SF Giants' lack of coaching changes is borderline malpractice after Tyler Mahle's Braves turnaround

We’ve already covered how former SF Giants pitcher Tyler Mahle thrived with the Atlanta Braves during the regular season after San Francisco dealt him at the trade deadline. Well, he’s carried that success into the playoffs with a great start in the Wild Card round against the Philadelphia Phillies.

Mahle delivered seven strong innings, allowing just one earned run and striking out six while only walking one batter. He looked masterful out there and the fact that Buster Posey basically said during his end-of-season presser that he doesn’t envision any major changes to the coaching staff just feels egregious since San Francisco’s coaching staff obviously failed to get the most out of Mahle.

After he was traded to Atlanta, the coaches over there advised Mahle to throw his splitter more and basically right away he saw better results. He had a 1.99 ERA in nine starts and looked like the guy San Francisco hoped it was getting when it signed him to a one-year, $10 million contract in the offseason.

The fact that San Francisco’s pitching coaches, between pitching coach Justin Meccage, Director of Major League Pitching Frank Anderson, and assistant pitching coach Christian Wonders didn’t think of so simple a fix is mind boggling.

Now, to be fair maybe there were some other factors with Mahle’s turnaround. He looked better in his last few starts before the trade deadline after spending time on the IL so he may not have been fully healthy in the year. Still, it’s clear the Giants didn’t get the most out of him.

Giants either need better coaches or better pitchers, ideally both

If the Giants are going to continue to be cheap when it comes to signing pitchers, then they had better have a great coaching staff that maximizes the most out of its arms. The Giants clearly do not have that. Instead, they are relying on a very inexperienced bunch who do not seem like they are milking every drop of value out of the players on the roster.

Yet, the Giants appear perfectly content to just run things back with the same coaching staff and front office. Maybe year two under the Tony Vitello-led staff will bring about different results, but it’s hard to have much hope given how year one went.

Remember back to the first year of Gabe Kapler’s time as manager and the impact was felt pretty much immediately. 2020 brought about some better results and 2021 was the miracle 107-win season so clearly whatever they were telling guys, especially on the pitching side under pitching coach Andrew Bailey, seemed to be working.

That doesn’t mean they need to return to Kapler’s ways, but after how 2026 went it would make sense to bring in new voices especially when looking at how Mahle has done with Atlanta. Instead, the Giants seem perfectly content to not rock the boat, keep the same coaching staff, and hope for the best.

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