If the Giants have a repeat performance of their horrific 2017 season it won’t be because they did not try to improve.
They’ve already improved a great deal, and they did even more today with the signing of Tony Waton, a Jeremy Affeldt like addition to the bullpen.
And somehow they did this without screwing up their tax situation. To the tweets!
Confirming #sfgiants and LHP Tony Watson are in agreement on terms. Two years with incentives plus a player option with incentives. Does not put them over CBT. Likely not official till Monday. Massive, massive achievement.
— Andrew Baggarly (@extrabaggs) February 17, 2018
Incentives will raise this, but still amazing that no team would top it. It’s nice to be searching for free agent help when half the league is tanking. https://t.co/H84QIgImSJ
— Alex Pavlovic (@PavlovicNBCS) February 17, 2018
Tony Watson’s deal with the #SFGiants comes with a guarantee of $9 million, source says. It includes escalators and performance bonuses that could ultimately increase the value to $14M over 2 years or $21M over 3 years.
— Jerry Crasnick (@jcrasnick) February 17, 2018
So, somehow the Giants signed a very good player, despite having very little room to do so, and still didn’t screw their cap situation. All of which is kind of amazing and perhaps related to this news.
As of right now, it’s very unlikely the Giants are able to make a deadline trade without dumping some significant salary. We have a long ways to go, but will be worth keeping an eye on once we get to June 1.
Let’s update our projected 25 man roster!
- Posey C
- Hundley C
- Belt 1B
- Panik 2B
- Crawford SS
- Longoria 3B
- Sandoval INF
- Tomlinson INF
- Pence LF
- Duggar CF
- Jackson OF
- McCutchen RF
- Parker OF
- Bumgarner SP
- Cueto SP
- Samardzija SP
- Stratton SP
- Suarez SP
- Melancon CL
- Watson LRP
- Dyson RRP
- Strickland RRP
- Gearin RRP
- Law/Fernandez RRP
- Black LRP
- Smith LRP
By all accounts, Will Smith won’t be ready until May 1, which means he starts the season on the DL. That probably allows the Giants a month to take a look at Andrew Suarez as the 5th starter, while keeping Ty Blach in the pen. If Suarez can’t cut it, Blach slides into the 5th starter role once Smith comes back.
There’s still a lot of fluidity here. Could Gregor Blanco sneak on to this roster? Will one of the other utlity infielders push Kelby Tomlinson aside? Who will really win the 4th and 5th starter roles? Does Derek Holland earn one of those spots? Who will take the Law/Fernandez spot at the end of the pen?
And, last but not least, will we see Timmy?
baseballmonk 