Less than halfway through the season, the Giants’ Casey Schmitt has already hit a career-high 15 home runs through Wednesday’s games.
Sara Nevis/Associated Press
The San Francisco Giants have been a severe disappointment for most of the season, but in a curious development, those days are gone.
So is the pennant race, but stick around.
This is a team filled with cool stories, endearing personalities and dynamic skill sets, well worth following into autumn, and it goes well beyond Bryce Eldridge. You just have to sort through the rubble of their 28-41 record heading into the weekend to get there.
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Here at the 3-Dot, when it comes to the first four batters due up in an inning, we’ll stack Luis Arraez, Jung Hoo Lee, Casey Schmitt and Eldridge against anyone’s lineup for quirky appeal. It’s a bit of a hidden story, nationally, as fans watched the Giants’ high-powered stars fade into strike-three oblivion, but it’s elite-level stuff all the same.
Major League Baseball’s best hitters are undeniably the Astros’ Yordan Alvarez, with his 22 homers and .316 average, and Shohei Ohtani, who exists in a private world. But for quality contact at the plate, you can go straight to the Giants after that, it says here, with Lee hitting .338 and Alvarez .327.
Given that the Giants seem bent on trading Arraez at the deadline, in exchange for prospects (horrible idea), we sincerely hope you appreciate this man while you can. In the grand manner of Rod Carew, Tony Gwynn and Pete Rose, Arraez surveys the defensive landscape not merely when he steps to the plate, but before every pitch, to see where the hits are most available.
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He’s got ideas, none of them having a thing to do with “launch angle,” an approach so terribly vulnerable to the high fastball. His swing is level but wildly variant, rarely a whiff and fascinating in its catlike reaction to every delivery. How many Giants innings have you seen in which Arraez, sandwiched inside three routine outs, crushes a single or double?
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Arraez was simply born to hit, and if his style doesn’t sit well with some in the analytics crowd, that’s short-sightedness at its worst. He’s also playing a terrific second base, thanks in part to the stellar coaching of Ron Washington, and he lights up the dugout and clubhouse with his infectious good will. Milwaukee’s Brice Turang is the best second baseman in the league, but here’s a vote for Arraez as his All-Star backup.
Lee’s ascent has come in a rush, but if you check his statics in Korea (acknowledging the vast difference in the overall competitive level), you see the glorious pattern of .324, .355, .336, .333, .360 and .349 in his six full seasons there, always with at least 520 plate appearances. That’s no accident. Along the way to that .360 season, he struck out just 37 times.
He’s known back home as a baseball savant, a pillar of class and humility, and for the better part of a month, Lee has been consistently drilling base hits all over the field. He was 27-for-46 at one stage of his 18-game hitting streak, and at no point did it seem unusual. This is the player the Giants wanted three years ago, and he may well be exactly that.
“I think he’s the best hitter in the world right now,” Eldridge responded with a smile when asked about Lee the other day. “Special player.”
The Giants have always felt Eldridge is special, and he feels the same. From the earliest moments of his interviews as a minor-league ballplayer, he forecast himself as the Giants’ main man. Fans may recall Will Clark in that manner, a country hardball hitting genius who looked like he could do anything at the plate — like homer off Nolan Ryan in his first at-bat (to this day, a stunning achievement) — and talked a good game, as well.
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But Clark was a hoot, with his crooked smile and Louisiana drawl, a cocky party of one. Eldridge is cool, calm and measured, with an inherently perceptive knowledge of the strike zone. He takes batting practice like a scientist, exploring the field’s every dimension. and he’ll willingly take a walk — essentially a foreign concept to these Giants for months — while awaiting that one pitch that makes sense.
It’s always difficult to know whether someone is meant for the moment, or just that particular one. Travis Ishikawa sent the Giants into the 2014 World Series with an NLCS homer against the Cardinals, sailing majestically into the right-field arcade, and belted just one more (with the Pirates) in his big-league career.
Eldridge found that general area with his walk-off grand slam against the Nationals on Wednesday, and it didn’t feel like some kind of miracle. More like a glimpse of the future.
Rookie Bryce Eldridge, celebrating after his walk-off grand slam Wednesday to beat the Washington Nationals at Oracle Park, is fulfilling his high hopes to be the face of the Giants.
Carlos Avila Gonzalez/S.F. Chronicle
As for Schmitt, a longtime 3-Dot favorite, it’s heartwarming to see him grind his way into an everyday job — and if you could let him know exactly where that is, he’d probably appreciate it. Whatever position he’s assigned, he’s a defensive asset and a high-average power hitter now unquestionably dangerous on the tough inside pitches that a lot of players can’t handle.
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He’s also a goofball at heart, and let’s face it, you can’t have enough of those.
The real Giants fans will speak of many other good-guy types who just need to match their reputations. That seems to be happening lately with Matt Chapman, who dazzles with his defense and power displays, and Willy Adames, one of the most fun-loving players I’ve seen in my lifetime and thoroughly genuine in his uplifting interactions with teammates.
Daniel Susac? Hard to say, although we’ll always defend the Bailey trade. Rafael Devers? Way too many swings and misses on fastballs in the zone. Harrison Bader? Far better than the guy so vulnerable to the low-and-away breaking ball. Drew Gilbert? Good college player, perhaps not a whole lot more.
If you ask about the pitching … check, please! We’re gone. This dreadful weakness is so clearly the reason the Giants have no chance to crawl back to .500. Just try to hang with manager Tony Vitello as he jumps into a poker game every night with this bullpen. Watch how the new crop of minor-league prospects (no fewer than four top shortstops) advance through the minor leagues. And have some fun along the way. It’s there if you want it.
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Bruce Jenkins writes the 3-Dot Lounge for the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: jenksurf@gmail.com; Twitter: @Bruce_Jenkins1