SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants have hardly performed like sellers because the mud settled from final week’s frantic wheeling and dealing, successful back-to-back collection on the highway and 5 of 9 video games total because the commerce deadline.
In a type of ways in which baseball may be merciless typically, had they strung collectively the identical stretch per week earlier — towards two of the identical foes, no much less — Mike Yastrzemski, Tyler Rogers and Camilo Doval may nonetheless be sporting orange and black.
However the Giants traded away three gamers from their major-league roster and can now get the possibility to see whether or not their current turnaround is greater than a mirage (consecutive losses to the Nationals over the weekend didn’t assist). In the meantime, no crew was extra energetic than the Padres, who added seven gamers in 5 offers.
The groups will meet seven occasions within the subsequent 10 video games, starting Monday at Oracle Park.
Buster Posey denied this week on KNBR that the offers meant the Giants had shifted their focus to 2026, and if the postseason stays a significant objective for this season, it is going to possible imply catching the Padres — or at the very least coming shut.
After dropping two of three towards the Nationals over the weekend, the Giants start the collection seven video games again of the Padres, who received their weekend collection towards the Crimson Sox.
“We worry about ourselves,” supervisor Bob Melvin stated. “They’re ahead of us, so we have to beat them. I think we just like the way we’re playing right now. We needed to get past what was a difficult period and not very good period for us. It seems like we’re playing a lot better.”
Melvin’s previous boss, A.J. Preller, the Padres’ president of baseball operations, has a well-earned fame for leaving no stone unturned and placing offers seemingly out of nowhere. In 2022, Melvin might hastily pencil Juan Soto into his lineup after an Aug. 2 blockbuster. They went massive once more this 12 months, swinging the highest-profile commerce of the deadline so as to add fireballer Mason Miller from the A’s to a bullpen that already the perfect in baseball.
San Diego additionally lengthened its lineup with outfielders Ryan O’Hearn and Ramon Laureano from the Orioles, firmed up its catching with Freddy Fermin from Kansas Metropolis, and deepened its rotation with Nestor Cortes — tentatively set to oppose Robbie Ray on Tuesday.
“I think that team played their way into that front office doing that,” stated Logan Webb, scheduled to begin Monday’s collection opener. “I think maybe a month before that, it was kind of the opposite. We were the good team that was probably going to be going all-in. They played really well, we didn’t play well.”
Certainly, whereas the Miller deal concerned the highest-rated prospect to be traded on the deadline in years (Leo De Vries), Posey closed arguably the largest blockbuster of the season six weeks earlier. The Giants have been 11 video games above .500, two again of the Dodgers and in possession of a wild-card spot once they acquired Rafael Devers on June 15. Regardless of the increase he has offered the lineup (125 OPS+), they sputtered to a 13-25 document from then till deadline day, cementing Posey’s promoting posture.
The trades served as a wakeup name of types, Devers stated.
“Every time a team makes a trade or any player movement, it’s for a reason,” Devers stated via crew interpreter Erwin Higueros. “So yeah, I think that’s something that will motivate us and has motivated us now to continue playing.”
San Francisco sat six again of San Diego on deadline day and has managed to maintain the hole from rising a lot bigger within the week and a half since. Regardless of their disparate instructions, the Padres have performed solely marginally higher, posting a 6-3 document to the Giants’ 5-4.
Nonetheless, the Giants must be making up floor — not treading water — no higher time than this week.
“It’s what, five games?” Webb stated Saturday of the hole within the standings. “There’s a month and a half of the season left.”
Added Devers: “It’s a very important series.”
