Your 2025 Giants: At the All Star Break

I thought I would write up some thoughts during the break.

ogc thoughts 

The Giants are in good position. Just half a game out of the last wild card spot.  As my playoff study showed, teams in the Top 5 in Runs Allowed take 75% of the playoff spots.  And 69% makes the playoffs.  And the Giants are sixth in the NL in RA, but with improvement, as I'll discuss below, can get back into the Top 5 easily.

The key questions are whether the pitching can continue being so good and whether the offense can improve.  I believe some tweaks would help a lot.

Offensive Improvement

This one is probably pretty much up to the players we have now, because it could cost a lot to improve at 1B.  Mainly we need Devers to pick it up to his career norms.  Both Chapman and Adames took about two months to adjust and get back to career norms. Let’s see how long he takes to adjust, but he's a better hitter, so theoretically, should be faster.

We also need Jung Hoo Lee to pick it up as well.  He started out well but then faded way off since, though he was picking it up lately in July.  He's been a StatCast darling so far, his batted balls are viewed as much better than his batting line both seasons, he should be 30-40-50 OPS points better at varying points over the past two seasons. 

We also need Ramos to continue hitting as well as he has these two seasons.  He's been the most steady hitter in the lineup this season. After a season and a half of him producing, pretty regularly, I feel pretty good about him continuing.  

For the rest of the lineup, you just have to accept that they are what they are.  Chapman, Adames, and Yaz are what they are, Three True Outcome hitters, who are inherently streaky because of their tendency to strikeout a ton. They will always have a lot of swing and miss. Bailey, Smith, Schmitt are up and down hitters because they are unproven so far, but their offense looks pretty good when they are on, and their defense is always good, no matter what their offense is.  And Flores is a professional hitter, with horrible EV's, but he has the ability to hit them where they ain't regularly enough to hold a strong position on the bench.

Maybe the Giants pick up a 1B with an expiring contract to take over, but I think he would cost a lot to acquire.  And the Giants have a bigger problem looming:  starting pitching

The Giants Need a SP

The Giants need to acquire a better starting pitcher.  Their overall RA is 3.94, putting them 6th, but the teams ahead of them have RA of 3.93, 3.92, 3.92, 3.91, 3.91, so with one better pitcher than Birdsong, they can easily be in the Top 5 again, if not first.

Moreover, they have question marks with over half the rotation, where Webb and Ray are the two aces and nothing much to worry about than normal pitcher stuff. But Verlander, Roupp and Birdsong all have issues where they might not be available at some point this season.

Verlander and Birdsong are pretty clear cut.  Both have not pitched all that well, will they be effective enough should the Giants make the playoffs?  Verlander says he has figured out his mechanics, and had a good start, so maybe he’ll be okay.  But he is also 42 year old and thought he was fine earlier.  Birdsong has not been pitching well, period, and if the Giants acquire another starting pitcher, he would be the one to be replaced, and be next man up.  One or both might still be performing poorly as we near the trade deadline.

Roupp is also a question mark. He has been scuffling, from my view (someone had a hissy fit when I said this, saying “but but his ERA good! Weird framing!”).  

But I don’t know what else to call it when a pitcher went from 8.8 K/9, 3.2 BB/9, 2.77 K/BB, 3.18 ERA, 3.49 FIP in his first 12 starts to a horrible 6.4 K/9, even worse 5.8 BB/9, horrid 1.11 K/BB, 3.86 ERA, 4.62 FIP in his last 6 starts. He didn’t just stop striking out guys, his walks almost doubled, increasing 81% on a rate basis and his FIP ballooned to a poor 4.62.” 

That’s scuffling, even if his ERA was a good 3.86 ERA over the six games, because his peripherals were lousy, and the 4.62 FIP shows that he was simply lucky in those games.  That is why I focused on just those starts, his peripherals went from day to night, clearly, so it's great that he was able to pitch his way to a good ERA, something caused the great change in peripherals, and generally, that's usually something bad and not random.

And ERA is generally good to use to compare pitchers, but if his FIP is much higher, it means his peripherals are much worse.  And that is why Fangraphs uses FIP in its methodology for valuing pitchers, and not ERA, because his underlying numbers are saying another story.  He may be pitching well, but his skill in getting strikes have fallen off the cliff, which could be a skill decline for some unknown reason.

I believe this was a valid reason to be concerned. To be clear, I like Roupp a lot. I was one of his advocates early last season, even when he wasn’t doing well during the season, and into this season. My only concern is that his IP is nearing his career max of 107, and after that, we are in the unknown because he’s missed so much time the past two seasons that the total IP is 107 together. And he pitched poorly the past six games, but after this 7th game, it’s now possible that his mechanics were off before and now it’s fixed, since he was so dominant and in command.  But it could also be a one off start and whatever affected him before comes back. I've seen this before with pitchers. We just don't know.

Given the context of him being 1) past last year’s IP and 2) nearing his career high in IP, it is valid to be concerned that he might have hit some wall of some sort, if he has a six start stretch where he couldn’t put hitters away like he did earlier in the season, in his first 12 starts. It could also be a sign of him working with some sort of unknown ailment, hindering him.  

And it wasn’t like I advocated to remove him from the rotation. I simply think the Giants need to acquire another SP who can be a good option to be available for any playoffs, should we get in, and that would then push Birdsong out of the rotation until he’s needed again. 

And with valid question marks about Roupp, Verlander, and Birdsong, getting a proven pitcher who we can expect to pitch well and well into October is crucial for hopefully getting enough wins to make the playoffs, and then be a good rotation option if we make it in.  We need a reliable 3rd starter, and if Roupp, Verlander or Birdsong can still pitch well, that's great, but if not, we really need another starter.

Whether we can acquire one without giving up a highly ranked prospect like Whisenhunt is another question.  There are not many do not trade prospects (Eldridge and maybe Whisenhunt) and hopefully we don't have to give up much, the Giants are still trying to become consistently and sustainably competitive, so they can't trade away so much of their best prospects.

Bullpen Mostly Good

The bullpen has been mostly good so far, even great.  They need a LH reliever who is good to replace or supplement Eric Miller, who may or may not return, as he strained elbow ligaments, and that can often lead to TJS.  Maybe Posey and gang can find their version of 2010 Sabean acquisitions of Lopez and Ramirez.  

It would also be nice to acquire a proven closer.  Both Doval and Walker has been a roller coaster this season.  But a closer would be costly, and we need a starting pitcher more than a closer.  

Trent Harris is a reliever who might get called up to help out.  He has risen fast up the minors (undrafted!) and was recently promoted to AAA.  He could be the only reliever added this season after the ASB.

Trading Priorities

I would rank the team's trade priorities this way:

1. Starting Pitcher:  worse case scenario is if anything happens to Roupp, Verlander, Birdsong, in that likely order, we then have to go with Black, Seymour, McDonald, Beck, Bivens, all unproven starters. After a bold trade to get Devers, if Posey is serious about making the playoffs, another SP is necessary to grab that last playoff spot.
2. Left hand reliever:  most great bullpens have a LOOGY who can shut down LHH. The Giants are surviving because they have RH relievers who can also get LHH out, but if they can get a shutdown LOOGY, that would boost the bullpen to even greater heights.
3. Starting 1B:  this is not as necessary as the above.  I think we need the above pitchers to get to the playoffs, but I am not sure this would move the needle much or enough.
4. Closer:  I think this is more necessary than 1B, but would cost a lot more, as a 1B is likely more a salary dump (but if upgrade over Smith/Flores, will still cost some) and a better closer than Doval or Walker would be costliest.  I just don't see Posey trading away a top prospect for a closer, at least not yet.  While the Doval trade was a stunner, he was more being opportunistic than declaring the Giants are all in on this season. And paying a large price in prospects for a proven closer would be an all in move.