Identifying Giants' needs, priorities heading into pivotal 2025 MLB offseason originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants announced this week that they will once again host an exhibition with Team USA next spring ahead of the World Baseball Classic, which is exciting for the organization for reasons other than the fact that the game will bring some of Major League Baseball’s biggest stars to Scottsdale Stadium.
When the Giants did the same thing before the last WBC, they hoped to be able to show off their $50-plus million Papago training facility to potential free agent targets. Giants officials were thrilled when they heard that during the workout at Papago, one of the team’s best players FaceTimed his general manager to show off some of the amenities.
Perhaps in future years, a player will sign with the organization and note that he wants to spend his winters and springs at Papago. For now, Buster Posey, Zack Minasian and Tony Vitello are tasked with finding contributors who want to be there next spring, and that work starts today.
MLB free agency is officially underway, and while most of the heavy lifting is traditionally done around the Winter Meetings in December, Posey showed last year — with Willy Adames — and again during the season — with Rafael Devers — that he doesn’t care all that much about the usual timelines. The recruiting starts now, and Posey and Vitello should be pretty good at it given their backgrounds.
Both are known for connecting with players. Both also know they have a lot of work to do this offseason. In their first year under Vitello, the Giants will try to chase down a team that just went back-to-back, and the rest of the division should be pretty good, too. Here’s what the new brain trust will be working with and focusing on as the offseason officially begins …
Their Own Free Agents
On Sunday, Wilmer Flores, Dominic Smith and Justin Verlander returned to free agency, and Tom Murphy became a free agent later in the week when the Giants declined his $4 million option for 2026. The Giants have made a habit of reunions over the years, but there seems to be a good chance all four will be elsewhere next season.
Verlander would fill the biggest need, and he had a strong second half and enjoyed his time in San Francisco. But he also just had a baby and lives in Florida, so a second spring in Arizona might not be at the top of his wish list. Nobody would blame him, either, if he wanted to pick a team with a more realistic shot at regularly getting him in the win column.
Flores is a capital ‘G’ Good Giant, but he said his goodbyes in September. With Devers at first and Bryce Eldridge just about ready, there’s no longer room on the roster. Free agency can be rough on 34-year-olds these days, but Flores is very popular around the league and could find a bench spot on a contender.
Smith was one of Posey’s best moves in Year 1, but as a left-handed first baseman, he doesn’t make a lot of sense on a roster with Devers and Eldridge. After what he showed in San Francisco, he should be in line for better opportunities this winter.
Murphy played just 13 games in two seasons for the Giants. That signing, which led to the trade of Joey Bart, was one of the previous regime’s most baffling moves.
This Year’s Class
It’s a deep free-agent group this offseason, although it’s lacking star power. Kyle Tucker is the consensus best player available, but the 28-year-old outfielder is coming off a disappointing walk year. He pumps out four-win seasons, but this isn’t an offseason where a Shohei Ohtani or Juan Soto will alter the course of a franchise.
Bo Bichette, Cody Bellinger, Pete Alonso and Alex Bregman lead the rest of the position player pack, and the pitching list is led by Framber Valdez, Ranger Suarez and Dylan Cease. There are plenty of intriguing options further down the top 50 lists like Zac Gallen and Michael King, which is helpful for a Giants team that needs pitching help.
The relief market is full of closers like Edwin Diaz, Raisel Iglesias, Robert Suarez and Devin Williams. Again, that potentially lines up nicely for Posey.
What They Need
Pitching, pitching, pitching. And then, more pitching.
In his first year in charge, Posey learned a lesson.
“You always hear it: ‘You can never have enough pitching,'” he said on “Giants Talk” last month. “We came into the year thinking we had a nice amount of depth and then by the end it didn’t feel like we had a lot of depth. It was definitely a learning experience for me to learn that that old adage ‘you never can have enough pitching’ is definitely true.”
The rotation needs two arms, and it wouldn’t hurt to add a swingman — a Yusmeiro Petit/Jakob Junis type — to the mix, too. The bullpen needs, well, what doesn’t it need?
Of the Giants pitchers who made more than 40 appearances last season, only Ryan Walker and Spencer Bivens are under team control. Erik Miller is confident he’ll return healthy after a second half wrecked by elbow discomfort and Joey Lucchesi is arbitration-eligible. There are plenty of others — Jose Butto, Joel Peguero, Tristan Beck, etc. — who will again be in the mix, but the Giants have a lot of work to do to regain what they had in the first half, when their bullpen might have been the best in the league.
The biggest need in the ‘pen will be finding a closer, although paying handsomely for one in free agency is generally a terrible idea. The Giants also need a reliable eighth-inning guy, with a Tyler Rogers reunion standing out as a way to potentially get that done quickly.
The Giants plan to be extremely active with minor-league free agents, and Jeremy Shelley and his group have had tremendous success there over the years. Whether it’s that market, higher-end free agency or trades, they probably need to add more than a half-dozen potential options before the start of camp.
Other Holes To Fill
Casey Schmitt hit a dozen homers and was roughly a league-average hitter by wRC+, but the Giants talked about upgrading at second base ahead of the trade deadline and could again look at their options. Given that they already have three nine-figure contracts on their infield, though, it probably doesn’t make sense to go big at a position where they do have a young cost-controlled option.
The more pressing need on the position player side is in the outfield, specifically right field. It’s possible that at some point the staff will decide to move Jung Hoo Lee to a corner and get a better defender in center, but that’s probably not going to be much of a conversation after his first full season. Heliot Ramos is poised to end the Opening Day left field streak, and he stands out as a player who should benefit greatly from a new coaching staff.
The rest of the 40-man roster includes Jerar Encarnación, Drew Gilbert, Marco Luciano, Luis Matos, Grant McCray and Wade Meckler, and some of them look like players who will be taken off the roster in some way this offseason. Gilbert, one of Vitello’s favorites at Tennessee, is probably the frontrunner among that pack, but the Giants could really use a dangerous veteran bat in the corner to start the season.
It seems that every team is looking for catching depth every offseason, and the Giants will be no different. Jesus Rodriguez and Andrew Knizner could be options to back up Patrick Bailey, but Vitello could use more help.
The Most Intriguing Question
Minasian has piled up the frequent flyer miles over the years with visits to Asia and Posey quietly took a trip to Japan during the season to get a better sense of that market. Ohtani got most of the attention a couple of years ago, but for the previous front office, the bigger disappointment was missing out on Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who turned into a World Series MVP.
The Giants got Lee, but at some point they’d like to strike it big with a Japanese star, and there are some options this offseason. The Giants extensively scouted Munetaka Murakami in recent years, but just about all of that work was done before the Devers trade. It’s hard to see how they’re a fit for a left-handed hitter who plays first and third.
Tatsuya Imai, Jo-Hsi Hsu and Kona Takahashi are among the pitchers who could be available, and the Giants also could turn to a former MLB pitcher who had success overseas, like Forest Griffin or Cody Ponce.
The organization has righted the ship in Latin America and is poised to have a second straight star-studded class when it comes to international amateurs. But the Giants also want to be major players in Asia; will this be the year that becomes their focus?
What Else To Watch
The Giants won’t have to stress much about their arbitration class, which consists of only Lucchesi, Knizner and JT Brubaker. They’ll have to add some players to the 40-man roster to protect them from the Rule 5 Draft — former first-rounder Will Bednar, who now throws 100 mph as a reliever, is a fascinating case — but the bigger question might be which players they remove from the 40-man.
Luciano, Matos and Meckler are going to be out of options and none of them were that involved during the 2025 season. The unknown right now is what Vitello thinks of each of his young players, but it could be time to look for a fresh start for at least a couple of those guys.
If they’re involved in trades, those could go down at the Winter Meetings, held the second week of December in Orlando. That week also will include some nervous moments for franchise legends. Barry Bonds and Jeff Kent are on the Contemporary Era ballot for the Hall of Fame and Duane Kuiper is once again a finalist for the Ford C. Frick Award.
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D.J. Short
