Bruce Bochy has egg on his face with SF Giants’ Tyler Mahle disaster

After yet another less-than-stellar start from Tyler Mahle, it seems pretty clear that the SF Giants made a mistake by signing him. Mahle was highly recommended by legendary Giants manager Bruce Bochy so he will come out of this with egg on his face along with the rest of the front office.

When the Giants signed Mahle to a one-year $10 million deal in the offseason, it was not exactly met with excitement from fans. Sure, Mahle had a 2.18 ERA in 16 starts for the Texas Rangers, but his numbers seemed flukey especially since his career ERA was much higher than that.

Yet, Bochy vouched for Mahle which makes sense since he was his manager last season and got to see him pitching well when he was on his game. Obviously, 2026 Mahle is a far cry from the 2025 version. The veteran has a 6.04 ERA this season in 11 starts. He’s had some positive flashes like a masterful start against the Los Angeles Dodgers, but on the whole he’s been pretty dreadful.

Bochy now holds a front office role with the Giants after stepping away from managing after last season. While he will always be held in high esteem by Giants fans for leading the team to its three titles last decade, that doesn’t mean his word is golden when it comes to potential free agent acquisitions.

Bochy is not the only one who should be blamed for the Tyler Mahle signing

He doesn’t deserve all the blame. President of baseball operations Buster Posey and general manager Zack Minasian are the guys actually signing players so they deserve criticism as well. Of course, their hands are somewhat tied by an ownership group, namely chairman Greg Johnson, that made it abundantly clear the team was not going to spend a lot of money on the rotation.

That’s how you end up with Mahle and Adrian Houser and a record well under .500 in late May.

Free agent pitchers are always a roll of the dice and it’s hard to argue that some other free agent would have been that much better. Tatsuya Imai? He’s got a 6.17 ERA on the year. Framber Valdez? He’s got a 4.28 ERA on the season and has proven those character issues during the offseason were very real.

Maybe the right move for the Giants would have been to just roll with their young arms. Trevor McDonald has been one of the few bright spots this season for the Giants despite a rough last outing against the Chicago White Sox. Carson Whisenhunt is dealing in Triple-A with a 3.21 ERA in 11 starts on the year. 

A lot of fans would have much rather seen those two guys pitch, even if there would be some inevitable growing pains, rather than be treated to the bland disaster that Houser and Mahle have been.

Maybe the Giants can trade Houser and Mahle (and probably Robbie Ray too) if anyone wants them and roll with their young guys in the second half. At least that way they can be building for the future.

The Mahle disaster has a lot of culprits but definitely has some egg on his face for how poorly that signing has turned out so far.

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