The past 15-20 years of the San Francisco Giants’ existence has been a wild ride. The highs have obviously been quite high, with their three World Series titles in 2010, ‘12, and ‘14. While that run would often get a team a “dynasty” designation, it was hard to do that with the Giants, considering they had a lot of changeover in basically all of those years and never were really dominant despite their October success.
Then there’s the fact that in a lot of the years where they didn’t win the World Series, they’ve just kinda…been there? They have some other playoff appearances since then — including an out-of-nowhere 107-win season in 2021 that represents the only time the Dodgers failed to win the NL West since 2012 — but they have a .512 winning percentage across 2010-25.
That hasn’t been for lack of trying. They famously pursued Aaron Judge hard back in 2022, and had an agreement on a big deal with Carlos Correa the following year, before the results of his physical nixed that. They finally did land a big fish in a trade with the Red Sox with Rafael Devers. While he didn’t improve San Francisco’s fate much last year, can he, and a bunch of changes around the organization, get San Francisco back into contention this year?
2025 record: 81-81 (3rdm NL West)
2026 FanGraphs Projection: 82-80 (2nd, NL West)
The most intriguing thing about the Giants going into 2026 is probably the new man in the dugout. After a couple uninteresting seasons, they let Bob Melvin go and hired Tony Vitello in his place. This will be especially fascinating, as Vitello comes from the college baseball ranks and has prior professional coaching experience. While jumping right from college the pros as a head coach is not unheard of in other sports, it’s very unconventional in baseball. A large part of that is that MLB teams have their own development ecosystems that often give coaches a ladder to climb.
All that being said, Vitello was plenty successful in college. When he took over at the University of Tennessee in 2018, it had been a while since they had even made the NCAA Baseball Tournament, never mind been a contender. By 2021, he had gotten them back to being relevant, and in 2024, they won the school’s first national championship in the sport. What of that ends up being relevant on the MLB stage remains to be seen, but if you were going to pluck any college coach to try this with, he would be the one.
Vitello’s hiring came from the Giants’ new-ish president of baseball operations, Buster Posey. He was originally hired in that role back after the 2024 season, and has been at the helm for stuff like the Vitello hiring, the Devers trade, Matt Chapman’s extension, and most of this offseason’s moves.
As far as the offseason moves go, there weren’t any massive acquisitions, seemingly content to view last year’s midseason pickup of Devers as their major star addition. However, there were a couple moves that could seemingly shore up and deepen the roster. None of them are exactly dynamic, but they did pick up Luis Arraez, Harrison Bader, and Will Brennan for the lineup. Arraez still rates as an above average hitter by several metrics, even if not as good as his batting averages might suggest. Also, the plan seems to be to play him at second base, as first base is occupied by Devers, which might not be the best defensive idea. The pressure will just be on the bat to carry him.
SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA – FEBRUARY 26: Luis Arraez #1 of the San Francisco Giants bats during the third inning of the spring training game against the Colorado Rockies at Scottsdale Stadium on February 26, 2026 in Scottsdale, Arizona. (Photo by Mike Christy/Getty Images) Getty Images
On the pitching front, Logan Webb is a certified ace, but there’s no one after him that really strikes fear in you. Former Cy Young Robbie Ray was better last year after a poor start to his Giants’ career, but it’s tough to expect the now 34-year-old to revert back to that Cy-winning form.
In total, the Giants’ roster isn’t bad, but it’s not great either. Maybe if a couple of their moves hit, they could grab an NL Wild Card spot, but considering they play in a division with the Dodgers, it’s hard to see them do anything more than that in 2026.
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