How Giants made the doubters look foolish
San Francisco punches playoff ticket for first time since 2016
The 2021 San Francisco Giants are the best kind of great team: A surprise.
At the beginning of the season, in the early days of spring training in Arizona, the thought of the Giants making the playoffs was a farfetched fantasy to even the most brainwashed and optimistic San Francisco fan.
Now, with 18 games to play, they’re in. With more than half of the final month of the regular season to play, they’ve clinched a spot in the postseason.
The Giants are the first team in baseball to stamp their ticket to October. They did it Monday night and, fittingly, did it by beating the San Diego Padres — a division rival that many people, including me, had pegged as a “super team” at the beginning of the season.
Wait. How, exactly, did the Giants do this?
After all, the Giants aren’t the best team money can buy. The majority of their payroll, the
10th-highest in baseball, is tied up in four of five players signed under the previous front-office regime.
The Giants’ payroll is 60 percent of what the Dodgers spend. The Padres pay more than the Giants too. Yet both are looking up at the Giants in the standings. What’s that all about? After all, the Giants don’t have the best pitchers, either. Their bullpen has been strong, but there are no big names or superstars. Their two best relievers are a submarine tosser and a guy who throws only one pitch but is not Mariano Rivera.
The team is operating with only three starting pitchers at the moment. Luckily all three have been strong this season, with young Logan Webb — dropped from the rotation at the beginning of the year — becoming the ace in the last few weeks. But two of every five games are bull-penned, including Monday’s clincher.
And the Giants’ hitters aren’t going to sell many jerseys outside of San Francisco either. There’s no Fernando Tatis Jr. on the roster.
But can I interest you in Lamonte Wade Jr.?
I couldn’t have told you who Lamonte Wade Jr. was in April.
And who expected Brandon Crawford and Brandon Belt and Buster Posey to drink from the fountain of youth this season? This season was going to be about that trio aging out and exiting the stage. Even they seemed surprised by their success. But Crawford and Posey both have flirted with MVP candidacy while Belt — the team’s new selfappointed captain — has been the hitter every Giants teammate emulated. Plus, he finally hit 20 homers this season.
Every night, the Giants’ lineup is different — tailormade for the opposition, built to aggravate and to mash. By the time you figure out who is where on the diamond and in the batting order, the Giants often have the lead.
So, seriously, how did all this happen?
Well, baseball in 2021 is a simple game, really: Hit home runs and don’t allow the other team to hit home runs.
It’s all about the long ball, baby.
Whether it was by design or accident, the 2021 Giants are masters of the modern game.
The Giants — yes, the San Francisco Giants, who play in a ballpark so punitive to power hitters that it might have driven the greatest power hitter of all time to take performanceenhancing drugs — lead the National League in home runs this season.
All this, while allowing the second-fewest dingers.
There are countless complications around the simple formula — strikeouts, walks, actually playing defense, a timely basehit
every now and again — but the Giants have never forgotten what wins baseball games today. They’ve stayed true to the plan and that will have them playing in October.
But to formulate that plan required clearminded thinking from the front office, led by Farhan Zaidi. Zaidi took over the toughest rebuild in the sport in 2018, a team that was riddled with “bad” contracts and a non-existent farm system. He spent his first season working without a general manager, doing the vital work at the start of a rebuild
hands-on.
But before free-agent money was freed and before the organization’s now-vaunted minor-league prospects were ready for the show, Zaidi put the Giants in the playoffs a year — perhaps two — ahead of schedule.
This season’s success also required a steady hand from manager Gabe Kapler and his ever-expanding coaching staff. Over the course of the last six months, the Giants — like any team — have faced times that have tested their mettle. They have found a way to come out ahead nearly every time. Kapler’s commitment to Zaidi’s vision, his own analytical bent, and his even temperament were exactly what this fascinating and ever-changing mix of personalities needed.
Of course, priorities
No. 1 through 40 were the players.
And beyond the home runs hit and the home runs prevented, the Giants also showed gumption and heart and wisdom that’s befitting a team this old, but not one this inexperienced.
It resulted in the good moments begetting more
good moments and the bad moments never snowballing out of control.
The Giants found so many ways to win we ran out of viable explanations. At a certain point, the success was chalked up as “magic”.
Of course, it was homers in and homers out, but that’s no fun.
No, artificial inscrutability — that’s the real hallmark of a great team.
And while no one expected that from the Giants this season — even when the calendar flipped to September, the concept seemed a bit ridiculous — that’s the reality. It’s official now.
Monday’s celebration on the field and in the technicolor clubhouse was well-earned for that reason alone.
The only question now is how far this team can go after its earliest clinch, by date, in franchise history.
There’s still plenty of baseball to play — more celebrations, perhaps, to come — but the Giants guaranteed themselves and their fans at least one more game in October with their win Monday.
I have a feeling it won’t be their last.