The Giants have reached a point most teams spend months trying to avoid: the decision has basically been made for them. San Francisco entered the year expecting to contend, but a 35-49 start has left the club with little room to pretend otherwise. President of baseball operations Buster Posey has already said the team is trending toward selling, and unless a blistering run suddenly appears, that’s the lane the Giants are in.
That record puts San Francisco fourth-worst in baseball and squarely in the conversation for most disappointing team of the 2026 season, alongside the Mets, Tigers and Red Sox. The numbers behind the skid tell a pretty clear story, too.
The pitching staff has been uneven without completely collapsing. Giants starters own a 4.35 ERA, good for 15th in the majors, while the bullpen sits 17th with a 4.30 ERA.
But the rotation drops off sharply after the top three arms, and the relief corps just took a hit when Keaton Winn went down with a right elbow strain. The team says there’s no structural damage.
The offense, though, is where the frustration really lives. San Francisco is hitting .256 as a team, which ranks fourth in baseball, and the slugging percentage is strong at .417, fifth-best in the league.
But the Giants simply do not get on base. Their .308 on-base percentage ranks 26th, and their 6.4% walk rate is the worst in baseball by a full percentage point.
That lack of traffic has left too many of their biggest swings empty. The Giants have scored just 341 runs, which ranks 26th, and their 89 home runs are tied for 19th.
Even more striking, 59 of those 89 homers have been solo shots, a massive 66.3% of the total. No other team in the majors has had a higher share of its home runs come with the bases empty.
Add it all up and the picture is bleak: a minus-51 run differential, fifth-worst in the sport, and a roster that has been mostly average in pitching and defense while the offense lacks the kind of patience that can turn hard contact into sustained pressure. FanGraphs gives the Giants just a 1.9% chance to make the playoffs. The only real question now is how San Francisco chooses to handle the rest of the season.
In Other News...
Giants Fans Are Getting Dragged Back Into This Free Agency Debate
Several weeks after the Giants Pride Night, the fallout from four pitchers protesting the teams Pride hats is still echoing around San Francisco. What started as a game-night controversy has turned into a broader conversation about the city the Giants represent, and whether that environment can become a factor when the club tries to bring in outside talent.
San Francisco Chronicle reporter Susan Slusser said the debate could linger because the citys prominent LGBTQ community is part of the reality free agents have to consider. The question hovering over the Giants now is not just how they manage the public reaction to the protest, but whether that reaction becomes something players weigh when the offseason market opens up again. [Read more 🡒]
Brandon Pfaadt Is Back In A Huge Moment For Arizona
Arizona has been piecing together its pitching plans while working through injuries to Michael Soroka and Ryne Nelson, and that pressure has pushed the club into some familiar roster juggling. The latest move gives Torey Lovullo another option as the Diamondbacks try to steady a rotation that has had to absorb a heavier bullpen workload than planned, and the timing matters with the Giants next on the schedule.
Brandon Pfaadt has been working his way back after time spent in the bullpen and Triple-A, where the results were enough to keep him in the conversation for a return to the starting group. His next outing comes with real significance for a Diamondbacks staff that has been stretched thin, and the corresponding roster move should tell more about how Arizona is trying to manage the rest of the week. [Read more 🡒]
Giants Keep Embarrassing Themselves In The One Area Posey Preaches Most
For a club that has spent much of the season talking about cleaner habits and sharper execution, the Giants keep finding ways to undercut that message with the same old baserunning sloppiness. It has shown up in recent days in more than one form, from Willy Adames losing track of the outs while chatting with Mookie Betts to rookie Jonah Cox making a similar mistake, which only deepens the sense that this is becoming more than an isolated lapse.
The bigger issue for San Francisco is that these are exactly the kinds of details Buster Posey has said matter most, the little things that should be nonnegotiable on a well-run team. Instead, the Giants are leaving the impression of a club that is not nearly attentive enough in the areas that most reward discipline, and that puts pressure not just on the players but on Posey, Tony Vitello and the rest of the staff to make sure the message finally sticks. [Read more 🡒]