The San Francisco Giants are well behind the curve in power numbers, even with balls flying out of the yard at a historic rate. One way to cure that ailment would be to add the game’s best slugger to the middle of their lineup.
The San Francisco Giants are having an unexpectedly lousy season at 53-80 and their biggest rivals have already eliminated them from NL West contention days before the final month of the regular season begins.
The Giants play in a hitter’s park, so their lack of home run numbers isn’t necessarily a surprise. Heck, they’ve won championships while not relying on the long ball. But this season is different and they’re far from championship contenders.
With nearly everyone in their lineup having a down year, one way to get them better pitches to look at next season would be to insert Giancarlo Stanton into the middle of the lineup. He can hit them out of anywhere. He’d see the fog (its name is Karl) as a challenge. Adding him to the lineup would give a fair-weather (which is really odd considering my daily, year-round San Francisco weather is jeans and a hoodie) fan base something to talk about.
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Bob Nightengale of USA Today is saying that the Giants are “expressing the strongest interest” in talks with the Miami Marlins regarding their top asset.
Giancarlo Stanton is due $77 million over the next three years, taking him through his age 30 season, at which point he could potentially opt-out of his lucrative deal in pursuit of an even bigger payday. If he doesn’t opt out of his deal, he’d be owed $208 million through his age 37 season in 2027 and the team would then decide on paying him $25 million to play for the team or a $10 million buyout. There is a lot of money at play, but the Giants love bad contracts, see: Matt Cain, Jeff Samardzija, Barry Zito, Tim Lincecum and potentially Brandon Crawford and Brandon Belt.
They’ve escaped many of those contracts by spending money on other talent, but it seems as though that method is catching up to them a bit with the team already approaching the luxury tax while being miles away from contention. Why not add Stanton to the mix and build a new future around him?
Well, mostly because it would take any of the pieces they have in their extremely weak minor league system to acquire said slugger. Grant Brisbee put together a trade package to consummate this deal that includes Joe Panik, their top eight prospects and Chris Stratton. That’s ten players in all, and that’s if San Francisco picks up the entire Stanton bill.
In other words, not gonna happen. The Giants don’t have the prospects, and the Marlins are gonna want at least one player ranked in the top 50 prospects.
Plus, if Stanton opts out in a couple of years anyway, that may be good for the Giants, but not if they’ve given up so much to acquire him. If he stays with the club, that would mean that he either (a) doesn’t think he can get more money on the open market, or (b) has been hurt/not playing up to the value of his deal and will take the sure thing. Neither scenario sounds great for any team looking to add Stanton, really.
As I wrote about a couple of weeks ago, the new ownership group in Miami is going to have to set the tone for their tenure this winter. While making a trade that includes the heart of the franchise seems like more of the same, if they get the right deal in return–and with the second half Stanton is putting together that’s becoming easier and easier–then moving the face of the franchise for a brighter tomorrow may not be a terrible idea.
The new group may not have to move Stanton, though relieving themselves of his contract would be nice, but they have a few pieces that could bring back a nice haul and help propel future playoff runs. Stanton’s is just the flashiest name on the block.