Numbers are helpful. Numbers make things plain when words muddy things up.
What follows are some numbers, basic numbers, that I found before putting some words next to them. They don’t tell the whole story of the 2026 San Francisco Giants — but who wants that? No thanks. Measurable data in small, manageable punches, please.
0 — Zero, it’s a number. Kind of. A number is a measurable value, and zero is measurable as an absence of value (see, numbers aren’t confusing at all). It’s a number in the same way that nobody is a presence. “Nobody is attacking me! Nobody is attacking me!” Polyphemus screamed from his cave after Odysseus blinded him, and all the other giant cyclopses who rushed to his aid at the sound of his shrieking, turned away grumbling. The ravings of a lunatic. Many of us, at our most dramatic and most sensitive, probably felt like Polyphemus in the last couple weeks of the season, watching a team that was notable in what it lacked. Absence as a presence — that’s the line-up in a nutshell. A bunch of nobodies. It was not the plan.
Zero players who took the field on Opening Day for the 2026 Giants way back on March 25th took the field as a Giant when the season concluded on September 27th.
Four were traded – Luis Arraez and Caleb Kilian to the Phillies, Patrick Bailey to the Guardians, Heliot Ramos to the Yankees. Five players — Matt Chapman, Casey Schmitt, Harrison Bader, Rafael Devers, and Keaton Winn — landed on the 60-day IL. Two — Logan Webb and JT Brubaker — are on the 15-day IL. Two more — Jung Hoo Lee and Willy Adames — are on the 10-day IL.
1 — One sweep. One real one. A real one is at least three games. A series sweep really only matters because it is more than two games. One win could be a fluke. Two in a row is like a broken clock being right twice a day. But three, and against the same team, now that’s something with substance.
There were 52 series (counting the split-up Braves as one) on the 2026 calendar. The Giants swept the 45th one they played in. Fans had to wait until the second week in September, with the Cardinals in town, to bust the brooms out. They flipped the script on us too with a 6-run comeback in the 8th.
2 — Two players. Christian Koss and Landen Roupp. Woke king Koss and Remember the Covenant! Roupp — diametrically opposed on the political spectrum, and yet tied together to the mast. There on the 26-man roster on March 25th when the boat left port, and (though Koss only had 14 AB before July 1st and was sent to Sacramento for most of May and June) there on September 27th when it washed ashore in pieces. The only survivors of this shipwreck season.
It’s fitting then that Koss was the last player to represent the Giants on a baseball field in 2026. He delivered the final joyful moment, the final disappointment when that joyful moment had the rug pulled out from under it, and the final out of the year.
3 — Three Giants starting pitchers suffered a torn UCL in their throwing arm during the regular season. The injuries actually all came within a month-and-a-half., the pitchers dominoing off the mound and onto the 60-day IL. Trevor McDonald went down in August, Carson Whisenhunt in the middle of September, Blade Tidwell in the last week of the season. Harken back to the halcyon days of Spring Training, when Hayden Birdsong heard the dreaded “pop,” and the writing was on the wall. Three became four. Four Tommy John surgeries levied on a whole generation of Giants’ pitching talent. All 25 year old rotation arms slowly being built up to handle a full season’s workload.
The “rising wave” of pitching depth never broke. Now 2027 will be missed, and it’s hard not to feel like when they return, they’ll be starting over. A hopeful normalcy, if it ever arrives, for these pitchers won’t be until 2029? Maybe? And who does the front office plan to put in their place? Will they still be stubborn about handing out long-term, six-figure contracts to free agent starters? Will the accelerated rise of Yunior Marte, Matt Wilkinson, and Cesar Perdomo, (another) 3 representatives dredged from the depths of the farm system to handle the final chunk of innings at season’s end, represent a new wave? The trio of replacements held their own to a certain extent — but expectations were low. Hanging sliders, demolished by Major League hitters were glossed over, elevated walk rates forgiven, and they were rarely pushed to pitch through the 5th. Though “Tugboat” is a Major League nickname, the jury is still out on the rest of him.
4 — Four wins in a row. The Giants didn’t do it. First time in franchise history its happened — rather, it hasn’t happened.
They won three in a row seven different times. They were an out from sealing a fourth W in Chicago on June 6th when future-MVP Pete Crow-Armstrong launched one of his MLB-leading 45 home runs off Keaton Winn. They nearly did it against Seattle in mid-July, but a Logan Webb cruise capsized after allowing a game-tying 3-run shot in the 7th. The Giants again lost in 10 innings.
Maybe that Cubs game was the moment we all should’ve recognized it wasn’t going to happen. It being anything good, or restorative, or sustained. Early June was plenty of time for reality to set in, but we (some of us? Just me?) were still counting on that one-in-a-half-century hot streak to pick the Giants up and lift them out of the funk. It happened to the Red Sox instead, which makes sense because the Red Sox had a bullpen.
5 — Five walk-off wins. On the other side of the coin is the dozen times the Giants were walked off, but that’s another number further on in this doom count. Focus on the present. Every game has a story. Over a long baseball season, it’s important to find excuses to celebrate. Those silly, over-the-top, on-field fandangos — as contrived as they can be at times — serve a purpose.
The 2026 Giants did deliver a walk-off for the ages. No fabricated excuse needed to go nuts after Bryce Eldridge’s “ultimate grand slam” capped off an 8-run comeback against the Nationals. Moments before Eldridge delivered his first (of hopefully many) highlight reel clips, Duane Kuiper and Mike Krukow threw another on top of the career pile with the quickly infamous “drop trou and hog out” exchange.
The walk-off homer, aired-out to right, plopped down atop the Willie Mays wall, and everyone went ballistic. A routine out in many parks, but no one cared. It was ridiculous and comedic and unexpected and so needed, for the fans, for the players. A moment of pure, amnesiac bliss. Nothing before mattered. Tomorrow felt so far away. The Giants had won the game when they were expected to lose it. For once, they defied expectations rather than fell short of them.
For some, it was the last enjoyable moment the Giants delivered on the field. A couple days later, the wheels came off the vibe train.
Nothing good lasts. The 2026 Giants taught me that.
