San Francisco Giants Rumors: Winter Rumor Mill Roundup

The Winter Meetings are over (I think?), and although the San Francisco Giants didn’t make a huge splash as of today, they have set the groundwork for how the new Zaidi regime will be approaching free agency and trades.

San Francisco Giants fans are used to the Winter Meetings being over and having a majority of the teams roster already in place. Usually, they leave the meetings with just one or two major holes to plug. Then, once the Giants have fallen out of contention for good players that can actually help the team, they go ahead and panic-sign Barry Zito or Jeff Samardzija.

The new guard led by Farhan Zaidi are playing the long game as they wait for the market to play out and prices to drop.

Instead of rushing into making moves and overpaying players (e.g. the Detroit Tigers signing Tyson Ross for 1/yr at $5.75 million– are you kidding me?!) they are using analytics to identify better values and waiting for the correct moment to start striking deals. That’s not to say Farhan Zaidi isn’t doing anything.

He has signed Catcher Cameron Rupp to a minor league deal, picked up OF Mike Gerber from waivers, and in the Rule 5 draft he acquired LHP Travis Bergen, OF Drew Ferguson, 3B Peter Maris, and LHP Sam Moll. These are not exciting moves, but they are moves that indicate Zaidi’s desire to replenish a depleted minor league system and create depth at positions where the Giants have been thin. Furthermore, he’s creating competition in areas where there is no guaranteed starting job lined up. It’s a new age.

Now, these under the radar moves are not the big-time, exciting moves that some Giants fans were wishing for, but there are plenty of rumors attached to the Giants coming out of the Winter Meetings. They are not just rumors, they are substantiated rumors confirmed by multiple sources. So if you like things that maybe might happen, there’s a bunch of professional sports writers that are confirming that yes, something maybe might happen according to their sources that they are not allowed to divulge. Sounds legit!