SF Giants fire manager Gabe Kapler before final series of the season

The Giants decided to cut ties with their manager on the eve of their final series of the season against the Dodgers.

Eric Cole

San Francisco Giants v San Diego Padres / Sean M. Haffey/GettyImages

It is fair to say that the news and gossip surrounding the San Francisco Giants' leadership in recent weeks hasn't been great. Fans are upset with every decision-maker right now from ownership to president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi to manager Gabe Kapler for how poorly the 2023 season has gone and it is hard to blame them.

The smoke around Kapler's future in particular has been very prominent recently with many speculating that the would not be back next season. However, few expected the Giants to not wait until after the season, but that is exactly what they did as Gabe Kapler was dismissed by the team today ahead of their final regular season series against the Dodgers.

Gabe Kapler is out as manager of the San Francisco Giants, sources tell ESPN.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) September 29, 2023

SF Giants fire manager Gabe Kapler

The Giants' decision to move on from Kapler is, again, not that surprising given all of the rumors that have been swirling. Someone was going to have to pay for the Giants' mediocrity this year and Kapler was an easy target. Many fans blame Kapler's overmanaging and overthinking for some Giants losses and he has certainly rubbed certain segments of the fanbase the wrong way.

However, the timing of the Giants decision is pretty strange here as there are only three games left in the season. The best guess is that all of the rumors ultimately caused one side or the other (although Kapler makes the most sense) to force the issue instead of having to endure the endless speculation from outside observers. There is also a chance that the Giants wanted to make the move quickly to pursue their top candidates before other teams were in the market for them.

With Kapler hitting the unemployment line, Zaidi and the rest of the front office doesn't have any other excuses to defend their record next year. They will be picking the manager again and if they fail to build a contending roster next season, Farhan may be joining Gabe in needing a new gig.

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Eric Cole

I started my career writing about baseball covering the Atlanta Braves for SB Nation's Talking Chop back in 2015 which has since been renamed Battery Power. After years of writing for those fine folks, I made the decision to take over as Site Expert at House That Hank Built before becoming a full-time MLB Staff Writer for FanSided in 2023. Along the way, I have been a guest on multiple ESPN radio affiliates as well as 680 The Fan and 92.9 The Game to discuss Braves baseball and especially Braves prospects and was a long-time host on the Battery Power podcast. These days, I continue to write about the Braves as well as covering the Astros, Padres, and Angels with particular expertise with minor league coverage, the MLB Draft, and bashing Anthony Rendon when possible. When I am not writing about or talking about baseball (which is seldom), I am an avid baseball card collector (Maddux and Soroka being my primary personal collections) and I also collect shark teeth. All other sports are mostly dead to me as my Bills have broken my heart too many times.