The San Francisco Standard has an email service which shares news and thoughts about the local teams, like the Giants. Kerry Crowley wrote about the Bailey trade to Cleveland in a recent email (September 4th), part of which I excerpt here for your reference:
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Was trading Bailey a smart move?
It’s too soon to say whether the Giants or Guardians won the deal, in part because Bailey’s primary replacement, Daniel Susac, appeared in just 53 games before a fractured left kneecap ended his season.
Susac isn’t as highly regarded as Bailey defensively, yet this season he recorded six defensive runs saved (DRS) compared with Bailey’s seven. Bailey has a narrow edge in pop time (1.85 seconds to 1.89 seconds), but Susac graded out as a slightly better framer (92nd percentile to 83rd percentile).
Giants pitchers recorded a 3.63 ERA throwing to Bailey this season, nearly two-tenths of a point better than the 3.82 mark they recorded with Susac catching.
Bailey’s two Gold Glove Awards and longer track record suggest he’ll remain the better defensive player, but he’s arbitration-eligible and will command a higher salary moving forward.
Susac’s .664 OPS is well below league average, but a strong September at the plate will give Bailey — who has a .604 OPS — a chance to catch up. The switch-hitting veteran has a .699 OPS with Cleveland, a .789 mark since the All-Star break, and had a .814 OPS in September 2025, whereas Susac regressed following a red-hot start to his career.
After a right elbow injury forced Susac to the injured list in April, he returned May 15 and hit just .198 with a .574 OPS in 42 games.
The good news for the Giants is that Susac isn’t the only player responsible for filling Bailey’s void. The bad news is that neither of the other top catchers — Drew Cavanaugh and Jesús Rodríguez — is a strong defender. Cavanaugh’s pop time and blocking skills grade out above average, but his framing ranks in the 31st percentile among catchers, and Giants pitchers have recorded a 4.70 ERA with Cavanaugh behind the plate. Rodríguez, meanwhile, has poor defensive metrics and is likely better suited to a role as a utility infielder.
It’s possible the best path forward for the Giants would have been keeping Bailey and platooning him with Susac. It’s also possible Bailey, a multiyear starter in San Francisco, would have been frustrated with that arrangement.
So with the team struggling and Bailey underperforming, Posey took a risk by resetting the catching depth chart in return for a pair of valuable assets. Wilkinson might struggle as a starter, but it’s realistic to think he could succeed out of the bullpen.
Then there’s Bolemon, a 19-year-old lefty who is already one of the Giants’ top 10 prospects. If the 6-foot-4 South Carolinian becomes a force in the rotation, Posey may look back on the Bailey trade as one of his best moves.
A lot has to go right — Susac must improve, Wilkinson must contribute, and Bolemon must develop into a trusted starter — but one of the bolder trades of Posey’s tenure could eventually pay off.
ogc thoughts
I have never been happy when people (whether media or fans) base the success of things like a trade on what happens eventually. Because, as with most things in life, success is a chaotic mix of a variety of factors. And nobody can tell the future. So I prefer to look at the situation at it existed at the time, and if it made sense in the moment, that could be a success, even if it ends up being bad. Of course, end results do matter in some way, but it is not the end all and be all of analysis of such a deal.
Also, another problem with that is society has a problem with people taking risks, and sometimes it goes to the extreme where any failure is not acceptable. In life, you have to take some risk. Hopefully you can minimize the risk, but you can never eliminate it, it will always be there. And you don’t want your top decision makers to take the easy path in order to maximize success, because it becomes limiting to the magnitude of success that can happen overall. That’s how top companies end up losing to competitors, not taking the risks to become much better.
Bailey Trade is a Success Already
It was a smart risky move. Any time you trade away a two time Gold Glove catcher for prospects, it is very risky. But it was a move to position the Giants to draft a good HS pitcher in the draft, which happened after the trade.
The industry opinion, reported by various media outlets, was that teams were avoiding HS pitchers in the first round, and that most if not all would fall out of the first round. This has been an industry trend since the mid-2000’s, especially after a draft analysis by Baseball Prospectus found HS pitchers to have the least WARP produced. And the pick the Giants got in trade was a supplemental draft pick that was after the regular first round picks. They could theoretically have the pick of the crop.
Another factor in why this trade was a smart move is because Bailey reaches arbitration next season, and would reach free agency in 2030. Most of the top prospects the Giants had at that time (Gonzalez, Level, Hernandez, Davidson, Jordan, Bresnahan, Martinez) should be reaching the majors in the 2028-30 timeframe, so he might not even be with the team when these players reach their prime in the early 2030’s. Trading him now lets the Giants take a step back and get a better balance between pitching prospects and position prospects, by getting a high end HS pitcher who can hopefully reach the majors in the 2029-2032 timeframe (Bumgarner was a starter in the rotation only three years after he was drafted), around the time the others are reaching their peaks.
It was also nice to pick up an interesting prospect in addition to the pick. Even better that he has a fun nickname, Tugboat. Wilkinson might work out, crafty lefties like him appears to be a dying breed, but that category was created because there was a significant segment who were that good. Kirt Rueter was a famous and favorite one for the Giants. Still, you never know with prospects who aren’t Top 100 ranked (even Top 100 ranked isn’t all that you would think it is cracked up to be). Anything he produces will be a bonus.
So I viewed the trade as a success immediately because it accomplished the above, transitioning from a player who might not even be part of the next good Giants team, to picking up a pitcher (or maybe two) who could be a part of that next good Giants team. In particular, getting the 29th draft pick in the upcoming draft. Getting that pick gave the Giants the ability to get a top HS pitching prospect. And optionality is a key component of any business decision.
Optionality
This move would probably not even be possible if the Giants didn’t think ahead and traded for Susac in the Rule 5 Draft. Showing Posey and gang’s eye, as the data Crowley shared above shows, Susac has had a very good first season as an MLB catcher. Maybe not Gold Glove level, but he is very good, period, so far. Sure, his hitting has been up and down, much like Bailey over his career, but Bailey set the bar so low offensively in 2025-26 that even what Susac hit this season is a lot better.
This was similar to Cleveland’s situation. They traded for Bailey because their catcher was not a good hitter either, nor a good catcher, so the 0 fWAR that Bailey had at the time of the trade was still an upgrade. For the Giants, while they lose Bailey’s elite defense, because of his bad offense, he was only a replacement level player for the Giants in 2026, and that’s all Susac needed to be to allow the Giants to trade Bailey, a replacement player. Unfortunately, he got injured, but in his short 19 games played, he still produced 0.2 fWAR, which is roughly what an average player produces, so he could have produced a lot more than Bailey, who hasn’t hit in years.
Catching Gurus
The Giants seem to have catching gurus in their organization. Posey was a premier framer during his career. Also, his backups were pretty good too, I recall Chris Stewart and Eli Whiteside being good framers. Most of all, when Patrick Bailey was drafted with their 2020 first round pick, their most valuable draft pick of that draft, and even though they already had Joey Bart, the Giants immediately made him change everything he knew about catching, and he became a two-time Gold Glove catcher. And he likely should be a three time Gold Glove winner because even though he didn’t win his first season, all his metrics led the majors still. Add Susac now to that list of good catchers.
Bolemon: “He Pitches to Kill”
That the Giants did end up picking Carson Bolemon was the whipped cream on top. Bolemon was the top pitching prospect in the draft in the preseason. He fell because he had a slow start (which I had to laugh at when I learned what it was: in 2025, he didn’t give up a run, but in 2026, he gave up a solo homer - gasp - in his first start, the only run he gave up in the game). But then the rest of the season he pitched as dominantly as he did his previous season, giving up no runs. That ended up being his ONLY run given up all season. Slow start?!?!?!
Just found this great article on MLB outlining all the great accomplishments he has done:
- First player to win back to back Gatorade South Carolina Player of the Year Awards
- His teams won five state titles
- Starred for Team USA World Cup, winning the gold medal twice (Giants have traditionally loved prospects who do well in showcases like this)
“I think from a young age, I’ve always had the pitchability. But as I’ve gotten older, that velo started to tick up and it’s helped me a ton to get better and get guys out more consistently. I pride myself on keeping hitters off balance -- if you’re throwing the same thing over and over, eventually they’re going to hit it. You gotta be able to mix speeds and locate the ball.
I’m kind of a new-school/old-school guy. On one hand, you have to be able to locate the ball, throw strikes and get ahead, but at the same time, you have to understand the technology and how you can use it to be a better version of yourself. I think where you go wrong is if you’re using it to be someone you’re not. How I developed my pitches is more trial and error -- at the end of the day, if you try something and it works [keep it]; if it doesn’t, try something else. It’s insane to do the same thing over and over and expect a different result.”
I was extremely excited when the Giants selected Bolemon. Beyond the fact that he was the fourth pick where they picked who I wanted (Lincecum, Posey, Flora, and Bolemon, so far), he was ranked the best pitching prospect in the pre-season. But these quotes got me even more excited. He is showing a lot of maturity, as well as knowledge. I expect him to fly up the minors, much like Cain and Bumgarner, and be part of the NextGen Giants.
Much like how things began in 2010 for the Giants, it feels like 2030 could be the start for this next era, led by Eldridge. Who is the same age as Jackson Flora. But the Giants will have to hit on a lot of prospects to reach such heights. They have a lot of legit prospects, though, so the possibility is there. Now they need to execute.
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