The San Francisco Giants had one of the most depressing offseasons of all time, and they capped it with a mediocre signing.
If you told San Francisco Giants fans how their offseason would go before free agency opened up, there’s no shot they would believe it. They were right on the edge with Aaron Judge, so much so that an MLB Insider prematurely reported they had agreed with Judge on a contract. Hours later, he had an agreement with the Yankees.
They had a firmer agreement in place with Carlos Correa, a solid follow and backup plan to missing out on Judge. A situation as bizarre, if not more so than the Arson Judge saga saw Correa head to the Mets instead at the last minute. Correa was already dressed for his introductory press conference when he found out there was an issue with his medicals causing the Giants to renege. Before they could patch things up, Correa had been swooped by New York.
You snooze, you lose. They lost to the Big Apple twice. Ouch.
If Judge was Plan A and Correa was Plan B, what is Plan C?
Well, we just found out.
Giants sign Michael Conforto as a very sad close to free agency
With all the marquee free agents off the table after two botched negotiations with Judge and Correa, the Giants had to turn to the leftovers. That left them with Micahel Conforto:
According to Bob Nightengale, it’s a 2-year, $36 million contract.
Conforto, a New York Met every year of his career before this, is a fine signing, but he’s no Judge or Correa. He slashed .232/.344/.384 last season. In 2017 he was an All-Star. His offense took steps forward since then, and back down to about where he was in 2017, but his defense has suffered in recent years. After a 3.5 defensive WAR in 2017, he put up a 1.1 the following year and has dipped into the negative territory every year since. His steamer projection next year is -12.4 on the defensive side according to Fangraphs (Judge is projected at -3.6 for comparison).
What a sad conclusion to a very depressing offseason for the Giants. At least they were able to get back at the Mets for stealing Correa… sorta?