Giants Are the Perfect Landing Spot for Best Remaining Free Agents
It's been quiet for the Giants, but that could change as the top remaining free agents are all ideal fits in San Francisco.
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The San Francisco Giants have had a fairly quiet offseason so far. While they have made two additions to the back end of the rotation, they haven’t made the splash that fans have been waiting for.
As we enter the new year and inch closer to Spring Training, there are still a handful of the class’s top free agents available. Funny enough, the majority of them are all fits for this San Francisco roster.
With room for improvement at second base, right field, and in the rotation, the Giants still have the potential to have a big offseason, placing them right in the thick of contention this summer.
With the acquisition of Rafael Devers and the signings of Matt Chapman and Willy Adames, the team’s competitive window is open now.
The real question is going to be how serious the organization’s ownership and front office is when it comes to bringing another World Series title back to San Francisco.
The Position Players
Kyle Tucker, Cody Bellinger – RF
Right field is the biggest position in need of an upgrade heading into the regular season.
Kyle Tucker’s bat profiles as a better fit for Oracle Park and San Francisco, one of the few teams that can afford him if he gets the long-term deal everybody is expecting him to.
Tucker is 10th in both fWAR (23.4) and wRC+ (143) since the start of the 2021 season and would give San Francisco one of the better lineups in baseball, putting him next to sluggers like Rafael Devers, Willy Adames, and Matt Chapman.
Mix in solid contributions from Heliot Ramos and Jung Hoo Lee, as well as the power upside of top prospect Bryce Eldridge, and you get an offense that could easily contend in 2026.
Giants’ POBO Buster Posey has also been outspoken on defense and the need for improvement from the outfield on that side of the ball.
In over 5,000 innings in right field since the start of 2021, Tucker has racked up 1 Out Above Average and 6 Fielding Run Value, which both lead right fielders in that span.
Bellinger has also been one of the more consistent outfield defenders in recent memory.
While he hasn’t played as much right field, he’s posted 45 Defensive Runs Saved in the outfield across his career.
Unfortunately, Bellinger’s bat would likely take a significant hit if he played at Oracle Park for 81 games a year. He’s hit 235 home runs across his career, but according to Statcast, Bellinger would have nearly 100 fewer career home runs if all his games were played in San Francisco (138).
Bo Bichette, Alex Bregman – INF
Both of these top-of-the-order bats have reportedly hinted that they’d be open to a move to second base, which is where San Francisco would bring them in to play.
Due to the aging core of the Giants, Bichette appears to be the better fit due to his ripe age of just 27 years old. He holds a career batting average just under .300 (.294) and is coming off a season in which he posted a 14.5% strikeout rate.
Both would help a Giants lineup that was in the bottom half of baseball in both areas last season.
With a shift to second, San Francisco would hope for improvement defensively from Bichette, who’s struggled in recent years as the shortstop of the Toronto Blue Jays.
However, if San Francisco is serious about going for it, Bregman would make a lot of sense as well. While he is significantly older (32 for most of the 2026 season), his consistent output of value is up there with the best.
His 41.9 wins above replacement (FanGraphs) is eighth among position players since the start of 2017, and unlike Bichette, he’s been a plus defender for the majority of his career.
An upgrade at second isn’t absolutely necessary for San Francisco, as Casey Schmitt has had flashes of an above-average player at the position. However, more certainty at the position would propel the Giants right into contention prior to the 2026 season.
The Arms
Framber Valdez, Ranger Suarez – SP
At this point in the offseason, it seems highly unlikely that the Giants will make a significant addition to the rotation. After bringing in Tyler Mahle and Adrian Houser via free agency, the front office has signaled that they’re comfortable with the group they currently have.
I think we’re very comfortable with the five that we have and then the bundle of arms behind them now, to say that our depth is in a much better spot than it was at the beginning of the offseason. We’re happy with where we’re at. We’ll keep working at it, but we do think this is a solid five-man rotation going into the spring.”
– Giants GM Zack Minasian via Alex Pavlovic NBCSBA
Unfortunately, it’s still a rather underwhelming group as they currently rank 24th in terms of projected fWAR. This is especially concerning when you consider the division they’re in and how loaded the National League is as a whole.
Adding one of these two southpaws to the group would significantly raise the floor of this rotation. Since the start of 2021, only three starting pitchers have a higher ground ball rate than Logan Webb. One of those guys is Framber Valdez, who leads Major League Baseball in the stat during that span.
The longtime ace of the Houston Astros has had four straight seasons of at least 175 innings and 3.5 fWAR. If hypothetically signed by San Francisco, he’d comfortably give the Giants one of the best one-two punches in all of baseball.
Suarez, on the other hand, might not be quite the caliber of a Valdez, but still offers a significant potential addition to this rotation. He’s coming off the best season of his career, in which he threw 157.1 innings with a 3.20 ERA and the lowest walk rate of his career at 2.17 walks per nine.
Robbie Ray would no longer be the lone lefty in the group, and the Giants would have a rotation with a much higher ceiling. Not to mention, in a hypothetical playoff series, they’d be much more comfortable with one of these two grabbing the ball.
Will the Giants Make a Big Splash?
At this stage in the offseason, with this many top free agents on the board, sometimes patience can be rewarded in the market.
The Giants are going to need as much talent as they can get if they want to compete with the Dodgers in the NL West, and all of the best players available can fit their roster. It is just a matter of putting the chips on the table and signing one of them.
You can make the case for adding a big bat over anything else, or you can defer to the belief that pitching wins championships. Either way, there is talent to be had on the market. All the Giants have to do is bid on it.
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Michael Monreal got his start in baseball media when he started his own website covering the San Francisco Giants after playing two years of college baseball.…