Thairo Estrada, and later Mitch Haniger and top prospect Kyle Harrison, will be the players tasked with pushing the Giants into the postseason and beyond.
Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, Eduardo Rodriguez, Jack Flaherty, Paul DeJong, Mark Canha, Randal Grichuk and Tommy Pham changed teams before the 3 p.m. deadline. Any could have helped the Giants. None will don orange and black.
The Giants (58-49) are leading a pack of seven National League teams vying for a wild card and trail the Los Angeles Dodgers by 2.5 games in the NL West. Fangraphs gives them a 60.9% chance at reaching the postseason. They have a +23 run differential and are 31-27 against winning teams.
Clubs in San Francisco’s position are typically aggressive in adding players who can provide a lift. The Giants, sifting through a seller’s market, settled on adding veteran outfielder AJ Pollock, who’s hitting .173 on the season.
“I think the biggest signal it sends to the clubhouse is: we believe in them,” manager Gabe Kapler said of SF’s deadline. “We believe this is a good group, a group that’s capable of going to the postseason, making a deep postseason run. We’re in a really good position to strike in the National League West. You know, we have our work cut out for us. It’s right in front of us — we’re playing the Diamondbacks right now. We’re going to have a lot of opportunity in this month and the two months ahead to make some noise. I think the message is pretty strong and clear: we believe in this group.”
Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi has also repeatedly described this club as a playoff-caliber team. He’d said he’d be aggressive in trying to improve the roster. But Zaidi will never make a trade just to make a trade.
Zaidi and the Giants’ front office ultimately decided that banking on their internal talent — both for the 2023 playoff push and beyond — made the most sense.
“If the goal is to do something, we could’ve traded half our farm system for a fifth starter,” Zaidi said. “Somebody would’ve happily agreed to that deal.”
The Giants looked at adding “complementary pieces,” Zaidi said, but their middle infield getting healthier made that less of a priority. Brandon Crawford has returned and Estrada could be back in San Francisco as soon as this weekend.
Estrada is scheduled to play five innings for Sacramento Tuesday night and serve as designated hitter the following day. He was one of San Francisco’s best players in the first half and will lengthen a lineup that has seen rallies go to die in the bottom third in July — a month in which the club ranked last in runs scored, batting average and wRC+.
Haniger, too, is eligible to return off the injured list in two weeks. The veteran who signed a three-year, $43.5 million contract this winter is progressing well and, — if healthy — will help aid the Giants’ struggles against left-handed pitching.
Zaidi hinted that the Giants were in on some veteran starting pitchers who were available, but had trade restrictions baked into their contracts. Scherzer, Verlander and Rodriguez — who blocked a deal to go to the Dodgers, reportedly preferring to be on the east coast — fit that bill.
Many of the starters who changed hands also did so in exchange for big prospect hauls.
“I think the supply and demand factored into that,” Zaidi said.
Instead of sending a top prospect for an established, expensive pitcher — like the Rangers did for Scherzer when they dealt their second-ranked prospect Luisangel Acuña — they’re betting their own top prospect can swing the race.
Harrison, regarded as the top left-handed pitching prospect in baseball, is on an accelerated rehab program for his mild hamstring strain. He threw two scoreless innings in Arizona Monday night, topping out at 96 mph, and is expected to head to Sacramento this weekend.
Harrison likely would’ve been called up by now if he hadn’t injured his leg. Instead, he’ll have to build back up before proving himself ready to pitch for the Giants. But a 2023 debut seems more likely now than ever.
“He was really right on the cusp when he had the hamstring injury,” Zaidi said. “So it’s not going to take much for us to feel like he’s checked the last box and is ready to come up here.”
Zaidi indicated that Harrison will start for the Giants. The Giants will evaluate his readiness “from start-to-start,” making him a real candidate to boost a pitching staff that has worked valiantly through tectonic shifts in roles.
Logan Webb and Alex Cobb have been San Francisco’s only two traditional starters for weeks, with the team using openers and bulk-inning starlights around them. Harrison, 21, could emerge as the third starter for a playoff series the Giants currently lack. Away from the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League that also features the difficult automatic balls and strikes system, there’s a possibility that Harrison could be even more effective in the big leagues compared to Triple-A.
Harrison, Estrada and Haniger could very well provide the boost San Francisco needs. But there is something to be said for injecting new life into a clubhouse with a deadline move. Veteran Ross Stripling said recently that a clubhouse responds when a front office pushes its chips in.
“It does always feel good to get some new blood in here,” Stripling told KNBR.com Tuesday. “And have the idea that the front office is in on this team and in on this locker room, and ready to add to it this year. That’ll always make a locker room feel good.”
Maybe the front office’s message to the clubhouse — one of belief and confidence — could have carried even more weight if they acquired an impact player. But Stripling said he doesn’t think the team will succumb to that thought process.
“Try to look at it as ‘Okay, they think this team has what it takes to make a run’ — so we should think that, too,” Stripling said. “I think we can all buy into that mentality, which I think we will and we should, and it’s not a big deal. Think about it like: all the other teams had to go better to compete, we can compete with what we have.”