Picking The Perfect Gift For 12 SF Giants Players In 2021

SF Giants Gifts: Austin Slater/Alex Dickerson Health

Austin Slater and Alex Dickerson have both flashed the potential to be big-league outfielders. However, long injury histories and inconsistencies had left both of their futures up in the air. When both were able to take the field in 2020, it was easily each of their most productive years. Slater posted an impressive .282/.408/.506 triple-slash in just 31 games. Dickerson, on the other hand, played in nearly every Giants game and posted a .298/.371/.576 line of his own.

For the first time in his career, Slater consistently drove the ball in the air and was able to turn his propensity for solid contact into extra-base hits. On top of his career year at the plate, he also showed an increased willingness to be aggressive on the basepaths. Slater stole eight bases in just nine attempts, and for a sizable amount of time early in the season, he led the league in steals.

An elbow injury would eventually prevent Slater from playing in the outfield, but he remained productive as a designated hitter. However, next season, the Giants can no longer count on the designated hitter position to be available. Without that to fall back on, Dickerson and Slater’s health becomes even more pivotal for the lineup.

Still, even with that uncertainty, the Giants front office made sure to retain both for another season. It’s easy to understand why. Not only did both players post OPS north of .900, but each compliment the other perfectly. When healthy, both grade as above-average defensive outfielders in either corner with severe platoon splits. Against left-handed pitchers this season, Slater hit .316/.469/.658. Dickerson, who bats left-handed, .300/.373/.579 in an even larger sample against a right-handed pitcher. Neither are perfect players, but they could combine to give the Giants elite production opposite of Mike Yastrzemski if they can platoon in the left field.

SF Giants Gifts: Kevin Gausman Big Contract Year

Kevin Gausman was coming off the worst season of his career in 2020. In 2019, splitting his time between Atlanta and Cincinnati, he managed just 102.1 innings and a 5.72 ERA. Fielding independent metrics, like FIP, were higher on Gausman’s 2019 season, suggesting he’d actually suffered from terrible luck. Gausman posted a then career-high 10 strikeouts per nine innings and recorded a FIP of 3.98. With plenty of front-offices intrigued by his peripherals, teams were targetting him as a bounceback candidate. He signed with the Giants on a one-year, $9 million pact to rebuild his value.

The deal worked out great for both sides. Gausman was easily the team’s best starter all season. He produced the highest strikeout rate of his career and maintained an above-average 3.62 ERA. Once again, FIP (3.09) and other advanced metrics were even higher on his performance, suggesting he’d suffered from some bad luck. Although admittedly, this disparity is far more in-line with his career gap between ERA and FIP than in 2019.

This offseason, the Giants offered Gausman a qualifying offer, valued at one-year, $18.9 million to ensure they at least recouped draft pick compensation if he departed. Instead, he decided to re-sign with the team on another one-year deal. While he’ll be better paid next season, another strong campaign could set him up for a massive payday next offseason.

If the Giants want to be competitors next season, Gausman will need to replicate his performance from 2020. Luckily for them, Gausman has all the incentives in the world to try and take another step. He will not turn 31 until 2022, and coming off two strong campaigns with his career track-record as a mid-rotation arm, Gausman would seem like an obvious candidate for a multi-year deal with more than $50 million in guarantees.

SF Giants Gifts: Donovan Solano Defense

I contemplated asking for continued batted ball luck. Solano has been an incredibly productive offensive player in 2019 and 2020 but relied on a .409 and .396 batting average on balls in play each respective year. Still, even if that regresses substantially, he could be a valuable player if his defense returns to its pre-2020 levels.

Before joining the Giants, Solano had slashed a .257/.306/.331 line in parts of five MLB seasons with the Miami Marlins and New York Yankees as a defense-first utility infielder. Struggling to find a permanent home, he bounced around many organizations before seeming to find another offensive gear. Then, in his early thirties, Solano reemerged as an offensive juggernaut.

While Solano won the Silver Slugger this season, though, he was bad defensively for the first time in his career. For the Giants in 2019, Solano was more than solid defensively, grading above-average at both second base and shortstop by Outs Above Average. However, in 2020, he ranked in the sixth percentile among all infielders. While it was likely a product of many factors, when Evan Longoria began the season on the injured list, Solano was forced into playing more third base than he had in years. His fringe arm caused several errors and seemed to knock him out of sorts all season.

With an offseason to get back in rhythm, Solano should hopefully be ready to return as a strong defender in 2021. The Giants expect Longoria to be healthy to start the season and brought in Jason Vosler, a primary third baseman, which should enable Solano to focus on his best positions: second base and shortstop.

SF Giants Gifts: Logan Webb Batted-Ball Luck

Young starting pitcher Logan Webb seemed to stall in his second taste of MLB ball with the Giants in 2020. The lone member of the team’s staff under 30 remains the team’s best hope for improvement next season. Of course, after struggling in his first two big-league seasons, there is some reason for concern. With that said, at least one projection algorithm remains very high on the 24-year old. A huge part of that is batted-ball luck.

In 19 starts (21 games) over the last two seasons, Webb has posted a 5.36 ERA. While Webb has struggled to limit runs thus far, he has a solid 2.18 strikeout-to-walk rate and an impressive 1.83 groundout-to-flyout rate. His FIP has been at least a run below his ERA in both 2019 and 2020. Over his career, it estimates his performance more in line with a 4.15 ERA. Given his solid strikeout and walk rates, if his batting average on balls in play (BABIP) drops from .340, his career mark, there’s reason to believe more success is ahead.

Some pitchers are more prone to higher BABIP than others. Certain types of batted balls and harder contact generally lead to more opposing hits. Still, without even 25 big-league appearances under his belt, it’s nearly impossible to draw any conclusions in either direction. Ground balls do tend to induce more base hits than flyballs, but Webb’s average exit velocity against last season ranked in the 50th percentile.

SF Giants Gifts: Anthony DeSclafani Bounceback

From 2015-2019, Anthony DeSclafani made 103 starts to a 4.01 ERA (4.17 FIP), completed 589.2 innings, struck out 531, and walked just 164. While he missed much of the 2017 season with elbow tendinitis, he was a relatively healthy starter as well. The Giants obviously hope he can regain that form for them next season.

Of course, DeSclafani is coming off a disastrous 2020 campaign. After throwing 11 shutout innings to start the season, it was all downhill from there. DeSclafani finished the season with a 7.22 ERA over 33.2 innings with a career-worst strikeout rate and walk rate. By the end of the year, the Reds had relegated him to the bullpen.

As bad as DeSclafani was last season, there were no obvious causes for the sudden disaster. He actually posted a career-high fastball velocity, and most of his pitches posted similar spin rates and movement patterns as in years past.

DeSclafani has relied heavily on a four-seam fastball, sinker, and slider (throwing them at least 79% of the time every year of his career) but also has a changeup and curveball. While his fastball and sinker sit in the mid-90s, his slider is has been his only consistently above-average pitch. Even amidst his struggles this season, batters hit just .190 and whiffed on 35.6% of swings against it.

Reds catcher Tucker Barnhart suggested that after DeSclafani’s third start of the season, he was tipping pitches, but he would make nine more appearances on the season with no better success. Furthermore, when asked about it, DeSclafani was skeptical that he was tipping pitches.

After a couple of starts in 2020, DeSclafani looked set to receive multi-year offers with $25 million in guarantees. Instead, he signed a one-year, $6 million deal with the Giants this offseason. Needless to say, if he rebounds to his pre-2020 form, Farhan Zaidi will have struck gold once again in free agency.

SF Giants Gifts: Evan Longoria Flyball Luck

Evan Longoria appeared to have another unexceptional season for the Giants. He posted a .254/.297/.425 line while offering strong defense at the hot corner. However, more advanced statistics made an argument that Longoria was playing like one of the best third basemen in the league. While he finished the season in a bit of a slump, Statcast still believed he was a far more productive player than his final numbers suggested.

On the season, Longoria posted his best average exit velocity since MLB began tracking such data in 2015. Expected batting average and slugging percentage, which utilize batted-ball data to estimate a hitter’s statistics, both were far higher on Longoria than traditional statistics. Nowhere was that starker than with home runs.

Longoria was easily the Giants unluckiest home run hitter in 2020. According to Baseball Savant, Longoria hit 15 flyballs classified as possible home runs, ranking fourth on the team. However, he finished the season with just seven big flies, ranking sixth on the roster. If just two more of Longoria’s hits had gone for home runs, his OPS would have jumped by 50 points this season.

Assuming the Giants can get their third baseman to continue hitting the ball as hard as he did in 2020, the team should expect to see far better from the three-time All-Star. Given his age, it’s hard to envision him returning to the levels he played at in his younger days with the Tampa Bay Rays, but if 2020 taught Giants fans anything, it’s never to give up on veteran players.

SF Giants Gifts: Brandon Belt Health

Belt missed the early part of the season and got off to a terribly slow start. Then, he got hot and seemed to carry that momentum through the end of the season. Belt finished the year with a career-best .309/.425/.591 triple-slash. He also received an eighth-place vote for the National League Most Valuable Player award and was a finalist for a Gold Glove and All-MLB selection.

Not only was Belt able to have the most productive season of his career at 32-years old, but he excelled in almost all metrics. Even by Statcast data, Belt’s expected numbers were in line with his elite production. It took nearly a decade, but Belt finally had a season that met the ceiling many scouts had projected for him when he was the top prospect in the Giants system.

The new coaching staff under manager Gabe Kapler deserves some credit, but it’s hard to ignore the peculiar circumstances of the 2020 season. Belt has dealt with chronic knee injuries throughout his career. The wear and tear of a 162-game season is difficult on every big-league player. Someone like Belt, though, may be particularly likely to see their performance wane over a longer season.

With the COVID-19 pandemic delaying the start of the season, Belt got a prolonged offseason to let his body recover as much as possible. Then, when the league returned, players only had to play a 60-game season. Next season, Belt will not have the same extended rest and shortened season, but if he can be as healthy as possible, fans now know he’s capable of being one of the top hitters in the league.

SF Giants Gifts: Mike Yastrzemski Extension

Mike Yastrzemski was unequivocally the star of the Giants season. Acquired by the Giants in a minor trade last Spring, Yastrzemski has unexpectedly emerged as one of the best outfielders in baseball. Since debuting in 2019, he has slashed .281/.357/.535 line with 31 home runs in 636 plate appearances.

However, since Yastrzemski did not reach the big leagues until he was in his late twenties, he is not slated to hit free agency until he is well into his mid-thirties. While that works out great for the Giants, nothing stops them from giving him an extension to enable him to get a bit more of what he deserves while providing the organization with more cost certainty going forward.

SF Giants Gifts: Johnny Cueto Command

As players like Gausman and Drew Smyly had effective 2020 campaigns in the Giants rotation, it was incumbent ace Johnny Cueto who took a massive step back. After missing much of the 2018 and 2019 seasons recovering from Tommy John surgery, Cueto made 12 starts and finished with the worst ERA of his career (5.40). Now entering the final season of his six-year, $120 million deal with the Giants, it’s hard to know what to expect from the soon-to-be 35-year-old righty.

While it may be easy to write the veteran off next season, there were some reasons to remain cautiously optimistic about his 2021. Cueto has never had overpowering stuff; instead, finding success with a unique ability to throw off a hitter’s timing to accentuate elite command. In fact, Cueto’s pitch arsenal by velocity and movement were almost identical to their levels in 2016, when he was one of the best pitchers in baseball. Just over a year removed from surgery, Cueto appears to have regained his pre-injury repertoire. Maybe in 2022, he can regain some of his previous command.

SF Giants Gifts: Buster Posey Power

After opting out of the 2020 season to avoid the dangers of the COVID-19 pandemic, Buster Posey will be returning to the team next season. While he will be an obvious upgrade over the Giants meager production from their backstops this season, it’s hard to know quite what to expect. Already on an obvious downward trajectory, it’s hard to know how a year away from the game will impact his performance.

2019 was not a good year for the face of the franchise. Posey hit just .257/.320/.368 and managed just seven home runs in more than 400 plate appearances. He continued to produce elite defense with the glove and put the ball in play at a consistent clip but just seemed unable to generate the power he had flashed earlier in his career.

Like Belt, Posey has had his share of injuries over his career. It’s far from a guarantee, but some time away from catching might not have been the worst thing for him. Set to turn 34-years old in March, Posey got a chance to recharge and hopefully is positioned to return to the team in 2021 with newfound power potential.

A lot will have to go right for the SF Giants to become top contenders in 2021. If the baseball gods are interested in helping the Orange-and-Black return to the postseason, this list has plenty of ways they can help.