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More On Giants’ General Manager Search

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Earlier this month, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote about three potential candidates for the Giants’ open general manager position: Athletics assistant GM Billy Owens, Giants assistant GM Jeremy Shelley, and former Giants GM Bobby Evans. However, she also noted that the search was just beginning and was likely to go well beyond those three initial names. Indeed, the list is already growing. On Tuesday, Slusser reported that the team “appears to have targeted” De Jon Watson, formerly the director of player development for the Nationals and currently a special adviser for the Astros. She also names Logan White, a long-time special advisor in the Padres front office and formerly a long-tenured executive with the Dodgers, as a candidate for the position and adds that Royals assistant GM Scott Sharp is also “on the Giants’ radar.”

Additionally, Slusser emphasized that Evans isn’t necessarily a candidate to reclaim his job as the Giants GM, a role he held for four seasons from 2015-18. It’s not yet clear what type of front office job the team is considering him for; it could be more of an advisory role than an official position. Similarly, she mentions that Evans’s predecessor, three-time World Series winner Brian Sabean, would be “welcomed back” to the club in an advisory capacity. It’s unclear, however, if Sabean has expressed any interest in leaving his current advisory position with the Yankees to return to the Bay Area.

Just as interesting as the growing list of potential front office hires are the notable names to whom the Giants have not yet reached out. Slusser reports that the team has not been in contact with former Twins GM Thad Levine or former Marlins GM Kim Ng. Despite president of baseball operations Buster Posey’s limited front office experience, the Giants aren’t necessarily interested in hiring a veteran GM to work alongside him. Instead, Posey suggests they could look to hire someone with a strong scouting background, and Slusser adds the GM will most likely take on more of a “public-facing” role while Posey oversees transactions and hirings.

There’s good reason to believe neither Levine nor Ng would have much interest in taking on that type of role. Ng turned down her side of a mutual option with the Marlins last offseason because she didn’t want to work as the second-in-command under a newly hired POBO. Levine’s reasons for leaving the Twins aren’t quite as clear, though it’s easy to imagine he’d like a chance to be a team’s chief baseball decision-maker after working under Derek Falvey for eight seasons. Without reading too much into a playful comparison, it might have been telling when Levine likened his role with the Twins to Mary Poppins “singing in the background.” Perhaps he’d like a chance to sing center stage, and it doesn’t seem like he’d get that opportunity in San Francisco.

Bryan Price Steps Down As Giants Pitching Coach

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Bryan Price is stepping down from his role as the Giants’ pitching coach, The Athletic’s Andrew Baggarly reports.

From 2001-2013, Price worked as a pitching coach for the Mariners, Diamondbacks, and Reds. He took over as the Reds’ manager for the 2014 season and held that position until April 2018, when he was fired following a disastrous start to the season. He briefly returned to coaching after that, serving as the Phillies’ pitching coach for one year, before announcing his retirement from coaching following the 2020 season. However, he worked as a senior advisor to the Padres’ coaching staff from 2022 to ’23, and when long-time friend Bob Melvin moved from the Padres to the Giants, he convinced Price to come out of retirement and join him in the Bay Area.

The veteran coach explained to Baggarly that his return to the dugout was always meant to be a short-term arrangement. To that point, the Giants offered him a two-year contract last winter, but he requested a one-year deal. Price was born in San Francisco and couldn’t refuse the offer to coach for the team he grew up supporting.

It certainly wasn’t an easy season for Price, who had to deal with Blake Snell’s early-season injury woes, closer Camilo Doval’s unforeseen struggles, and Jordan Hicks’s difficult transition from reliever to starter to reliever again, among other problems. Still, the season wasn’t without its bright spots, most notably Ryan Walker’s breakout as a relief stud and Snell’s resurgence in the second half of. All things considered, the Giants’ pitching staff was slightly worse in 2024 than it was the year before – their ERA, FIP, and xFIP were all closer to league average – despite several notable additions in Snell, Hicks, and Robbie Ray. That’s not to say Price is to blame for all (or even most) of what went wrong, but it’s not as if Giants fans were begging him to stick around for another year.

It’s unclear if this is a proper and complete retirement for Price, or if he still plans to work in an advisory capacity with the Giants or another club. As for his replacement, Baggarly notes that Ryan Vogelsong, currently a roving minor-league instructor in the organization, is expected to have “an instrumental voice in the organizational pitching hierarchy.” That could mean helping to select Price’s replacement or filling the role himself. Baggarly also mentions that assistant pitching coach J.P. Martinez and bullpen coach Garvin Alston are expected to return in 2025; if the Giants are considering internal candidates, either of them could be up for the job. Finally, Baggarly names Javier López, who is currently working as a color commentator on the Giants’ broadcast team. While Baggarly does not necessarily suggest the 14-year MLB veteran is a candidate for the pitching coach position, he writes that López could one day “transition into a role” in the front office or on the coaching staff.

Offseason Outlook: San Francisco Giants

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A big shakeup is in process for the front office in San Francisco. The Farhan Zaidi era came to an end last month and now Giants legend Buster Posey will be calling the shots as president of baseball operations. Since Posey has so little experience in running baseball operations, it's hard to know exactly what to expect, but there are some signs that the club will move from a measured approach to a bolder focus on acquiring marquee players.

Guaranteed Contracts

Option Decisions

  • LHP Robbie Ray can opt out of final two years and $50MM remaining on contract
  • LHP Blake Snell can opt out of final one year and $30MM remaining on contract
  • IF Wilmer Flores has $3.5MM player option, Giants have $8.5MM club option if he declines

Total 2025 commitments (assuming Snell opts out while Ray and Flores stay): $110.75MM
Total future commitments (assuming Snell opts out while Ray and Flores stay) : $439.75MM

Arbitration-Eligible Players (projections via Matt Swartz)

Non-tender candidates: Yastrzemski, Doval

Free Agents

The Giants did some good things under Zaidi's watch but the club was mostly defined by mediocrity in his time. The club finished just below .500 in his first two seasons. They shot up to an amazing 107 wins in 2021 but were eliminated by the Dodgers in the playoffs and crashed back to earth after. They finished at .500 in 2022 and just below in the next two years, making the 2021 season look like a clear outlier.

On top of the on-field results, there were some unsatisfactory elements elsewhere. The club's offseasons often focused on the players they didn't acquire, as guys like Aaron Judge and Carlos Correa came close to becoming Giants but ultimately didn't. Also, the club struggled to graduate many of its top prospects, with guys like Joey Bart, Luis Matos and Marco Luciano struggling to establish themselves at the big league level.

There were some nice finds on the pitching market, but mostly on short-term deals that allowed the players to get their big money elsewhere. Both Carlos Rodón and Kevin Gausman were able to resurrect their careers as Giants, but both quickly returned to free agency and got their big deals from A.L. East clubs, Rodón with the Yankees and Gausman the Blue Jays. To a lesser extent, guys like Sean Manaea, Alex Wood and Anthony DeSclafani had some good results with the club but are no longer in San Francisco. The club recently snapped up Blake Snell when he lingered unsigned into early 2024, but he now seems destined to depart like the others.

Last month, it became apparent that the franchise was growing weary of this generally tempered approach. Third baseman Matt Chapman, who had also signed a short-term deal like Snell, was signed to a six-year extension to stay by the Bay. But it was quickly reported that Posey had taken a lead role in getting that deal done, talking with Chapman directly in order to work around Zaidi and Chapman's agent Scott Boras.

Many smelled smoke in that report and the fire was later confirmed, as Posey was then given Zaidi's job. Posey said that he views baseball as a "memory-making business" at his introductory press conference. "Sure, winning is great," Posey said, per Maria Guardado of MLB.com. "Ultimately, that's our goal, to be a playoff team every year and compete for a championship. But I think just the overall big picture of being a part of something that's bigger than yourself was really appealing."

Does this mean that the Giants are now going to take a more free-wheeling approach, with less concern about squeezing the value of every dollar at the margins of every transaction? Will the plan be just to get things done, even if that means being a bit more reckless and perhaps overpaying from time to time?

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Mark Melancon Joins San Diego State Coaching Staff

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San Diego State announced that longtime reliever Mark Melancon has joined the school’s baseball program as the pitching development coordinator.  Melancon hasn’t pitched since the 2022 season, so this new job implies that the 39-year-old has ended his playing career after 14 Major League seasons.

“It’s exciting to be part of a staff that has great experience and a clear vision on what needs to happen to be successful at the highest level.  I’m eager to help these players compete for a national championship and hopefully move on to the next level,” Melancon said.

Assuming that Melancon is indeed hanging up his glove, he’ll finish his career with 262 saves and an excellent 2.94 ERA, over 726 2/3 innings in the majors.  As opposed to most bullpen aces, Melancon didn’t bring heavy velocity or big strikeout numbers, instead relying on superb control and a knack for keeping the ball on the ground.  Melancon had a 55.3% groundball rate over his career, the seventh-highest grounder rate of any pitcher in baseball (minimum 700 innings) within the 2009-22 timeframe.

Selected by the Yankees in the ninth round of the 2006 draft, Melancon ended up pitching for nine different clubs at the MLB level after he made his debut in the Show in 2009.  The travels started early, as Melancon changed uniforms via three trades in as many years — from the Yankees to the Astros at the 2010 trade deadline, from Houston to Boston in December 2011, and then from Boston to Pittsburgh in December 2012.  Though Melancon had seemingly broken out with a nice 2011 season, the rebuilding Astros still dealt him, and he then struggled through a rough season with the Red Sox.

The move to Pittsburgh brought both some stability for Melancon, and set the stage for the best stretch of his career.  Melancon became a dominant set-up man and then closer over his three-plus seasons with the Pirates, delivering a sterling 1.80 ERA and 130 saves over 260 1/3 innings in a Bucs uniform.  The right-hander was named to three All-Star teams during this stretch, and finished eighth in NL Cy Young Award voting in 2015 after posting a league-best 51 saves.

Free agency loomed for Melancon after the 2016 season, however, and the Pirates weren’t going to pay top dollar for a star closer.  The result was yet another trade, as Melancon was dealt to the Nationals at the 2016 trade deadline, and he continued to pitch well for Washington throughout the rest of the regular season and into the playoffs.

The big free agent payday then came that winter when Melancon inked a four-year, $62MM deal with the Giants, which briefly stood as the biggest contract ever given to a relief pitcher.  While Melancon had a respectable 3.67 ERA over 115 1/3 innings with San Francisco, it wasn’t the kind of elite performance that was expected from the hefty contract, and injuries also hampered Melancon’s effectiveness.

As the Giants entered a partial rebuild and looked to cut payroll, Melancon was moved to the Braves at the 2019 trade deadline, and had an uptick in results (2.78 ERA in 22 2/3 IP) during the shortened 2020 season.  A one-year, $3MM deal with the Padres followed that offseason, and Melancon enjoyed one final All-Star campaign by posting a 2.23 ERA and 39 saves for San Diego.  This led to a two-year, $14MM contract with the Diamondbacks in December 2021, but Melancon struggled in 2022 and then missed all of 2023 due to a shoulder strain.

We at MLB Trade Rumors congratulate Melancon on a terrific playing career, and we wish him the best as he moves into the collegiate coaching ranks.

Latest On Giants’ General Manager Search

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The Giants are remaking their front office, looking to hire a new general manager and maybe other executives as well. Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle has reported some of the latest details today. Notably, the club has asked the Athletics to speak to assistant general manager Billy Owens. Other candidates include Jeremy Shelley, who is already with the Giants as an assistant GM, and old friend Bobby Evans. However, Slusser adds that the club is planning to do a thorough search that could take weeks, which perhaps suggests the list of possible candidates will include many people not specifically named here.

For most baseball clubs these days, the general manager is the second spot on the decision-making pyramid, with the title of president of baseball operations usually going to the top dog. That will be the case for the Giants but perhaps this GM job will be a bit more important than others around the league.

Buster Posey was just given the POBO title and will be the club’s chief decision maker, but he has come to the gig via an unusual path. Many presidents get their jobs after years working for clubs either in scouting or analytics, climbing the ladder over time. Posey was on the field as a player just three years ago, retiring after 2021. He later joined the club’s ownership group, purchasing a minority share in September of 2022, getting a seat on the board of directors.

It seems Posey was fairly active in that role. Back in January, Taylor Wirth of NBC Sports Bay Area relayed that Posey and righty Logan Webb were working together to recruit free agents to San Francisco. Last month, it was reported by Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic that Posey has taken a leading role in the Matt Chapman extension negotiations even though Farhan Zaidi was still the POBO at that time. Posey was given Zaidi’s job shortly thereafter and the club decided to reassign GM Pete Putila and give that title to someone else to assist Posey.

Despite Posey clearly taking a hands-on role as a partial owner, his unusual track record and quick ascent could mean that he might need a GM who has lots of experience with the day-to-day nitty-gritty of running a baseball team.

Evans certainly qualifies, as fans of the Giants are well aware. He was hired by the Giants in 1994 as a minor league administrative assistant and worked his way through various other titles, including director of minor league operations in 1998, director of player personnel in 2005, vice president of baseball operations in 2009 and general manager in 2015. The Giants had plenty of success in that time, winning titles in the even-numbered years from 2010 to 2014, but their results declined in the seasons to come and Evans was fired after the 2018 campaign as the club pivoted to Zaidi.

Since that time, Evans has emerged as a candidate for other front office jobs but hasn’t landed a gig. He interviewed for the Astros in 2020, though that GM job ultimately went to James Click. Evans also interviewed for the Angels’ GM position prior to 2021, a position that went to Perry Minasian. When the Astros surprisingly moved on from Click after winning the 2022 World Series, Evans got another interview but Dana Brown ultimately secured that spot. Per Slusser, Evans has been working for various nonprofit organizations since his time with the Giants.

Though he has been in the wilderness for a few years, perhaps Posey will bring him back to San Francisco. It’s unclear if he’s being considered for the GM spot or some other advisory role. Either way, he and Posey are presumably plenty familiar with each other from their overlapping time with the club, as Posey was drafted in 2008 and made it to the big leagues for the Giants by 2009. The fact that Evans is now a candidate to work with Posey again, though in different circumstances, suggests the two had a good relationship during that previous era.

It may be a similar situation with Shelley. Per his bio at MLB.com, he has been working with the Giants for over 30 years now, so his time with the club also overlaps with Posey’s time as a player but also as partial owner/board member. Shelley started as a baseball operations intern in 1994 before moving up to administrative assistant in the baseball operations department in 1996. He then became director of baseball operations in 2006, senior director of baseball operations/pro scouting in 2009 and vice president, pro scouting and player evaluation in 2013.

It would be a different situation with Owens, who has been working for the A’s for over 20 years now. Per an MLB.com profile by Bill Ladson published last year, Owens started with the A’s in 1999 as a minor league hitting instructor. He later became a scout and then a scouting coordinator. By 2010, he was named director of player personnel and he got the assistant GM title five years after.

This isn’t the first time his name has emerged for a job away from the A’s. Like Evans, he was a candidate for the Angels’ GM gig that went to Minasian in late 2020. That same offseason, he was considered for a GM role by the Mets, but Jared Porter got that spot at that time.

Giants Have Shown Past Interest In Willy Adames

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Willy Adames has long been mentioned in trade rumors, with the Dodgers one club known to have had past interest in the star shortstop.  It is fair to guess that any number of teams at least checked in with the Brewers about Adames’ availability, and the New York Post’s Jon Heyman (via X) writes that the Braves and Giants also had Adames as a “target” in the past.  As Adames is now set to become a free agent this winter, any of these teams could well be suitors again on the open market, though naturally a free agent pursuit and a trade pursuit can be very different endeavors.

Tyler Fitzgerald hit well in his rookie season but was a subpar defender as the Giants’ primary shortstop in 2024.  That said, Fitzgerald has played at six different positions during his two years in the big leagues, so it is easy to see San Francisco shift him to another spot on the diamond to accommodate Adames.  The Giants have long been eager to bring top-tier free agents to the roster, and with Matt Chapman already signed to a new contract, adding Adames would give the team arguably the league’s best left side of the infield.  Landing Adames (or another big name) would be an easy way for Buster Posey to make a splash in his first offseason as the Giants’ new president of baseball ops.

MLBTR Podcast: Buster Posey Takes Over In SF And The Cardinals’ Succession Plan

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…

  • The Giants firing president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi and giving the job to Buster Posey (1:15)
  • The Cardinals will replace president of baseball operations John Mozeliak with Chaim Bloom after 2025 (15:05)

Plus, we answer your questions, including…

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

34 Players Elect Free Agency

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As the offseason nears, a number of players elect minor league free agency each week. These players are separate from six-year MLB free agents, who’ll reach the open market five days after the conclusion of the World Series. Eligible minor leaguers can begin electing free agency as soon as the regular season wraps up. These players were all outrighted off a team’s 40-man roster during the year and have the requisite service time and/or multiple career outrights necessary to reach free agency since they weren’t added back to teams’ rosters.

Electing free agency is the anticipated outcome for these players. There’ll surely be more to test the market in the coming weeks. We’ll offer periodic updates at MLBTR. These transactions are all reflected on the MiLB.com log.

Catchers

Infielders

Outfielders

Designated Hitter

Pitchers

Giants To Replace General Manager Pete Putila

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The Giants held a press conference today to allow new new president of baseball operations Buster Posey to address the media. During that session, Posey announced that general manager Pete Putila will be given a new role and the franchise will be hiring a new GM. Maria I. Guardado of MLB.com was among those to relay the news on X. Chairman Greg Johnson reported at the conference that Posey will retain his seat on the club’s ownership board and has a three-year contract to serve as the POBO (X links from Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic).

Putila was hired as the club’s general manager going into the 2023 season, working under then-president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi. He got that gig on the heels of a long run with the Astros. He started with Houston as an intern in 2011, eventually moving up to director of player development and then assistant general manager before jumping to the Giants.

It’s difficult to assign blame and/or credit to someone in Putila’s shoes, who had a notable position on the Giants’ decision-making pyramid for the past two years, but on a staff that involved input from dozens of people. Regardless, it’s not terribly surprising that Posey is looking to find his own lieutenant, as opposed to just inheriting one from the previous regime.

Posey is coming into his gig in fairly unusual circumstances. Many of the people who lead baseball operations departments work their way up the ladder through scouting or analytics channels, gradually getting promotions and moving to more important positions. Posey took a different route, as he was on the field as a player as recently as 2021. Less than a year after announcing his retirement in November of 2021, it was announced in September of 2022 that Posey was joining the club’s ownership board.

At that time, Posey said that he wasn’t “taking on any type of front office role” and that it would be more “hey, let me know where I can help and I’ll help there” approach with his new position. It seems that his role and influence have grown in the past two years. It was reported a couple of weeks back that Posey took a leading role in the Matt Chapman extension negotiations and now he has been given the POBO role with a three-year contract.

Though the club clearly has lots of faith in Posey and he surely has confidence in his own abilities to handle this role, it’s possible that his second-in-command could play a notable role in helping him deal with any parts of the job that he hasn’t fully tackled yet. As such, he probably wants to pick someone that he feels best suits that particular requirement or simply someone that he has a good working relationship with.

For Putila, it seems like he will remain with the club for now but in a changed role of some kind. Prior to joining the Giants, he had interest from other front offices. He was a candidate for Pittsburgh’s general manager vacancy that eventually went to Ben Cherington, for instance. If he has interest for other such vacancies going forward, there would be little standing in the way of him pursuing those now. Clubs generally allow their employees to interview for positions with other teams as long as a promotion is involved, so Putila shouldn’t have any obstacles if another club views him as a possible future GM or POBO.

Giants Fire Farhan Zaidi, Name Buster Posey President Of Baseball Operations

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The Giants announced Monday that they have fired president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi. Franchise icon Buster Posey will serve as the team’s new president of baseball operations, the team announced. Posey is one of six on the Giants’ board of directors and will now oversee the roster’s construction as well. Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle first reported that Zaidi, who was under contract through the 2025 season (with a 2026 option), was being dismissed.

“We appreciate Farhan’s commitment to the organization and his passion for making an impact in our community during six years with the Giants,” chairman Greg Johnson said in statement within today’s press release. “Ultimately, the results have not been what we had hoped, and while that responsibility is shared by all of us, we have decided that a change is necessary. While these decisions are not easy, we believe it is time for new leadership to elevate our team so we can consistently contend for championships. I wish Farhan and his family nothing but the best moving forward.

“As we look ahead, I’m excited to share that Buster Posey will now take on a greater role as the new President of Baseball Operations. We are looking for someone who can define, direct and lead this franchise’s baseball philosophy and we feel that Buster is the perfect fit. Buster has the demeanor, intelligence and drive to do this job, and we are confident that he and [manager] Bob Melvin will work together to bring winning baseball to San Francisco.”

The writing has in many ways been on the wall for Zaidi for some time now. The 2024 season was viewed as a pivotal one for the Giants, who unsuccessfully pursued Shohei Ohtani over the offseason and instead wound up signing Matt Chapman, Blake Snell, Jung Hoo Lee, Jorge Soler and Jordan Hicks as they looked to get back on track after consecutive losing seasons. The Giants won 107 games under Zaidi in 2021 but have not had a winning season under his watch otherwise. The lack of consistent results prompted many to wonder whether Zaidi could survive another sub-.500 season.

The most telltale portent for change, however, came late this summer, when the Giants announced a six-year, $151MM contract extension for the aforementioned Chapman. Signing the star third baseman on the heels of a down season proved to be a home run swing for Zaidi & Co., as Chapman rebounded with one of the best seasons of his career. However, The Athletic reported not long after the extension was completed that Posey had stepped in to run point on negotiations after ownership had become “frustrated” with the lack of early progress in talks.

The Giants had plenty of individual player acquisition successes under Zaidi’s watch. San Francisco became a destination for pitchers looking to turn their careers around, as veterans like Kevin Gausman, Carlos Rodon, Anthony DeSclafani, Drew Smyly, Drew Pomeranz and Derek Holland all strong seasons at Oracle Park before cashing in on more lucrative deals (Holland’s in a one-year return to the Giants that did not pan out as well). Gausman’s resurgence, in particular, proved to be a major win for the Giants. He thrived on a one-year deal during the Covid-shortened 2020 season, accepted a qualifying offer that winter, and was dominant in a full season in ’21.

That list of successes is also emblematic of another hallmark of Zaidi’s tenure, however: an aversion to long-term spending. The Giants opted to let Gausman walk in free agency rather than commit long-term. His five-year, $110MM deal with the Blue Jays has been a bargain for Toronto thus far. Similarly, the Giants let Carlos Rodon depart after his own tremendous season in orange and black, although the early returns on his six-year deal with the Yankees might have the Giants feeling better about that decision than the Gausman one. The Giants did pay up to keep DeSclafani, who returned on a three-year, $36MM contract after a terrific 2021 season, but that contract almost immediately went south.

On the position-player side of things, the Giants have struggled to attract hitters to their spacious park and to develop key contributors. Zaidi’s early tenure included some unmitigated successes in terms of bargain bin shopping. He acquired Mike Yastrzemski, LaMonte Wade Jr., Donovan Solano, Thairo Estrada and Darin Ruf for next to nothing. All became vital regulars or role players for several years. But the Giants were also unable to land big fish like Aaron Judge and Bryce Harper, while the attempted 13-year deal with Carlos Correa was scuttled by medical concerns.

The Giants have regularly pivoted to Plan B or Plan C after missing on big-name free agents — as they did last year following Ohtani’s deal in L.A. — and have a much spottier track record on those deals. Soler, Mitch Haniger and Michael Conforto all fell well shy of being the middle-of-the-order presences the Giants hoped. It’s too early to tell how the aforementioned six-year deal for Lee will play out after his season ended early due to shoulder surgery, but the sheer magnitude of that $113MM contract was a surprise to some in the industry.

The missteps weren’t all limited to the team’s pursuit of big bats. San Francisco has also had its share of misses on smaller-scale free agent investments; Tommy La Stella, Luke Jackson, Ross Stripling and Tom Murphy have all fallen shy of expectations. La Stella was released before the final season of his three-year deal. Jackson and Stripling were shipped out in salary-dump deals. Murphy’s signing — which helped push Joey Bart out of town and over to Pittsburgh, where he enjoyed a breakout year — has been a flop thus far and could make him a salary dump candidate himself this winter.

Posey will now be tasked with engineering a turnaround at the stadium he called home for the entirety of his 12-year playing career. His instantaneous ascension to president of baseball operations is far more surprising than Zaidi’s departure. Posey joined the Giants’ board of directors barely two years ago, when he purchased a minority stake in the team.

At the time, it seemed to be little more than a ceremonial move from a beloved player. Posey even stated at the time of the announcement that he was not taking on any type of front office role and that he was viewing his new role as “another opportunity for me to learn more about the game, more about the business and really commit my time to an organization in a city that I’ve grown to love.”

What happens from here remains to be seen, of course. Johnson’s statement did not indicate that general manager Pete Putila is in any danger of being dismissed, though even if he stays on board, he’d be second on the team’s baseball operations hierarchy, behind Posey. Longtime assistant general manager Jeremy Shelley remains with the club as well. Still, today’s press release did include a reference to conducting searches for any “open positions.” Virtually any change at the top of a baseball operations department is eventually accompanied by some personnel changes down the ladder, so it remains possible there are still some alterations to the tapestry of the Giants’ front office that have yet to come to light.

Posey, of course, has no baseball operations experience outside of whatever interactions occurred between him and Chapman earlier this summer. He’s likely been at least tangentially involved in some roster construction elements since purchasing his stake in the club, but he’s never held any sort of baseball operations title and more or less went directly from the team’s everyday catcher to minority owner, purchasing his share of the club less than one calendar year after playing his final game.

It’s rare, albeit not unprecedented in today’s game, for someone to be tabbed as a baseball operations leader with zero prior baseball operations experience. Agents Brodie Van Wagenen and Dave Stewart (a former big leaguer himself, of course) were hired as the general managers for the Mets and Diamondbacks within the past decade, respectively. Neither lasted more than a few seasons in their posts, however. Current Rangers general manager Chris Young pitched in the majors until 2017 and was working in the league’s central offices as MLB’s senior vice president of on-field operations, initiatives and strategy when Texas hired him as GM under then-president Jon Daniels.

Posey’s ascension to the top of a baseball operations department is far more sudden and rapid than any of those executives. Van Wagenen had been one of the highest-profile agents in the sport for more than a decade, negotiating countless contracts — albeit on the other side of the proverbial table. Stewart was retired as a player for nearly 20 years and, like Van Wagenen, had been representing players for quite some time, giving him plenty of familiarity with that side of the game. Young wasn’t much further removed from his playing days but had spent two years working in the league’s central offices. He was also hired as the No. 2 executive on the Rangers’ front office chart and spent more than two years working under Daniels before being promoted to the top post in Arlington.

Posey will now be tasked with revamping a Giants roster that has regularly lacked star power, relied heavily on platoons and has too often been permeated by aging players with waning athleticism. He’ll simultaneously need to build up a farm system that’s regarded as lackluster and work to improve a player development operation that has frequently seen top prospects either underperform or fizzle out. Homegrown talents like Logan Webb, Kyle Harrison, Heliot Ramos, Tyler Fitzgerald and Patrick Bailey all look like viable core pieces. But a number of the team’s other top prospects over the years — Bart, Luis Matos, Marco Luciano, Hunter Bishop, Will Bednar, Casey Schmitt — have not developed as hoped.

The $151MM Chapman extension signals that even with this change in baseball operations, the Giants aren’t planning on taking any kind of step back. They’ll look to get back into competition in the National League West next year and do so alongside a perennial Dodgers powerhouse, an ascendant Padres club and a D-backs squad that went to the World Series as recently as last season. It’s a tall order for any executive, let alone a rookie one — though Posey’s last rookie season certainly produced strong results.

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