice in his first start for the Giants, and scoring two runs.  Obviously, extreme SSS, but I'm drooling over this batting line:  .281/.356/.602/.957.   Even it he's 100 OPS lower, that's still better than anyone on this team.

It will be interesting to see how Bochy handles Austin vs. RHP, where he's not all that good a hitter (Pillar like), if Zaidi is influencing, he should then be near the bottom, like 7th, with Pillar 8th.  Of course, a team using an Opener strategy would screw up these plans, as they could throw a LHP first, then switch to RHP the rest of the game.  But as I noted above, he's not platoon bad vs. RHP, he'll be fine in the mix for the bottom of the lineup.