Carlos Correa Astros setback is more evidence Giants made the right decision (but they still can't celebrate)

It’s been pretty clear for a while now that the SF Giants dodged a major bullet by not signing Carlos Correa to a 13-year, $350 million contract. The latest update on Correa is even more evidence of that.

Correa is not going to return this season after trying to rehab from ankle surgery which he underwent back in May. It was described as season-ending at the time but Correa tried the best he could to get back but his body will simply not allow him to return, even if the Houston Astros make a deep run in the playoffs.

That means that Correa will end the year hitting .279/.369/.418 with three home runs and 16 runs batted in across 32 games. It’s a rough season even though he played pretty well when healthy and shows that the injury concerns about him, even though his ankle injury this year was not the ankle doctors had concerns about, were probably valid.

Since 2023, which would have been Correa’s first year with San Francisco had that 13-year contract been finalized, Correa has hit .267/.341/.427 with 48 homers and 187 runs batted in across 397 games. Those aren’t dreadful numbers, but they certainly aren’t worth a $350 million deal.

If the Giants are tempted to breathe a sigh of relief or pat themselves on the back for avoiding what would have been a disaster, they really shouldn’t because of the contract they gave to Willy Adames just a few years later.

Giants gave a bad contract to a Willy Adames instead of Correa

Ahead of the 2025 season, the Giants signed Adames to a seven-year, $182 million deal which was the largest in the history of the franchise. So far, he has not lived up to that deal.

2025 wasn’t completely dreadful for Adames as he hit 30 home runs on the season even after a brutal first half, but 2026 hasn’t been pretty as he hit .230/.289/.424 with 21 homers and 51 runs batted in across 121 games before being shut down for the season.

The Giants still have to pay him over $31 million per year until 2031. It’s already unclear how long he is even going to last as the team’s primary shortstop and his offensive profile doesn’t exactly seem like it will age all that gracefully.

He also has a no-trade clause so it won’t be easy to move on from him for a number of reasons. It’s not as bad as the Correa contract would have been, but it’s still pretty bad. Maybe Adames will get healthy and prove to be worth it, but his struggles have made it far too early for the Giants to take any sort of victory lap for ultimately avoiding the Correa deal. 

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