6 players the SF Giants should have traded before their trade value tanked

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While the San Francisco Giants have done really well to fill out their roster with decent players at virtually every position, that does not mean they have been flawless. Sure, there are things that have happened which are outside their control like Thairo Estrada getting hurt, but there have definitely been some missteps.

When we think of front office mistakes, we think about terrible trades or contracts that turn into albatrosses around an organization's neck. However, another flavor of mistakes is where a team hangs on to a player for too long.

There are a lot of reasons this can happen. Sometimes a player is really talented and the team hopes they can fix a key flaw and it never happens. In other cases, a player has a track record of success with a team and his decline is ignored because of said track record and sentimentality. There are also plenty of cases of "what were they thinking?" that one will never understand.

Here are 6 players the Giants should have traded before they lost their trade value

To be clear, just because a player is on this list does not mean there is no hope for them. There are several players on this list that are young and/or prospects that could easily turn things around. However, what they all have in common is that they all had a peak trade value that is no longer anywhere close to what they could command now.

Let's take a look at six players that, with the benefit of hindsight, the Giants probably wish they had traded when their value was at its highest.

Joey Bart

Joey Bart is understandably at the top of most Giants fans' minds on this sort of list. When San Francisco took Bart second overall in the 2018 MLB Draft, he was hailed as the heir apparent to Buster Posey who would catch for the Giants for the foreseeable future.

Unfortunately, that isn't what happened. Bart's bat certainly showed up in the minor leagues, but in almost 500 plate appearances in the big leagues he sports just an 81 wRC+. With Patrick Bailey clearly surpassing him as the catcher of the future, the Giants have to wonder what Bart could have brought back in a trade when he was considered one of the best catching prospects in all of baseball and hadn't gotten exposed in the big leagues yet.

Heliot Ramos

It was only two years ago that Heliot Ramos looked like a fantastic outfield prospect who was easily a top 3 prospect in the Giants' farm system. San Francisco's first round pick from the 2017 draft had a ton of physical tools and elite bat speed that pointed to a future as a power hitting outfielder that could contribute on the field in multiple ways.

Unfortunately, Ramos has never really blossomed as a hitter the way the Giants had hoped. The power has shown up here and there, but the questions surrounding his hit tool have only intensified over the years and his limited stints in the big leagues have not gone well. This story could have a happy ending, though, as Ramos has posted a .935 OPS in Triple-A this year. While the shine may have worn off a bit, he could still be a useful piece after all.

Brandon Crawford

Shifting gears away from the minor leagues, we need to talk about Brandon Crawford. Crawford has been a stalwart performer for the Giants since 2011. While the offense came and went at times, he was as steady a defender at shortstop as they come the entire time. In 1561 games with the Giants from 2011 to 2022, Crawford accumulated 30.8 rWAR. That is big-time production no matter how you look at it.

However, there were signs last season that his decline was coming as he posted just an 87 wRC+ at the plate. It is understandable why the Giants didn't want trade a guy as iconic as Crawford, but it is hard not to wonder what they could have gotten for him this past offseason while teams still remembered his 2021 season. Unfortunately, Crawford has struggled mightily this season, is currently on the injured list with a knee issue, and is set to become a free agent at the end of the year.

Will Bednar

Pitching prospects are prime candidates to die on the vine and there is a real chance that Will Bednar could end up being such an arm. Bednar blasted his way into the middle of the first round in 2021 thanks to one of the more dominant performances in the College World Series you will ever see. Trading a guy the year he is drafted isn't usually advisable, but that may turn out to be the peak of his value.

The issue is that Bednar has already been bitten by the injury bug as issues with his back have really slowed his development. Again, keeping Bednar as long as they have is certainly understandable given his potential and how highly they picked him. However, this is the risk in investing pitching prospects to begin with. If he turns things around in the near future, it might be advisable for San Francisco to flip him and sell high while they can.

Casey Schmitt

There is no denying that Casey Schmitt has a chance to be special defensively at third base. He has the arm to make plays from anywhere and he constantly puts in the work to get to balls at any angle. He also was an excellent hitter in the minor leagues and if the Giants had been able to include him in a track package after the 2022 season where he posted an .854 OPS, he could have been the centerpiece in a big deal.

That is not what happened, however, and Schmitt's bat has been exposed in the big leagues this season. In almost 200 plate appearances in the big leagues in 2023, he has put up just a 52 wRC+ and he hasn't even been a particularly good defender. There is still a chance that Schmitt turns things around, but the odds are worse now than they were before the season.

Alex Wood

Finally, we come to Alex Wood who is a cautionary tale about not reading too much into a one season sample. In 2021, Wood was coming off back to back seasons where he had not pitched well and had dealt with back and shoulder issues. However, he put together a really nice season with the Giants with a 3.83 ERA. Trading him at the deadline wasn't really an option since the Giants were in the middle of a pennant race, but that probably would have been better than what actually happened.

Instead of letting Wood leave in free agency, the Giants signed him to a two year, $25 million deal. Wood's surface numbers weren't great in 2022, but his peripherals still looked good and he could have gotten a nice return in a trade given the extra year of team control. The Giants also didn't do that and Wood has looked even worse this year with big-time regression in his strikeout and walk rates.

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