Around next Wednesday, after this weekend’s MLB Draft and next week’s All-Star Game, we’ll firmly be in trade rumors season with just 27 days left until the deadline. As one of the worst teams in professional sports this year, the Giants will be sellers this year, and while the team is so bad it’s reasonable to conclude that they have little to offer actually good teams, I noted the 10 most valuable Giants they could trade a month ago, and yesterday, ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel along with Jeff Passan noted 7 Giants in their
top 100 trade value ranking. Could the Giants really remake themselves for 2027 at this year’s deadline?
Remarkably, Luis Arraez is not listed as the team’s most valuable trade chip, though he is also in the top 10 along with their top preference. The highest ranking Giant on the list is instead outfielder Jung Hoo Lee, whom they’ve tagged with a 50% chance of being traded, adding, “Lee is primed to get a big return if the Giants indeed move him.” Nine teams are listed as best fits, but in a sign that maybe this piece wasn’t as closely edited as we might want, the Padres are listed twice, meaning just 8 teams fit the bill, per their analysis.
Proof, btw:
If we assume that Buster Posey would not trade within the division, that really just means 6 (Arizoan is also listed), according to the speculation of two industry insiders. The Padres should, in theory, be in on a lot of players, though, because their new ownership probably wouldn’t be looking for them to dump salary despite their recent struggles (15-28 since May 19th), but of the plausible teams, the Phillies, Atlanta, Guards, Rangers, Rays, and Marlins, I think only Atlanta would work? They’ve already got Ha-Seong Kim there. The Giants could get back Mike Yastrzemski, I guess?
Anyway, it was a surprise to see him as the first Giant. I’m not entirely sure that his profile is more valuable than Luis Arraez’s, because even their conclusion is that he’s “a solid everyday player but not a star.”
With Luis Arraez, you’ve got a borderline Gold Glove defender up the middle with contact skills that are unmatched. Some of their analysis feels tinged by the defensive reputation he’s had over the past few years, which has led them to be suspicious of his improvement this season. I just think that if there was a tangible reason for suspicion, it would’ve cropped up by now. So, even though they think he has a 90% chance of being traded and consider him a 3- or 4-win player, they still put him below Jung Hoo Lee in terms of value.
In the most recent SB Nation Reacts poll analysis, I suggested that Cleveland would be a great landing spot for Arraez. McDaniel and Passan list the Guards alongside six other teams. One of them is Los Angeles, though, and I don’t imagine that Buster Posey would trade with the Dodgers, so it’s odd that they would list that team as a best fit, because, presumably, “best fit” involves an evaluation of the facts. To ignore the rivalry as a fact is a terrible omission, even in the business of baseball. They don’t bother to list the Yankees as a “best fit” for any Red Sox valued on this list, for example.
And then two more Giants are listed in the top 25: Matt Chapman (#15) and Robbie Ray (#22). With the former, the analysis believes that Chapman’s excellent defense is enough to prevent his deal from being underwater already, a situation unlike Devers and Adames. They do a quick and dirty analysis of Chapman’s batted ball profile and come to the same conclusion I did at the end of May — that Chapman’s raw talent is still there and age hasn’t gotten to them yet — but didn’t update this blurb after news of Chapman’s season-long abdominal strain, which explains all the weird power numbers this season. Anyway, I think Chapman’s age, contract, and durability concerns going forward (he played in just 128 games last season, remember) are enough to disprove the notion that the contract isn’t underwater, and I can’t see the Giants paying down much of it. The “best fits” list is interesting, though:
Cardinals, A’s, Nationals, Brewers, Marlins, Phillies, Mets, Red Sox.
Matt Chapman makes every team he’s on better, so, adding him to any of these lineups would be great for them. It would be funny if he went back to the A’s, though, and I just think this is another bit of poor analysis that doesn’t account for the on-the-ground details like the Giants and A’s are not in the business of helping each other. Quite the opposite!
Now, the main reason why Chapman’s on this list is the same as why Robbie Ray is #22 and not lower — there really isn’t a lot of value in the top 100 because most of the potentially available players are coming from bad teams. This isn’t one of those pure “What’s the trade value of every player” article that ignores all context, it’s very much looking at the continuum of players likely to be available at this year’s deadline. So, Robbie Ray cracks the top 25.
They suspect he’ll become a reliever in the postseason but would be crucial for a contender in the regular season as a starter. And given that need for innings coverage which Ray generally provides, their list of Best fits is obvious enough: White Sox, Cubs, Diamondbacks, A’s, Blue Jays, Braves, Padres, Cardinals, Rays.
Would the Rays trade for Robbie Ray and Luis Arraez? That’d really help them out. It might not help the Giants out, but that’s their fault. They’ve made a string of decisions that has once again put them in a place where they have to be sellers at the trade deadline.
Also mentioned but left un-blurbed: Caleb Kilian (#50), Harrison Bader (#70), and JT Brubaker (#77). I’ll try to reverse-engineer these rankings. Hmmm… well, getting any team’s closer automatically improves a bullpen, theoretically; and, theoretically, because Harrison Bader wound up being an impact player at last year’s deadline, he could be that again this season despite the time missed with injury — again, theoretically; and, um, JT Brubaker could, theoretically, improve the last man in the bullpen situation for a lot of contenders or be effective enough (2.89 ERA — just ignore the 4.01 FIP) for teams on a tight budget looking for a slight upgrade.
There’s no speculation about returns and that’s fine because otherwise this list would become too cumbersome to compile, but just from a bird’s eye view, I’d say that given the money involved in some cases and the term length in others that the returns wouldn’t be all that heavy. The Giants would be making these trades mostly for salary relief.
One thing they don’t do is post a tally at the end. If the Giants were to trade all these players and, let’s just say for the sake of argument, not have to eat any of the money, then they would save roughly $209.75 million (assuming Jung Hoo Lee doesn’t opt out after next season) total. They would also need to account for roughly 10 WAR next season. That’d be on top of the projected deficit they’re likely to have just based on their atrocious season.
Anyway, unless a team becomes very desperate or Zack & Buster’s Memory Hut is able to play teams against each other to maximize the returns, it doesn’t seem like the trade market will be a great avenue for reinvention. A good time to build up depth maybe.
