Grant Brisbee with a great article, including a very nice music metaphor

[msgkings322]

The San Francisco Giants (still) need a superstar hitter

The Giants have several hitters who are above average. The lack of a star makes that far less impressive.

www.nytimes.com

I wish more of you had access to this. I'll pick out some good parts but it's all great:

(Giants had 7 hitters with OPS+ of 110 or more...)

This is a lot of selective endpoints to process, so I’ll condense it: Teams with as many above-average hitters as the Giants tend to win more games than they lose. A lot of them win 100 games, the pennant or the World Series. The 2024 Giants will not do any of those things.

The difference isn’t that complicated.

Of the 56 full-season teams, only four didn’t also have a batter who was at least 30 percent higher than the league average (an OPS+ of 130 or better). They had a bunch of solid hitters, but they didn’t have any great ones. Those teams:

• The 1943 Senators, who finished 84-69

• The 1988 Angels, who finished 75-87

• The 2006 Blue Jays, who finished 87-75

• The 2016 Marlins, who finished 79-82

The teams without a star hitter didn’t do squat. All of the above was written before Andrew Baggarly’s exploration of the offense, which came to a similar conclusion:

The Dodgers are easy enough to explain. Turns out signing Shohei Ohtani, then sitting back and watching him post the first 50-homer, 50-steal season in major-league history is a good blueprint for success. Whether it’s Ohtani or Aaron Judge/Juan Soto in the Bronx or José Ramírez in Cleveland or Bobby Witt Jr. in Kansas City or Gunnar Henderson in Baltimore or Yordan Alvarez in Houston or Bryce Harper in Philadelphia, there’s a very short list of difference-making star players in the league right now and it doesn’t seem like a coincidence that all of them will be playing baseball in October.

 

[msgkings322]

This is a rough and dirty visualization of when each Giant with more than 250 plate appearances was hot or cold, with “hot” defined as an OPS over .800 during the stretch, and “cold” defined as an OPS under .700. (“Injured” is when the player was injured.) You can find a link to the timeline here, if that’s easier to read for you.

The best way to read this timeline is vertical. As in, read it from top to bottom and see how many of the red rectangles overlap. There aren’t a ton. When one hitter got hot, others got cold. It made for a lineup that was far too easy to pitch to. The presence of a star-level hitter, someone so productive that his cold stretches are merely blips, is how those gaps are bridged. (And if you can’t do that, pitch like the 2010 Giants.)

 

[msgkings322]

Except it might not be that easy. I truly believe the Giants made good-faith efforts for Harper, Judge and Ohtani (and dodged a bullet with Giancarlo Stanton). They didn’t go after Mookie Betts, which was possibly their biggest mistake, especially if the Red Sox would have been tempted by Joey Bart and/or Marco Luciano back then. But it’s just not easy to secure one of these players, even if you really, really want one and ask nicely.

 

[msgkings322]

One thing you should not do is put too much pressure on Bryce Eldridge, who just turned 20. Even though he had a remarkable minor-league season and is the Giants’ best hitting prospect since Buster Posey, if not Will Clark, it’s simply not fair to put the burden on his shoulders. While it might be true that I was winking at my computer the entire time I was writing that, it’s still very unfair to expect that of a recent teenager.

This is the next hurdle. The Giants have accumulated more solid hitters than you might give them credit for. It’s a stick of dynamite without a fuse or a match, though, and it’ll go to waste until they sign, develop or trade for A Guy. He doesn’t have to be a latter-day Barry Bonds, although that would certainly help. He just needs to be Brandon Belt, Brandon Crawford or Darin Ruf in 2021. And then he should do it again for several years after that.

The Giants’ lineup is a Coldplay album. Completely inoffensive. Sometimes pleasant. Never transcendent. They need at least one plus-plus hitter next year if they want to be “OK Computer” or “Kid A.” You’ll even settle for “The King of Limbs.” I know I would. That album’s second half is extremely competitive.

If you’re not a music/Radiohead person, just know that the Giants are so close, yet so far. The fix is easy to spot. That doesn’t mean it’s easy to make.

 

[calsnowskier]

The fix is easy to spot. That doesn’t mean it’s easy to make.

This is the crux.

And hopefully, that fix will come in a few days.

 

[msgkings322]

This is the crux.

And hopefully, that fix will come in a few days.

Whoever takes over for FZ will not have some magic way to get a superstar hitter

 

[sf1giantfan]

So what this is saying, is we have a chance next season.

 

[calsnowskier]

Whoever takes over for FZ will not have some magic way to get a superstar hitter

But if you fail for 6 years and still have (by some analysts, at least) the absolute worst farm system in the game, you have lost your right to continue trying.

 

[msgkings322]

But if you fail for 6 years and still have (by some analysts, at least) the absolute worst farm system in the game, you have lost your right to continue trying.

Isn’t part of that because so many prospects have “graduated”? Ramos, Bart, Fitz, Doval, Birdsong, Harrison, Bailey, etc. they have to reload due to success, no?

I am not in love with FZ but he has talent. He’d probably be better as the #2 guy, the Jonah Hill to a Brad Pitt type. There was chatter about how Posey was the guy who closed the Chapman signing maybe we need a former player to be the deal maker and FZ can be the numbers guy. Although I doubt he’d be happy with a demotion

 

[msgkings322]

So what this is saying, is we have a chance next season.

Don’t we always?

 

[calsnowskier]

Isn’t part of that because so many prospects have “graduated”? Ramos, Bart, Fitz, Doval, Birdsong, Harrison, Bailey, etc. they have to reload due to success, no?

I am not in love with FZ but he has talent. He’d probably be better as the #2 guy, the Jonah Hill to a Brad Pitt type. There was chatter about how Posey was the guy who closed the Chapman signing maybe we need a former player to be the deal maker and FZ can be the numbers guy. Although I doubt he’d be happy with a demotion

I would be 100% on board with him sticking as the #2. But we both know THAT isn’t happening.

Doval graduated 3 or 4 years ago. Bart graduated in ‘20. Bailey graduated a few years ago. Technically, Ramos graduated a few years back. Of the guys you mentioned, only Fitz, Birdy and Harrison graduated THIS year.

And I don’t care who has graduated recently. Having the WORST farm system in the game is absolutely unacceptable. Especially for a guy who came on board with the sales pitch of improving the system.

 

[calsnowskier]

And to be fair, I don’t necisarily buy the fact that the Giants have THE WORST farm in the game. I think we are somewhat deep, and have a few high ceiling guys. But I DO agree that we are probably in the bottom 1/2 or 1/3 of the league. And having an analyst from a reputable site make the claim that we are the worst (with receipts) makes me trust his opinion more than my own.