Photo credit: @NBCSGiants

By: Amaury Pi-Gonzalez

The Giants could go in a new direction. Would if be towards analytics and be more creative with their player acquisitions and trades? AT&T Park will never be a home run friendly park, even if they acquired Bryce Harper; that alone might not be enough for them to contend on their division. Many decisions now rest with the new person that will take over Baseball Operations, replacing Bobby Evans, who was fired prior to the game Monday against the Padres at AT&T Park.

The Giants have $132.9 million committed in 2019, $129.4 million in 2020 and $94.1 million in 2021–just five players.

The Giants have a lot of money tied up into a handful of players and most of them are bound to return in 2019.

Next year’s Giants will have Evan Longoria, Brandon Crawford, Buster Posey (coming back for surgery), Johnny Cueto $130 million (coming back from surgery), Jeff Samardzija–$90 million, and Mark Melancon–$63 million, These players are veterans who are in their 30’s.

Yes, the Giants need to get younger. Are the Giants going to pick up the 2019 option for Bumgarner? $12 million, that is a bargain, but maybe the new General Manager/Baseball Operations that will take Evans’ place might consider trading him for a few young prospects. I would trade Bumgarner if I was able to find a few young, exciting, promising players. Why not? He is the best bait you’ll have for a nice deal.

The Giants had a good run and won three World Series, but they got melancholic with their established players,  pouring big money on them and hoping for another run, which never happened. It is understandable, as they have a great fan base and want to keep that winning style of baseball happening at AT&T Park. But the last two seasons were not exciting at all. When you do not hit in today’s game, you become a boring team.

Yes, their pitching this year surprisingly was not that bad, but this is not Soccer/Fútbol, there is no tie and you have to win. You have to hit and hit with power in today’s game. The Giants are the only MLB team this year with no player hitting at least 20 home runs. Look across the bay, that A’s team has Khris Davis, Matt Chapman, Matt Olson, Stephen Piscotty, Jed Lowrie, Mark Canha, Marcus Semien and company–they all hit home runs and that is a huge part of the game and they ended up winning.

And by the way, the Coliseum–just like ATT Park–is also not a home run friendly park.

Good luck to the next man or woman who will be running the Giants’ Baseball Operations.