Snell signing could push Giants into postseason in '24

This has been the Hot Stove season that never ends. And no team has taken advantage of its unusual after-hours offerings quite like the San Francisco Giants, who, just 10 days shy of Opening Day, agreed to terms on a two-year contract with reigning National League Cy Young winner Blake Snell on Monday night.

Taken in connection with the Feb. 18 signing of slugger Jorge Soler and the March 3 signing of Gold Glove third baseman Matt Chapman, Scottsdale Stadium has been the center of the baseball transaction wire in recent weeks -- a late-forming Winter Meetings hosted by a club that entered the offseason with major holes and has filled them with patient productivity.

Having finished five games shy of a postseason spot in 2023 and six games out in 2022, the Giants were much too familiar with what it’s like to be good enough to not be good enough. But now, with Snell strengthening the rotation and seemingly completing a recent flurry of activity by the Farhan Zaidi-led front office, the projections tell us the Giants might finally be good enough.

This club needed the boost. It was coming off not only two disappointing seasons but two disappointing offseasons, spurned in the last two winters by the likes of Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, Seiya Suzuki, Starling Marte and, most famously, Aaron Judge. Franchise icon Buster Posey retired suddenly, Carlos Correa’s would-be contract fell apart even more suddenly and a general inability to reel in favored targets and impact talent made the Giants’ 107-win season of 2021 feel very far away.

That continued in the meat of the typical Hot Stove schedule of the 2023-24 offseason.

The Giants didn’t just lose out on Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto; they lost them to the rival Dodgers. The natives were getting restless, and there was only so much goodwill that could be engendered by the calculated gamble of a six-year pact with South Korean star Jung-Hoo Lee and the reeling-in of three-time Manager of the Year, former Giant and Bay-Area-boy-by-birth Bob Melvin.

But before the narrative about another upsetting offseason could fully form, along came some moves that have the Fightin’ Farhans looking feisty. There was the creative trade for 2021 AL Cy Young winner and 2023 Tommy John surgery recipient Robbie Ray, who, along with Alex Cobb (hip surgery) looms as a potential in-season upgrade for what was an inconsistent starting set last season.

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Then there was the pact with right-hander Jordan Hicks, whose big-league track record might be spotty (106 career ERA+, or 6% better than league average) but who comes equipped with two very attractive numbers – his age (27) and his average sinker velocity (100.1). Whether it’s as a starter, as he desires, or as a reliever, if the Giants can harness Hicks’ explosive stuff, that’s a great get.

Next came that Soler power, and, boy, do the Giants need some of that. Soler hit 36 homers last season. It has been 20 years since the Giants have had someone hit even 30. (That was Barry Bonds’ final MVP year, in case you couldn’t guess.)

Chapman signed a three-year, $54 million deal with the Giants not terribly long after turning down nine-figure offers from his prior clubs – the Blue Jays and A’s. His starpower and earning power might not be what they were back in 2019, when he finished sixth in the AL MVP voting. But his elite defensive work at the hot corner gives him a high floor, and a lot of us still think his hard-hit skillset can play up, especially after a humbling free-agent turn and with an opt out looming after each of the first two years of this deal.

Finally, there’s Snell. It was assumed his market would be difficult to make out, given a volatile performance track record that includes two Cy Young seasons on lower volume than your typical Cy Young season. Snell can confound with his command concerns and be the baddest man on the mound, in equal terms. It’s both fun and frightening to watch him do his thing. But on a two-year commitment in a sport where starting pitchers are dropping like flies? That’s a great deal for the Giants, and it boosts their projections in a meaningful way.

With Snell in tow, the Giants are now forecast by FanGraphs to have the sixth-highest rotation WAR in MLB, a year after they finished 16^th in that category. All told, FanGraphs pegs the Giants to 82 wins, which might not sound like a significant boost from 2023 (when they went 79-83) but puts them just a game behind the defending NL champion D-backs and ties them with the Padres and Cubs.

Last year’s NL playoff race came down to the final weekend, and there’s no reason to think this year’s won’t do the same. The Giants definitively played themselves out of last year’s race by going 9-19 in the final month. With this patient, productive “offseason,” they have put themselves in much better position to be in that end-of-season mix this time.

And if they happen to push themselves into the postseason in the final days, well, that would certainly fit the theme for a club that seems to do its best work late.