Matt Chapman Open To Temporary Shortstop Move If Giants Sign Ha-Seong Kim
The Giants are in the market for a shortstop. President of baseball operations Buster Posey acknowledged as much at the start of the offseason. San Francisco has been tied to Willy Adames and Ha-Seong Kim in recent weeks.
While Adames could play shortstop on Opening Day, that’s not the case with Kim. He underwent surgery to repair a labrum injury in his throwing shoulder. There’s still not a ton of clarity on when he’s expected back in game action. Kim’s agent Scott Boras has unsurprisingly taken an optimistic stance on the infielder’s recovery. Boras said at last month’s GM Meetings that Kim could be ready early in the season — potentially before the end of April. Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller has previously suggested the rehab could carry into “May, June, July,” a much more nebulous timeline.
Whichever team signs Kim will need a stopgap shortstop for at least a few weeks, potentially months. For the Giants, that could be Matt Chapman. Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reports that the star third baseman told team officials he’d be willing to play shortstop early in the year while Kim recovers. According to Rosenthal, that’s one of various possibilities the team is considering.
That’d be a creative solution. It’s not an outlandish one. Chapman is one of the sport’s best defensive third basemen. He’s a five-time Gold Glove winner. Both Defensive Runs Saved and Statcast’s Outs Above Average have graded him as a strong defender in every season of his career. Chapman tied Milwaukee’s Joey Ortiz for the league lead among third basemen in Outs Above Average this year. He’s fifth at the position by that metric across the past three seasons.
Chapman, who has 10 career innings at shortstop, has plenty of arm strength. He certainly has the hands for the position. The only question is whether he’d have enough lateral quickness to be a plus in the middle of the diamond, but he could probably at least play a competent shortstop for a month or two.
Sliding Chapman to shortstop would open a short-term hole at third base. Tyler Fitzgerald, Marco Luciano, Brett Wisely, Casey Schmitt and David Villar are among the options for work there. Aside from Villar, everyone from that group has some shortstop experience as well. None seems like a long-term answer. Wisely was primarily a second baseman in the minors, while Schmitt has spent most of his career at third base. Luciano has come up as a shortstop but was a disaster defensively in a limited MLB look. His long-term future is probably in the corner outfield.
Fitzgerald got the majority of the shortstop reps late in the season. He’d probably start there if the Giants came up empty in their pursuit. While he hit well enough to earn everyday playing time, the Giants seem to prefer him elsewhere. Posey suggested last month that Fitzgerald could be a second baseman. He also implied they were hopeful they could avoid bouncing him around the diamond as much next season.
“Tyler Fitzgerald did a great job at short last year. I think he has value and in multiple spots on the field,” Posey said at the GM Meetings (link via Shayna Rubin of the San Francisco Chronicle). “I do think it’s hard to play multiple spots at the same time during the season. Whether he’d be better suited to play second base long-term is a discussion we’re having.“
Posey: Giants Pursuing Shortstops
With the 2024 baseball season now complete and the offseason kicking off, the industry is currently buzzing at the general managers meetings in San Antonio. New Giants president of baseball operations Buster Posey spoke with members of the media and said the club is looking for a shortstop, per Shayna Rubin of the San Francisco Chronicle on X. Posey mentioned that Tyler Fitzgerald performed well in 2024 but can play other positions. Prospect Marco Luciano is seemingly ticketed for an outfield role for now, with the club hoping that can help him focus on taking a step forward at the plate.
It’s a bit surprising to see Posey be so frank in discussing a club need, as club executives are normally more cagy and vague in their statements, but it’s not a shock that he has identified this part of the roster as a target.
Brandon Crawford was a fixture at shortstop for the Giants from 2010 to through 2023, but his performance tailed off at the end of that stretch and the Giants didn’t bring him back for 2024. While Crawford got a bench job with the Cardinals this year, the Giants didn’t find an immediate replacement for him.
The aforementioned Fitzgerald got most of the playing time there this year and performed well at the plate. His 31.7% strikeout rate was on the high side but he hit 15 home runs in just 341 plate appearances, leading to a .280/.334/.497 batting line and 132 wRC+.
His defense was another story, however, as the advanced metrics weren’t keen on his work at short. Outs Above Average gave him a grade of -4 for his 594 innings at the spot while Defensive Runs Saved had him at -6. As Posey mentioned, Fitzgerald played other positions, spending some time in the outfield as well as at the three non-shortstop infield spots. Both OAA and DRS were more fond of his work at those other positions, so there’s logic in having him get bumped into a regular gig somewhere else or a super utility role.
As for Luciano, he has been considered a potential long-term solution at short for a while now but hasn’t cemented himself at the big league level. He has hit just .217/.286/.304 in the majors so far, in a small sample of just 126 plate appearances. His Triple-A performance hasn’t been great either, with a .243/.370/.386 line and 95 wRC+ at that level over the past two seasons.
His glovework has also been an issue and this isn’t the first time that the club has talked about moving him off shortstop. In September, manager Bob Melvin talked about Luciano getting more work at second base to finish the season, which was followed by then-president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi talking about Luciano getting some work in the outfield.
It seems the organization now plans to stick with that latter path. Luciano doesn’t yet have any official game action in the outfield, majors or minors, so there may be a learning curve for a while. But given how demanding the shortstop position can be, it’s possible that lining up on the grass could help him unlock his offensive potential at some point.
He hit well through the lower levels of the minors and up through Double-A, spending plenty of time on top prospect lists during that rise. Baseball America considered him the #12 prospect in the whole league as recently as 2021, giving him a 60 grade for his hitting and a 70 for his power on the 20-80 scouting scale. Getting Luciano back on track in the batter’s box is understandably a priority for the Giants, even if he won’t be in the shortstop position.
With the club viewing both Fitzgerald and Luciano as ticketed for other spots, pursuing an external shortstop candidate is a logical offseason goal. The free agent market has one clear top candidate in Willy Adames. There’s also Ha-Seong Kim, but he recently underwent shoulder surgery and has an uncertain return timeline. Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller recently gave a vague “May, June, July” answer about Kim getting back on the field.
The Giants could sign Kim and then keep Fitzgerald at short until the shoulder issue is resolved, but signing Adames is a more straightforward solution. Playing for the Rays and Brewers, Adames already has 150 career home runs, a .248/.322/.444 batting line and 109 wRC+. He just finished a season wherein he stole 21 bases, hit 32 long balls and slashed .251/.331/.462 for a 119 wRC+.
Defensively, Adames has received strong reviews in his career but is coming off a down year. He was credited with 10 fielding errors in 2024, despite having only seven over 2022 and 2023 combined. His -16 DRS for the year was dreadful but he’s still at +4 in his career, even when factoring that in. OAA had him at exactly league average this year but had him at +16 in 2023 and +10 the year before that.
It would be odd for Adames to suddenly experience a steep drop in his fielding abilities at the age of 28, so perhaps clubs will view his 2024 glovework as an odd aberration. Either way, Adames is the clear top shortstop available and MLBTR recently predicted him for a six-year, $160MM contract as part of our annual Top 50 Free Agents post. All four contributors to that post predicted Adames would indeed sign with the Giants, which doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a slam dunk to happen. However, it does reflect that Adames and the Giants are a logical pairing, for the reasons laid out above.
The Giants have made more recent headlines for the top free agents they didn’t sign as opposed to the ones they did. They’ve been connected to big names like Aaron Judge, Carlos Correa and Bryce Harper in past offseasons and reportedly made some strong offers. Most notably, the club and Correa agreed to a 13-year, $350MM deal two years ago, which would have solved their shortstop situation at that time. But the deal got scuttled by the medicals and Correa eventually signed with the Twins.
As such, the largest free agent contract the Giants have given out in the past five years was to Jung Hoo Lee. He got a $113MM guarantee over six years but was an exceptional case as he was coming over to North America at the young age of 25. Apart from that, in the same five-year window, the Giants haven’t given a free agent more than the four years they gave Jordan Hicks and haven’t given a guarantee larger than the $62MM to Blake Snell. The latter deal didn’t even play out in full as Snell opted out after one year.
But perhaps Posey has a goal of flipping that narrative. He recently spoke about getting the Giants back into the “memory-making business” and was reportedly instrumental in getting third baseman Matt Chapman to sign a six-year, $151MM extension, a fairly similar pact to the deal projected for Adames.
RosterResource projects the Giants for a payroll of $155MM next year, more than $50MM south of the 2024 spending. Assuming they are willing to run a similar payroll next year, there’s plenty of room to sign Adames and pursue other goals as well.
There’s also the trade market for Posey to explore, though it’s unclear if there’s a better option than Adames available. Bo Bichette of the Blue Jays has been in plenty of rumors but that club’s general manager Ross Atkins recently threw cold water on the possibility and Bichette is coming off the worst season of his career anyway. He missed time due to injury and hit just .225/.277/.322 for a wRC+ of 71, after hitting .299/.340/.487 for a 126 wRC+ in previous seasons. A deal now would be a big sell-low move for the Jays while the Giants would be taking a big gamble on a bounceback. Bichette is also just one year away from free agency and would only be a short-term solution, unless the Giants wanted to pursue a trade-and-extend path, though that would only add to the downside if Bichette can’t quite get back on track. Bichette also has mediocre defensive grades for his career, making it fair to wonder how much longer he can stick at short. Nico Hoerner was another theoretical trade possibility but he recently underwent flexor tendon surgery and has an uncertain path forward.
Posey is only just beginning his first offseason as a top front office executive, so perhaps he will take some time exploring his options before making a decision. But for now, he has shown some refreshing candor in laying out one clear priority for the winter ahead.
Giants Place Thairo Estrada, Wilmer Flores On Injured List
The Giants announced this evening that they’ve placed infielders Thairo Estrada and Wilmer Flores on the 10-day injured list. Estrada was sent to the shelf with a left wrist sprain and the latter was shelved with knee tendonitis. In corresponding moves, the club has called up infielder Tyler Fitzgerald and activated first baseman Lamonte Wade Jr. from the 10-day injured list.
It’s been a difficult year at the plate for both Estrada and Flores, both of whom have posted below-average offensive numbers after being among the club’s most productive players last year. On the heels of a 3.6 fWAR season where he posted fantastic defensive metrics and a 101 wRC+, Estrada has hit just .231/.264/.376 in 311 trips to the plate this year despite nearly identical peripheral numbers to his 2023 campaign. While his .259 batting average on balls in play may initially appear to be a clear indication that positive regression could be on the way for the 28-year-old, it’s worth noting that the infielder’s .279 wOBA actually outpaces his expected figure of .270.
As for Flores, the 32-year-old was coming off a fantastic 2023 campaign in a semi-regular role with the club last year where he slashed .284/.355/.509 (136 wRC+) in 454 trips to the plate while splitting time between first, second, and third base as well as the DH slot. Flores has found himself in a similar role to this point in the Giants’ season, albeit one that has seen him play first base almost exclusively while Wade was on the shelf. Flores’s plate discipline numbers are still excellent, as he’s walked at an 8.8% clip while striking out just 13.2% of the time, but he’s seemingly completely lost his power stroke. After crushing 23 home runs last year, he’s hit just four in 227 trips to the plate this season as his barrel rate has dipped from 7.8% to just 5.7% this year.
It’s not currently clear how long either player figures to be out of action, but the stays on the shelf should offer both veterans the opportunity to reset ahead of the second half, where both they and the Giants will surely be hoping for better results. Wade’s activation from the IL makes him a fairly clean replacement for Flores at first base, although it’s somewhat trickier for the club to replace Estrada.
Brett Wisely and Nick Ahmed had been acting as a platoon tandem at shortstop while Estrada manned the keystone on a daily basis, but with Fitzgerald entering the mix it’s less clear how that playing time will shake out. The 26-year-old has hit a respectable .273/.333/.409 in 28 games with the Giants to this point in the year, but he has just 106 total plate appearances under his belt since making his big league debut last season. It appears likely that Ahmed could see an uptick in playing time at shortstop as Wisely takes some starts at second base, while Fitzgerald could mix in at both positions in addition to the outfield and first base in a utility role.
Tonight’s news isn’t entirely bleak for the Giants, as they’ll surely be excited to return Wade to the starting lineup. The 30-year-old has been on the shelf since late May due to a hamstring strain but was among the very best hitters in all of baseball this year at the time of his injury. He’ll return to the starting lineup with a fantastic .333/.470/.426 slash line (166 wRC+) that makes up for the relative lack of power with an eye-popping 19.9% walk rate. If Wade manages to play at anything close to that level going forward this season, he’ll surely provide a major shot in the arm for a Giants offense that has ranked just 20th in the majors with a 97 wRC+ since Wade was placed on the shelf.
Giants Place Keaton Winn, Mike Yastrzemski On Injured List
The Giants announced some roster moves this morning, including the news that right-hander Keaton Winn and outfielder Mike Yastrzemski have both been sidelined with injuries. Winn has been placed on the 15-day IL with inflammation in his throwing elbow, while Yastrzemski is headed to the 10-day IL with a left oblique strain. Both placements are retroactive to June 21. Outfielder Luis Matos and infielder David Villar were called up from Triple-A in corresponding moves, and the Giants also sent utilityman Tyler Fitzgerald to Triple-A.
Yastrzemski left Thursday’s game due to his strain, and while oblique problems are known to have fluid timelines, the outfielder told the San Francisco Chronicle’s Susan Slusser (all links to X) that he doesn’t think he’ll miss much if any time beyond the minimum 10 days. After a very slow start to his season, Yastrzemski’s bat has started to heat up over the last few weeks, bringing him to an above-average 104 wRC+ and a .224/.304/.406 slash line over 215 plate appearances.
Yaz has been the Giants’ regular right fielder when a right-handed pitcher is on the mound, but his absence will leave the team short on left-handed bats as a whole, with LaMonte Wade Jr. is also on the IL and Jung Ho Lee is gone for the season. It isn’t an ideal situation for a team that likes to play matchups as much as the Giants, though Matos can help fill the void in the outfield overall, even though Matos is another right-handed hitter.
This is the second time Winn has visited the IL this season, as a forearm strain put him on the shelf for four weeks. He had made three starts since his last activation from the 15-day, though the righty has struggled both before and after his IL stint, posting a 7.16 ERA across 55 1/3 innings.
As much as the Giants were hoping Winn could become a solid rotation piece in his first full Major League season, health is now the bigger question for the 26-year-old. Winn missed the entire 2021 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, so a pair of injuries to his forearm/elbow area in quick succession certainly is a big cause for concern. Past health history notwithstanding, it is also possible Winn’s current issue is just some basic soreness that can be cleared up with 15 days of rest and rehab.
Logan Webb and Jordan Hicks are now the only two healthy starters in San Francisco’s rotation, though both Blake Snell and Robbie Ray will pitch in rehab work for Triple-A Sacramento on Sunday. Giants manager Bob Melvin told Slusser and other reporters that Snell might just need the one rehab start before being activated from the 15-day IL, if all goes well. Kyle Harrison is rehabbing from a sprained ankle and might not need any rehab work after being placed on the IL last weekend with an ankle sprain.
Giants Designate Ryan McKenna, Drew Pomeranz For Assignment
The Giants made a series of transactions today, with Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area among those to relay them on X. Right-hander Spencer Howard and first baseman Trenton Brooks have been selected to the roster, while infielder/outfielder Tyler Fitzgerald has been recalled. In corresponding moves, first baseman LaMonte Wade Jr. has been placed on the 10-day injured list with a left hamstring strain while outfielder Ryan McKenna and left-hander Drew Pomeranz have been designated for assignment.
Wade departed yesterday’s game, limping off the field with the club’s trainer. NBC Sports Bay Area provided video on X. The Giants later announced it as a hamstring strain and have now placed him on the injured list. The club says it’s a Grade 2 strain and he’ll miss about a month, per Pavlovic on X.
While he’s out, it seems the club will get a look at Brooks, who makes it to the major leagues just before his 29th birthday. He spent most of his career with the Guardians, as that club drafted him in the 17th round back in 2016. He climbed as high as Triple-A in Cleveland’s system but didn’t get a roster spot by the end of 2022 and reached minor league free agency.
He then signed a minor league deal with the A’s and hit 16 home runs in 94 games while drawing walks in 13.8% of his plate appearances. Even in the hitter-friendly environment of the Pacific Coast League, his stout .299/.405/.529 batting line translated to a 127 wRC+.
At that point, the A’s flipped him to the Giants for left-hander Sean Newcomb and Brooks has produced in similar fashion since then. He’s appeared in 67 more Triple-A contests since that deal and has ten homers, an 18.1% walk rate and a 15.3% strikeout rate. His .279/.409/.463 batting line in that stretch translates to a 120 wRC+.
Debuts at this late age are especially rare but Brooks clearly has some perseverance that is paying off today. If he can continue hitting major league pitching the way he has done in the minors, he will make for an especially heartwarming late-bloomer story. He has played some outfield in the past but has been strictly at first base this year. He’s in the lineup tonight in place of Wade and could perhaps get a few weeks to test his abilities against big league hurlers.
Turning to the pitching, the Giants have been getting by lately with just four starters in Logan Webb, Jordan Hicks, Kyle Harrison and Blake Snell. That group included Keaton Winn until he hit the injured list two weeks ago. Mason Black was recalled to cover for him but was hit hard in two starts and optioned back down.
Today’s plan appears to be a bullpen game with Howard expected to pitch bulk innings behind Erik Miller, who will serve as the opener. Howard, 27, has been in the Giants’ system since signing a minor league deal late last year. He’s made ten Triple-A starts this year, tossing 39 2/3 innings with a 5.90 earned run average.
That ERA may be misleading, both due to the fact that Howard has been pitching in the PCL and what may be some bad luck. His .406 batting average on balls in play and 66.1% strand rate this year are both on the unfortunate side of average. He’s actually struck out 32.2% of batters faced this year while keeping walks to a reasonable 9.6% rate, which is why his 4.19 FIP is kinder than his ERA.
The righty was considered one of the top pitching prospects in the sport a few years ago but has struggled in his limited looks at the big league level. He currently has 115 innings of major league work on his ledger with a 7.20 ERA. He exhausted his options as both the Phillies and the Rangers rostered him for a while and he will now need to keep his active roster spot or else be removed from the 40-man roster entirely. If this is the time where things click for him and he manages to hang onto that roster spot, he still has less than three years of service time and can be retained beyond this campaign via arbitration.
To get Brooks and Howard onto the roster, the Giants are cutting a couple of guys they only recently added. Pomeranz, 35, was signed on Friday but is now bumped off the roster without appearing in a game. That means he’s still looking to get back into official MLB action for the first time since 2021. The Giants will have a week to trade him or pass him through waivers. The latter scenario would be a moot point since the lefty has more than enough service time to elect free agency.
The southpaw was once one of the better relievers in baseball but underwent flexor tendon surgery late in the 2021 campaign and struggled to get healthy in the two following years. Here in 2024, he was able to throw eight Spring Training innings with the Angels and nine frames in Triple-A in the Dodgers’ system, on minor league deals with both of those clubs. He allowed four earned runs in his first Triple-A game this year but has a 2.25 ERA in the eight innings since, striking out 48.3% of batters faced while walking just 3.4% of them.
That was apparently enough to get a roster spot, although briefly. The next week will shed some light on whether or not another club is equally interested. If so, perhaps the southpaw will indeed return to a major league mound for the first time in almost three years.
McKenna, 27, was just claimed off waivers from the Orioles ten days ago. He got into four games and stepped to the plate six times, striking out four times without getting a hit. He’s generally been a glove-first outfielder in his career, having hit .221/.298/.328 but with eight Defensive Runs Saved and six Outs Above Average in 1,287 2/3 outfield innings. He’s out of options but could appeal to other clubs as a bench outfielder.
The Giants will have a week to trade him or pass him through waivers. Since he has a previous career outright, he has the right to reject another such assignment in favor of free agency. However, with less than five years of service time, doing so would mean forfeiting his remaining salary. He is making $800K this year, slightly more than the league minimum, and may not want to walk away from that if he clears.
Giants Exploring Trade Market For Shortstops
The Giants have been exploring the trade market for a potential shortstop upgrade, reports Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle, who adds that the team’s recent signing of Tom Murphy to a two-year deal could lead to former top catching prospect Joey Bart being moved Some combination of Bart, young pitching and/or outfield talent could conceivably be used to add the desired help at shortstop.
With Brandon Crawford becoming a free agent for the first time in his career, top prospect Marco Luciano currently resides atop the Giants’ depth chart at shortstop. Casey Schmitt, who made his MLB debut this past season at age 24, is another option at the position, as is 26-year-old Tyler Fitzgerald, who also made his debut in 2023. The Giants have begun to use Fitzgerald more frequently at other positions in the minors, however.
Suffice it to say, it’s an inexperienced group. Luciano has the highest ceiling of the group, but the 22-year-old hit just .231/.333/.308 with 17 strikeouts in 45 plate appearances during last year’s MLB debut and struggled in Triple-A, too, where he slashed .309/.321/.418 with a 36% strikeout rate. Luciano only turned 22 in September, so some struggles at the top minor league level and especially in the big leagues aren’t exactly cause for full-scale alarm bells to sound.
That said, those struggles also suggest that Luciano could benefit from some further development time in Triple-A. Giants president Farhan Zaidi said last month that organization was hopeful Luciano could seize the role but also noted the importance of having some insurance. Considering Schmitt hit just .206/.255/.324 through 90 games in his own debut while Fitzgerald has just 34 MLB plate appearances, a more established option would be a sensible acquisition.
Slusser speculatively lists Ha-Seong Kim of the division-rival Padres and Milwaukee’s Willy Adames as options, though it’s not clear the Giants have had meaningful discussions on either. Both would be one-year stopgaps; Kim has a mutual option for the 2025 season, and Adames is entering his final year of arbitration.
Mutual options, it should be noted, are almost never exercised by both parties. Kim won’t have six years of MLB service even if/when he declines his end of the 2025 option, but MLBTR confirmed at the time of his signing that he’ll still be a free agent when the contract is up. Adames, meanwhile, is hardly a lock to be moved at all. Even as his free agency draws near, the Brewers are still planning to contend in 2024 and would likely only move him if it meant acquiring MLB-ready talent in return.
There are other options to consider. The Twins seem likely to trade Kyle Farmer this offseason, given their crowded infield mix. Zaidi is plenty familiar with Farmer, who was drafted by the Dodgers, where Zaidi previously served as general manager. The Reds, Guardians, Cardinals and Rays all have ample infield talent as well. Not all of those teams are in need of a catcher specifically, although including Bart (and perhaps others) is of course just one of many paths the Giants could take to addressing the issue.
The 27-year-old Bart was the No. 2 overall draft pick back in 2018. He’s appeared in parts of four big league seasons but posted an anemic .219/.288/.335 batting line with a 35.4% strikeout rate. Bart, who’ll be out of options in 2024, is a .274/.357/.434 hitter in 554 Triple-A plate appearances. He’s been leapfrogged on the depth chart by another former first-rounder, Patrick Bailey, who batted just .233/.285/.359 as a rookie but also graded out as arguably the best defensive catcher in MLB.
Zaidi: Marco Luciano Will Have “The Chance” To Be Giants’ Everyday Shortstop In 2024
With longtime shortstop Brandon Crawford‘s contract having run its course, the Giants will be looking at a new starting shortstop in 2024 for the first time in over a decade. While the club pursued Carlos Correa in free agency last offseason to take over the reins at short, the club now appears poised to stay internal as they look for their future shortstop. As relayed by Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area, Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi told reporters as much during his end-of-season presser today, saying that “As we sit here now, we want to give Marco Luciano the chance to be the everyday guy next year.”
“If anything, his call-up was slowed down by the injury he had this year,” Zaidi added. “We would have liked to see him up here a little bit more, but he’s worked his way up and earned this opportunity and we’re really excited about what we saw the last couple of weeks.”
With that vote of confidence, it seems fairly safe to assume that the club won’t pursue significant upgrades up the middle, instead placing Luciano at short with Thairo Estrada, who was among the club’s most valuable hitters in 2023 alongside Lamonte Wade Jr. and Wilmer Flores, remaining at second base. Luciano hit .231/.333/.308 with a 37.8% strikeout rate during his time in the big leagues this year, though of course that was a minuscule sample size of just 45 plate appearances. More representative of the talent that made Luciano a consensus top-40 prospect in the game entering the 2023 campaign is his .259/.356/.479 slash line in 292 career minor league games, including a .223/.334/.442 slash line in 320 plate appearances split between Double-A and Triple-A this year.
The shortstop position was far from the only thing Zaidi addressed during the presser, of course. Zaidi noted (per Pavlovic) that he hopes to create a more athletic roster with improved defense this offseason, citing both Luciano and fellow rookie Tyler Fitzgerald as possible pieces of the puzzle in that regard. Fitzgerald slashed .219/.265/.469 in 34 plate appearances at the big league level this year while playing both third base and center field. In 121 games between the Double-A and Triple-A level in 2023, Fitzgerald slashed an impressive .292/.365/.511.
Zaidi also discussed the club’s managerial search following the club’s dismissal of Gabe Kapler last week. As relayed by Pavlovic, Zaidi indicated that the club plans to begin the interview process next week with internal candidates before expanding to asking for permission to interview candidates from other organizations. As the club looks for a new manager, Zaidi also indicated that the Giants are heading into 2024 with uncertainty about his own future as things stand, confirming to reporters (including Danny Emerman of KNBR) that he’s headed into the final year of his contract in 2024.
Giants Place Brandon Crawford On Injured List, Release Paul DeJong
The Giants announced a slate of roster moves Thursday, most notably placing shortstop Brandon Crawford on the 10-day injured list due to a hamstring strain and requesting unconditional release waivers on fellow shortstop Paul DeJong. San Francisco has also selected the contract of infielder/outfielder Tyler Fitzgerald, recalled right-hander Tristan Beck and infielder Marco Luciano from Triple-A Sacramento, and optioned right-hander Sean Hjelle to Sacramento. Crawford will be eligible for reinstatement on the final day of the season.
Crawford, 36, exited yesterday’s contest after experiencing discomfort and acknowledged his frustration with the injury following the game (link via Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle). A free agent at season’s end, Crawford is perhaps playing out his final days as a Giant. That he’s eligible to return on the final game of the season could give him the opportunity to still get back in front of the home crowd for a potential sendoff. The Giants host their archrival Dodgers on Oct. 1. “It’s the most frustrating timing I’ve probably ever had with an injury,” Crawford told Slusser.
The 2023 season has been the least-productive of Crawford’s career. He’s posted a .197/.276/.319 batting line with a career-high 25% strikeout rate in 316 plate appearances. It’s a step down from last year’s output and a major departure from the 2021 season, when Crawford was a bona fide MVP candidate, placing fourth in the National League voting that year. Crawford’s .298/.373/.522 slash and world-class defense in ’21 prompted the Giants to sign him to a two-year, $32MM extension covering his age-35 and age-36 seasons, but he’s batted just .217/.295/.334 in 774 plate appearances over the life of that contract.
It’s not clear whether Crawford will continue his playing career beyond the current season. He’s spoken in the past about the possibility of spending his entire career with the Giants, which surely holds extra appeal given that he’s a Bay Area native who grew up following the team. However, Luciano has ranked among the organization’s top prospects for several years now and could be ready for a full-time audition.
It’s possible the Giants could bring in a stopgap in the event that the 22-year-old still needs more minor league seasoning, but that’d likely be an awkward role for both Crawford and the organization; it’s feasible he could shift to a bench role if and when Luciano proves ready, but it’d be hard for the Giants to carry Crawford in a part-time role if his production mirrors his 2023 output. Similarly, it’d be hard for them to move on somewhat unceremoniously midway through the ’24 campaign. The Giants faced a similar situation with Crawford’s longtime teammate Brandon Belt this past offseason and ultimately opted to let him walk. Belt signed a one-year deal with the Blue Jays and has had a highly productive but also injury-marred season.
There was no such commitment or legacy to ponder in the decision to cut ties with the veteran DeJong. San Francisco signed the former Cardinals shortstop to a Major League deal one month ago after he was released by the Blue Jays, who’d acquired him at the deadline when Bo Bichette sustained an injury.
DeJong gave the Giants 114 innings of strong defense at shortstop but hit just .184/.180/.286 in 50 plate appearances. He had a relative bounceback year at the plate with the Cardinals prior to his trade, but since leaving St. Louis he’s batted a combined .129/.128/.183 with no walks and 34 strikeouts in 94 plate appearances between Toronto and San Francisco. He’ll be a free agent once he formally clears release waivers, although at this point of the schedule, he may simply wait until the offseason to find a new club.
Fitzgerald, 26, was the Giants’ fourth-round pick in 2019 and will be making his big league debut when he first takes the field. He’s had a nice season in the minors, batting .324/.410/.588 in a small sample of 78 Double-A plate appearances before moving up to Triple-A and hitting .287/.358/.499 in 466 trips to the plate. Fitzgerald has smacked a combined 22 home runs and swiped 32 bags in 35 tries this year. His 9.7% walk rate in Triple-A is an above-average mark, while his 23.8% strikeout rate was also slightly higher than average.
San Francisco has bounced Fitzgerald all over the diamond in 2023. He’s logged time at shortstop, second base, third base and in center field this season, in addition to occasional stints at designated hitter. While he’s never been considered one of the Giants’ top prospects, Fitzgerald has been an above-average hitter at virtually every minor league stop and clearly possesses above-average speed (career 70-for-79 in stolen bases). He’ll add a versatile defensive repertoire and right-handed bat to the club’s bench mix.