Your 2025 Giants: Reviewing The Modern MLB Rotation Chaos Portfolio Theory

Last off season I wrote in a post about how the Giants approached Zaidi’s idea of finding starting pitchers who can get the Giants 162 game starts, as contrasted with the traditional objective of finding 5 32-starts starting pitchers. 

Now that Posey is in charge, I thought it would be interesting to see what the Giants are trying to do this season, which, to me, is very much like last season.  And dig into where they are going to put all these pitchers. 

{Note: wrote most of this before Opening Day; obviously, the pitching has been pretty good so far}

Feeling the Need to Write: Giants Great Season so far reminds me of the 2010 Padres

I've been following this season, and been enjoying it so far, pleasantly surprised, but if you follow me, you know that I have not been happy with Zaidi's strategy for the starting rotation, which is basically what the Dodgers did when he was the GM there: overflow the starting pitching on the roster with starting pitching projects, whether projects who they can improve or frequently injured starting pitchers who will be on and off the roster, mixed in with farm system prospects. 

One of the key components of the 2010's dynasty is the starting rotation, so I wanted to dig into their performance so far to see whether this is a sustainable. For now, it reminds me of the 2010 Padres, who, as I wrote about back then, led the NL West with great ace level pitching by a staff that had no real history of being ace starters, and as that staff reverted to their mean, the Giants caught up with them, though it took a superlative stretch of starting pitching on the part of the Giants pitching staff at the end of the season.

Your 2020 Giants: Revised Top Prospect Timetable Thoughts

Obviously, with the MLB season unlikely to begin until June or July, that throws all my prospect timetables out of whack, since they won't be playing, something I should have realized when I posted them (honestly, as you can tell by the length of each, I just wanted to get them out).  I probably should have thought about that before publishing, realizing that things have been moving so fast on Coronavirus Time.

So I thought I would take a stab at initial thoughts on how the top prospects might be affected, based on the current thinking that the MLB won't start until mid-year.  CDC guidelines is restricting meetings of 50+ for the next 8 weeks, which lasts to mid-May, but even if that works and people can somehow start to congregate again, the players will need spring training again, which pushes the start to, at best, early June; and some GM's are thinking July, because many players come into spring training having already gotten ready, but with this order, nobody is staying in shape.  Plus, some counties, like in the SF Bay Area, has a shelter order in effect, restricting people to stay at home for the three weeks, except for essential business (of which, entertainment is not).  Who knows how long that will take?  Still, thought I would tackle the scenario where the season starts up around June/July.

Your 2020 Giants: Top Giants Prospects Lists

I compiled some Top Giants Prospects lists, some only had 10, others had a lot more:

• Baseball America Top 10 Giants Prospects
• MLB Pipeline Top 30 Giants Prospects
• Baseball Prospectus Top 10 Giants Prospects
• FG:  Top 36 Giants Prospects
• The Athletic:  Keith Law Top 20 Giants Prospects
• Minor League Baseball Analyst (MiLBA)

Also interesting are rankings of the Giants farm system in the majors:

• Baseball America: #14
• MLB Pipeline:  #10
• Baseball Prospectus:  Has not been released yet
• Fangraphs:  Has not been released yet
• Keith Law:  #10
• Minor League Baseball Analyst:  #6 (A- in hitters, C+ for pitching, A for Top-End Talent)

I know I said this for my last post, but this one (plus the last one, combined) is probably going to be in lieu of my usual Big Six prospect post (so refer to my post on Top 100 for further info on the top prospects) that I've been doing in the spring most seasons.  :^)

Of course, with the coronavirus delay to the season, who knows how much of the 2020 season will be played.  Stay safe and healthy out there!