The Giants are hoping Brandon Belt can stay healthy for a full season. Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
It’s rare when a defending champion looks to avoid repeating its recent history, but there’s no doubt that’s Priority No. 1 for the San Francisco Giants in 2015.
You see, there has been an odd sequence to the Giants’ success — or at times lack thereof — the last five seasons. In the even-numbered years — 2010, ’12 and ’14 — they’ve won the World Series. In between, they’ve missed the postseason altogether.
The calendar flipped to another of those evil odd-numbered years in January, meaning the Giants could be destined for another short season. In one of the club’s featured promotions, even stoic manager Bruce Bochy jokes about the annual roller-coaster ride in attempting to sell Giants fans on season tickets for 2015.
Club management appeared to have learned from previous mistakes when attempting to mold a recession-proof roster in the offseason.
Instead of reinvesting big time in the talent that produced the previous season’s championship — see Aubrey Huff, Cody Ross and Marco Scutaro — the Giants watched as two of their most potent offensive weapons (third baseman Pablo Sandoval and outfielder/first baseman Michael Morse) left the organization for better offers.
The replacements (third baseman Casey McGehee and outfielder Nori Aoki) don’t figure to be as headline-grabbing, but they aren’t the only newcomers to the attack. The Giants also welcome back center fielder Angel Pagan (back surgery) and first baseman Brandon Belt (broken thumb, concussion), a heart-of-the-lineup duo that sat out a combined 167 games last season because of injury.
Where the Giants look the most like 2014 — only a year older — is in the starting pitching staff. That’s good news when it comes to staff ace left-hander Madison Bumgarner, and potentially with former All-Star right-hander Matt Cain (who is coming off elbow and ankle surgeries), but that’s not necessarily the case with oldies-and-used-to-be-goodies righties Jake Peavy, Tim Hudson, Tim Lincecum and Ryan Vogelsong, a quartet that was so useless last October, the rotation transformed into Bumgarner’s solo act.
In an effort to prevent Bumgarner from having to pitch three of every seven games — as he did in the World Series victory over Kansas City — Bochy must find quality in a staff where the only certainty is quantity.
How the veterans pan out this spring will go a long way toward determining whether the Giants might have been better off investing in the likes of a Max Scherzer, Jon Lester or James Shields rather than in Bochy’s odd sales pitch.
