The SF Giants' disastrous 2026 season should lead to some uncomfortable conversations with front office

The SF Giants are off to a disastrous 22-34 start. Another down season should lead to some uncomfortable conversations with the front office.

The Giants shook up the front office at the end of the 2024 season. Buster Posey replaced Farhan Zaidi as the president of baseball operations. After that, there were not many notable changes to the front office.

General manager Pete Putila was one of the few departures. He quickly landed a role with the Atlanta Braves and brought Michael Schwartze along for the ride. Schwartze served in an analytics role with the Giants and has since been promoted to an assistant general manager for Atlanta.

Of course, Zack Minasian was elevated to general manager, and Randy Winn was brought in as the vice president of player development. They also overhauled their pro scouting, with Hadi Raad taking over as the director of pro scouting.

Oftentimes, when there are changes at the top of the front office, this is followed by major changes throughout the organization. That was not necessarily the case with San Francisco. They replaced the voice at the top, but kept many of the same personnel.

The SF Giants struggles in 2026 may soon point to the front office

When the season began, I felt confident that the Giants would not be making any major leadership changes. They had major changes in each of the past three seasons. You can only hit the reset button so many times in sports, but they may need to do it again. Less than two months into the season, my confidence in that assumption has disappeared.

The Giants are off to a disastrous start to the season. It would be one thing if they had a subpar record, and you could point to promising underlying indicators, but there is none of that. They have a -54 run differential and rank near the bottom in nearly every meaningful offensive category.

The starting rotation has the fifth-worst ERA in baseball at 4.82, and while the bullpen has been a pleasant surprise, there are few answers outside of Keaton Winn.

The Giants have earned their record. On top of this, they have not looked great in terms of optics. Bryce Eldridge has started to see regular playing time over the past week, but his initial handling upon being called up had everyone across baseball questioning it.

The Giants have said that they want to put him in the best position to succeed. That sounded like a unified decision between the coaching staff and front office. However, Zack Minasian left Tony Vitello out to dry when he said that lineup decisions and construction were Vitello's call.

That did not sound like a unified response. Rather, it sounded like someone who knows he might be interviewing for other jobs in the offseason, and needs to start defending his reputation.

The front office put together this roster, which was flawed from the start. This is really where organization needs start looking in the mirror. Minasian has been with the organization for years, and they have experienced little success during his tenure. He has been asked about the team's struggles, and his responses have had little substance.

Of course, Minasian is not leading the front office. That title belongs to Buster Posey. He is a franchise legend. Everything he did on the field will not be forgotten. It is also easy to separate the player from the executive.

In his second season at the helm, the Giants have only gotten worse. He did not inherit a great situation, but he has not done much to help either. Most of his moves pleased the fanbase at the time, but he is judged on the results. Many of those moves have flopped so far and have contributed to the club's poor start.

Posey is in a weird spot. He is both the head of the front office, minority owner, and franchise icon. If ownership decided that a change was needed, they would likely need to go about it carefully and without doing anything to impact Posey's image.

The Giants are in a weird spot. That could start leading to some weird and uncomfortable conversations soon enough. If the tailspin continues, those conversations become more and more pressing.

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