The Giants have no clear direction less than three weeks before the July 30 MLB trade deadline.
San Francisco enters Friday's series opener against Carlos Correa and the Minnesota Twins with a 45-49 record.
What was supposed to be a bounce-back season -- with several marquee free-agent additions, including Blake Snell, Matt Chapman, Jung-Hoo Lee, Jorge Soler and Jordan Hicks joining the mix -- has been a turbulent campaign with very few smooth patches.
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President of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi offered a stark assessment of the Giants while talking to KNBR 680's Tom Tolbert and Adam Copeland on Thursday.
"Look, we're four games under .500 now," Zaidi said shortly after the Giants lost 5-3 to the Toronto Blue Jays at Oracle Park. "We have some great storylines, [Heliot] Ramos, Logan Webb making the All-Star team for the first time. But overall it's been a real disappointment. I think we pushed a lot of chips in with this team. We're well over $200 million in terms of our payroll. I think we need the players to show us what the right direction is for us."
Most fans and pundits have expected San Francisco to buy ahead of the trade deadline in order to make a NL-Wild Card push, but with the way the team is playing, Zaidi didn't rule going in the other direction.
"If we show signs of life and feel like we're a piece away from really making a run, that will dictate things," Zaidi told Tolbert and Copeland. "If we keep playing the way we did for the last five days, we're gonna have to think about selling and seeing some younger players, because when I talk to Giant fans, that's what you hear about a lot is, you know, they're as excited about the guys who may be here for the next five or six years and we have a lot of those guys coming up in Sacramento now than guys who are, maybe going to be free agents at the end of this year or next year."
San Francisco Giants
The Giants finish the first half with three games against the Twins and then have 11 games after the All-Star break before the 3 p.m. PT trade deadline on July 30.
So they have 14 games to show Zaidi it's worth adding to this roster.
"This is a big two, three weeks for us and I want us to have a strong direction as we go into the last couple of days leading up to the trade deadline," Zaid said. "And obviously how do we play up until then is gonna determine that."
The Giants selling off veteran pieces at the deadline would be a bit of a stunning development, but they have players who could help contenders down the stretch, if that's the direction Zaidi is forced to go.