The Giants expect to welcome back their missing corner infield duo, manager Gabe Kapler told reporters including Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area (via Twitter). Barring a surprise, Brandon Belt and Evan Longoria will be back in action tomorrow.
It’s generally promising not only that both players are now ready to roll but also that they only required the minimum necessary stay on the injured list. Belt has been working through a heel issue while Longoria is nursing a mild oblique problem. It seems in both cases the team has nipped things in the bud.
While the Giants aren’t expected to make much noise in 2020, it’s easy to overlook how important the season is with respect to these players in particular. Both have been highly productive players in the past, which is why they’re earning so much now.
Belt is under contract for $16MM annually in 2020 and 2021. Longoria is earning at a $15MM rate this year before successive $18.5MM and $19.5MM salaries (as well as a 2023 club option that can be bought out for $5MM, which the Rays will pay down by $3MM).
The Giants will obviously be in much better shape to the extent that these two one-time sluggers can regain some of their former glory. That said, it may be be tough to move a significant portion of these contracts even in the best-case scenario.
The cavalry has arrived!
Ponies?
Haha
Lol. Giants
And the Indians are cellebrating….
Mercy, those contracts are awful…..
Hard to find an example of an organization that was more mismanaged than the San Francisco Giants. What a mess.
Zaidi will fix it. But it’s gonna take a really long time.
All the contracts expire in 23/24 and it’s not like they’ll be playing them if they can’t produce. With the ability to exceed the tax threshold I believe they are closer than your really long time estimate. Hopefully start getting more competitive and figuring out their core by 23. Lines up nicely with the financial freedom they will have shortly after, now they just need to groom/keep/acquire the players to create that base. Their farm is not terrible and they are hoping to have some key pieces already acquired like Bart, Luciano, Bishop, Ramos. This season and next season are likely to be terrible but the sun is rising in San Francisco. 2-3 seasons 1 being shortened has me more optimistic than pessimistic.
@ 27rings I’m sure a lot of teams would like to be as mismanaged as the Giants if it meant 3 WS rings in the last ten years. Imagine thinking that anything but WS rings are what matter. Ask the Dodgers and Yankees on how that has fared for them?
In professional sports, Nobody cares about who won a Championship a decade or a half a decade ago.
I mean, the San Antonio Spurs were the NBA champs in ’14. LOl
The Giants haven’t finished above .500 since 2016. Now, They’ve established themselves as a loser team. A joke.
I’m sure the Yankees or the Dodgers want absolutely No part of what the Giants have become. Those franchises field winning teams. Not beater loser teams like the Giants
Since the Yankees haven’t won in over 11 years does that mean they are losers and chokers. Oh and by the way how is your boy Frazier doing with the Yankees?
All this talking only to lose to the Astros again and another year of choking is what awaits the Yankees. Keep on crying about how the Astros cheated lol. Your team is just not clutch. How’s your boy Frazier doing by the way? I didn’t see you reply about his demotion.
@27rings It must be sad to be you. Your life is so empty you have to attack other people for no reason. You obviously know nothing about baseball.
What a pathetic person you are!!!
When did the Yankees win last?
so I guess the dubs are LOSERS now. Get a clue
Dubs losers? You’re tripping. One bad year. On the other hand, The Giants have book three consecutive losing seasons and have just began their 4th
@dubsdynasty And what about the 40 years before 2015? Where you a Spurs fan then? Lakers? You obviously only like teams that win? The Warriors where pretty pathetic before then.
Really?
Yes, according to your own metrics the Dubs ARE losers: they’re the worst team in their league this year and didn’t win a championship last year, so they’re losers, right?
And I bet that for the 20 years before 2015 you were blasting the Dubs the way you’re blasting the Giants? Cuz few teams have ever been as pathetic for as long as the warriors were up until a few years ago!
Also, people do remember and care about championships from more than just last year, that’s exactly why you brought up how many more lifetime champs NY has, (cough, hypocrite)…so for the record, this millennium the Giants have been to and won more World Series than the Yankees.
These are facts
*been to as many
@Howie415 Is clearly, your stereotypical, overly sensitive, too many cats in the house, Birkenstock wearing Frisco baseball fan That somehow functions in a nostalgic SF Giants time warp.
@27rings What is wrong with being nostalgic? Most fans are nostalgic. Clearly you are. I’m looking forward to the young talent coming up.
@ABStract I raised the Yankees institutional success not Dubs.
I brought that in response to the tireless Frisco fans that scream ‘ 3 in 5’ in response to any criticism of their team. Yankee fans don’t live in the past like Giants fans. We also don’t mismanage our franchise the Brian Sabean and his side kick Bobby Evans did
That just doesn’t happen in NY.
You book a 98 loss season like they did in 2017, and the GM and President of Baseball Ops get Fired
@ChocoRolles You seemed to leave out the fact that Sabean / Evans made such a mess of the organization that Larry Baer had to go get a DODGER executive to clean up their mess.
As a lifetime Giants fan. I found that to be telling in how Bad things were and how screwed up the franchise became. It was also embarrassing..
It’s humbling to know that as a Giants fan, your teams goal is be LA
@DubsDynasty So what you’re saying is that professional teams want recognition for great regular seasons, but who fold like a tissue when the games actually count more? That’s an odd take. You go ask ANY Dodger fan right now, and ask them would they trade ANY of these super terrific division titles for 1 WS Championship. See what they say. I’ll wait….
@lethimsmoke It’s part of the reasons why the Giants are in this mess. They held on to players and never traded them when they had value. ( Panik, Belt, Hector Sanchez, Bumgarner, Will Smith, Samardzija, Watson, and other bullpen pieces. He also gave them too much money as a reward for the WS Championships. Bobby Made some horrible trades
BE LA, BE LA….
*BEAT LA BEAT LA, there I fixed it for you.
Poor Bobby Evans. Contracts for Belt and Crawford were done while he was GM. Also traded for Longoria. What was Sabean’s role in these deals. Not surprising we now have Farhan.
This would be a massive boost if it was 2013-2015.
Wish we had him two years ago… We did… Four years ago then.
Now that Belt and Longoria are coming back, we have a good shot at the division title!
Stop smoking the weed. I’m a Giants fan and know better than to start touting the Giants for a divisional title. What’s more, Belt and Longoria are barely replacement players. Their return will have little effect except to perhaps add some defense at both corners. But their bats . . . doubtful theirs will improve things.
Ahaha – Major League reference. Well done!
Pretty sure the Rays are on the hook for a portion of Longoria’s salary, plus the money they took on for the Span contract. That figure I think is over $25 million. So subtract that from whatLongoria’s owed in the future. Regardless, the Giants aren’t going to make any big splashes in free agency (maybe they would have gone for Mookie) and have really minimal obligations beyond 2021. So I’m not sweating the fact that ownership spent some money to try and win. They can afford it.
There are reasons for optimism. Yaz looks great. Bullpen looks good. Solano repeating his breakout from 2019. Dickerson needs to stay healthy.
What isn’t good is Pence. Love that guy but he is hitless this year; time to try Ruf at DH for a bit. And I hope Joe McCarthy gets DFA’ed tomorrow when Longoria and Belt are activated. Dubon is playing good D but his bat needs to heat up.
Padres will start feeling the pressure; they’re supposed to be good this year. Giants have no pressure, they’re just playing hard and trying to win.
3-3 is OK with me.
What are the chances both players are dealt
Zilch unless they turn in career years, their contracts are unmovable
Good team with a weak spot at 1B would deal for Belt if SF eats some contract. Longoria they’d have to eat a huge chunk due to the remaining years and production. But Belt has a shot at having a taker.
why does Belt have any market value? 30+ yo, little power, and breaking down. the body language says he is either in pain or just doesn’t want to be on the field…
Solano is starting to look very solid, .500 ba…