It would be difficult to draw up a worse season for the San Francisco Giants. Coming into 2026, they didn't project to be much better than the .500-ish team they've been the last few years, but injuries and ineffectiveness resulted in their worst season since their 98-loss campaign in 2017. Two years into Buster Posey's front office reign, the Giants are arguably in a worse place than they were the year before he took over.
"I think everyone deep down felt we're gonna take the world by storm," rookie manager Tony Vitello told The Athletic about the club's season recently. "And when we didn't right out of the chute, it put everybody on their heels, and I'd be guilty of that too." Injuries have certainly played a major role in San Francisco's disappointing season. They currently have 17 players -- 17! -- on the 60-day injured list, and no team has the depth to cover that.
Between injuries and the subsequent trade deadline sell-off, the Giants are running out the string with a lineup that more closely resembles a Triple-A team. This is unfathomable: The Giants current 26-man roster contains 2 players who were on the Opening Day roster The roster construction and the contracts on the books almost force the Giants to be a win-now team. They have highly paid veterans on long-term deals who won't be the players they are today after a rebuild.
The good news is the Giants do have a solid talent base, including several interesting young players, and the third wild-card spot is very forgiving. Contention is not too far away. Here now are three questions facing Posey and the Giants as they head into the offseason and begin their 2027 planning.
Give Posey this: He's willing to be bold and think outside the box. The Giants hired Vitello away from the University of Tennessee last offseason, making him the first person to jump straight from college to an MLB managerial job with no prior professional playing or coaching experience. Posey took a risk, for sure, but he didn't shy away from doing something unconventional.
Vitello's first season with the Giants was ... rocky. He made headlines for all the wrong reasons early in the season, including his "fire and brimstone" speech before Opening Day and letting old college grudges bleed into his relationships with umpires. He also questioned his team's effort level in May.
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