San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
DECADES-LONG PROBLEM
Lack of homegrown outfield talent continues to haunt the Giants
Heliot Ramos began his day with a sharp single that produced loud contact, a blistering 111.8 mph off his bat. He later walked and drilled another single, this one at 106.6 mph. Finally, he crushed an eighth-inning home run (108.6 mph) that secured a 5-4 victory for the Sacramento River Cats.
Meantime, the parent club went through a stretch through Friday without scoring more than three runs in eight straight games.
The San Francisco Giants’ offense is not performing as management had expected and fans had hoped, especially after the spring-training acquisitions of Jorge Soler and Matt Chapman and the December signing of Jung Hoo Lee. The Giants rank around 20th in MLB in on-base percentage, OPS, runs scored and home runs and worse in run differential and hitting with runners in scoring position.
The Giants’ current roster has one everyday player who came from the farm system, catcher Patrick Bailey, plus two role players, outfielder Austin Slater and utility man Tyler Fitzgerald, a far cry from the championship era when lineups included Buster Posey, Brandon Crawford, Brandon Belt, Pablo Sandoval, Joe Panik and other homegrown players.
It’s not always beneficial to heavily rely on so much help from the outside, but the Giants have been forced to build their lineup mostly with free agents and a few minor trades that panned out because their farm system has fallen short on producing marquee position players.
That’s especially true in the outfield. It’s nothing new. The Giants’ track record of developing outfielders is horrendous, and it goes back decades. Dare we say the last Giants All-Star outfielder who was homegrown was … Chili Davis in 1986? How is that even possible?
The last Giants homegrown outfielder to win a Gold Glove? Would you believe Bobby Bonds in 1974?
That’s so long ago, Farhan Zaidi was two years from birth. But the Giants’ president of baseball operations has been around long enough to know the story of the Giants’ history with homegrown outfielders, and he neither shies away from the topic nor makes excuses.
“I think it’s natural to ask if we should spend more draft capital on outfielders, middleof-the-order hitters,” Zaidi said. “That’s something for us to consider.”
As for the lack of homegrown outfielders flooding the roster during his five-plus years on the job, “I think it’s probably a few things. The thing that really stands out to me is as a corner outfielder, and it’s even true in center field, there’s a really high offensive bar. If you come up as an infielder or catcher, you can sort of ride the highs and lows offensively so long as you contribute defensively.
“If you’re an outfielder, you’ve got to hit. It’s hard to help your team if you’re not producing at some base level offensively. (Oracle Park) is a tough hitting environment. Our league, our division. Not that other teams in the division haven’t produced outfielders, but when I look at other position player prospects, I feel they get a little bit more rope than outfielders.”
Of course, the Giants have acquired many quality outfielders from elsewhere including Bobby’s son, the home run king, Barry, along with plenty of others on teams that won three World Series. But when there’s a lack of homegrown infielders on the majorleague roster, the void in the
nd outfield becomes far more noticeable.
Ramos enjoyed his three-hit day last weekend in Sacramento and in April hit .300 with a .390 on-base percentage and .578 slugging percentage. He leads the River Cats with seven homers. It would seem an opportune time to promote him to the majors, but the Giants have stuck with basically the same position players to date.
That includes four outfielders: Lee, Michael Conforto, Mike Yastrzemski and Austin Slater, the only right-handed hitter in the group who fared extremely well against lefthanded pitchers in recent years but has started 3-for-30 this year. Until someone gets hurt or Ramos forces his way back to the majors, the roster isn’t budging.
Zaidi said it’s always possible that if Ramos “keeps producing like this, we’ll find a way to bring him up.” But remember, Ramos didn’t dominate at Triple-A in 2021 or 2022, and when he hit himself to the majors last year, he batted just .179 in 25 games. Even with his impressive numbers this year, he struck out 32 times in his first 101 at-bats.
“Right now, we’re pretty committed to the group that we have,” said Zaidi, noting Conforto started hot before cooling down, Yastrzemski was the opposite and Slater has had limited reps because the Giants haven’t faced many lefties — for what it’s worth, 29% of the Giants’ plate appearances have come against lefties; it’s 37% for the Dodgers.
As always, the Giants want more consistency from Ramos, 24, the same thing they wanted from Luis Matos, 22, who was given ample big-league time last season but didn’t lock up a job over 253 plate appearances and now is scuffling in Triple-A.
Outfielder Hunter Bishop, the Giants’ first-round pick in 2019 (10th overall), will be 26 next month and is in Double-A, still searching for a groove at the plate and any semblance of prolonged health. The good news is that he’s playing regularly.
Could Marco Luciano become a star outfielder if he transitions from shortstop? Zaidi said the Giants still view Luciano as a shortstop because of the long-term need. “Look, it’s possible,” Zaidi said of a position change. “We’ve seen it with plenty of guys. But we still think he could handle it.”
While Bailey has been a major difference maker behind the plate (and at the plate) and the pitching staff features plenty of homegrown talent, from starters Logan Webb, Kyle Harrison and Keaton Winn to relievers Camilo Doval, Tyler Rogers and Ryan Walker, fans have waited a long time to embrace an outfielder developed in-house.
We can’t count Bryan Reynolds, who became an All-Star outfielder after his trade to Pittsburgh, or Adam Duvall, a former Giants infield prospect who emerged as an All-Star outfielder in Cincinnati. It’s odd that the Giants’ only homegrown outfielder since Marvin Benard in 2000 with 500 plate appearances in a season was Fred Lewis back in 2008, Bonds’ first year away from the game, but for a prolonged stretch in the Brian Sabean/Dick Tidrow drafts, all that mattered was selecting pitchers.
Meantime, fans continue to wait for that mystery outfielder to emerge from the farm system and take the game by storm because, after all, patience is a virtue.