5 days ago
- Sport
- San Francisco Chronicle
What are the best outcomes possible for Giants in their first Buster Posey season?
For the San Francisco Giants, the rest of this season and the near future comes down to the old question posed in 1965 by the Lovin' Spoonful: Do you believe in magic?
The Giants can't look for hope from the cold numbers. The computers don't like this team's chances the rest of this year. Baseball-Reference's analytics show the Giants with an 8.6% chance to make the playoffs. In the last 30 days, their odds have taken a 35.5% dive, biggest in the National League, second-largest swoon in MLB beyond the plummeting Rays.
Teams that are sellers at the trading deadline are supposed to surrender their playoff hopes, and the Giants cooperated, at least analytically.
So you have to look beyond the numbers to find hope, and as any Giants follower knows, if you're looking for rays of sunshine, chat with Mike Krukow.
'To me, this feels like '86,' Krukow said in a brief conversation Monday. 'We knew we were putting stuff together. After losing 196 (combined losses the previous two seasons), we won 83, and carried it right into '87, we just knew it was working, and we went into the World Series in '89. That's what it feels like now.'
What happened in '86 was that the Giants got a spiritual infusion in their first full season with Roger 'Humm Baby' Craig after he took over as manager at the tail end of the previous campaign.
That was the hope in the current Giants organization, and in the clubhouse and in the grandstands, when Buster Posey took over as president of baseball ops after last season — that he would bring some magic, the kind of cosmic stuff that resulted in World Series titles in 2010, '12 and '14.
Buster's magic factor as an executive is still an unknown.
On paper, this is not a great Giants team, and that's likely to be the case next season, too. To succeed, the Giants will have to do what Olympic rowers call 'catch your swing,' which is when everyone pulls together so perfectly and the boat seems to leap out of the water.
It's probably not fair to expect that to happen before next season, but you never know. Krukow pointed out that a trade deadline selloff can be a kick in the pants to the guys who survive the mini purge.
'You are vulnerable when you go through a deadline and watch some of your main players walk out the door,' Krukow said. 'How you respond to that as a team determines if you have any chemistry at all for the rest of the season.'
Friday, the day after the deadline, was a rousing win for the Giants. That showed, to Krukow anyway, that the players heard Posey's unspoken message.
'There's no greater motivation for a professional athlete than to know you need to produce to stay, and you need a kick in the ass to remind you.'
Beyond that, maybe the players are getting a vibe from Posey that he believes in them, and he is willing to proceed boldly, as he expects them to do.
Looking for rays of hope? Here are a few:
• Jung Hoo Lee has been underwhelming this season, but he went 8-for-12 in the series win over the Mets. It's possible that Lee is heeding the coaches' urging to do less pulling and make more contact. Coincidence that the mini surge happened just after the deadline?
Maybe Lee is motivated — let's say inspired — by the arrival of call-up Grant McCray in right field.
McCray is a legit center fielder, and he's got a bit of swagger. In Sacramento this season, McCray stole 26 bases in 29 attempts. The Giants have been encouraging Lee to run more — hey, he is the Grandson of the Wind — and he stole a bag Saturday. The Giants need to run more, and maybe Lee and McCray will bring that.
Lee has played less than half a season in the big leagues. In Korea, he faced mostly slow stuff and is still adjusting to nightly 98 mph gas. The Rays' shortstop, Ha-Seong Kim, hit .202 as an MLB rookie after he came over from Korea in 2021, adjusted to the power pitching, and hit .251 his second season.
Lee has a much higher ceiling. Kim was a .300 hitter in Korea; Lee hit .349 his last full season in the KBL and was a career .340 hitter there (and a career .491 slugger).
• Also intriguing is Jesus Rodriguez, the catcher obtained from the Yankees. He's 23 and is hitting .315 in his first season at Triple-A. Giants catchers are hitting a collective .202/.262/.295 this season (through Sunday). Could Rodriguez wind up in an offense/defense platoon of sorts with Patrick Bailey, maybe even later this season?
What's clear is that Posey and manager Bob Melvin can't sit back now. They have to decide whether to go kid-heavy the rest of the season, taking a good look at youngsters, or, if the Giants surge in the next couple weeks, making the most of a renewed, if long shot, run at a wild-card berth.
Whatever the Giants do, this season and next, will demonstrate whether Posey is merely another baseball-savvy, hard-working player personnel boss, or if he has something special.
When he was a player, Posey made the team better. It was hard work and talent, but it was also magic. Should the Giants believe in magic?
