Of all the foreseeable problems from the multiple free agent deals the San Francisco Giants signed this offseason, Mitch Haniger not playing much was the most obvious.

Wouldn’t you know it, he’s barely played this year. .214/.271/.378 in 57 games (218 PA), the same number of games he played last season for the Mariners (.246/.308/.429 in 247 PA). In 2021, he played in 157 games (.253/.318/.485), missed 2020, and played in just 63 in 2019. Now, he will definitely exceed last year’s total at some point over these final 9 games, but what seemed like a simple path to playing more games than 2019 has been foreclosed thanks to these comments from Gabe Kapler.

Before last night’s loss to the Dodgers, Susan Slusser asked him why Mitch Haniger would be out of the lineup for the second game in a row.

I just asked Kapler about Haniger not being in the lineup for the second day in a row and he said he is fine physically “and at some point I’ll have the conversation with Hanny about what we think gives us the best chance to win every baseball game. (Cont)

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) September 22, 2023

Sorry, I have to stop and laugh at this. What makes the Giants so confident that they know what it takes to win a baseball game? I’ve seen no evidence of that in the last two seasons.

Anyway, Slusser continues:

“Sometimes that means him coming off the bench and taking down a bigger bat. Sometimes it’s going to be starting.”

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) September 22, 2023

My knee jerk reaction was that this is disciplinary for the perceived lack of hustle on this play:

The Diamondbacks scored 4 runs after this 2-out double. Had a 9% hit probability off the bat. Haniger had a 20% catch probability, per Statcast (not sure how that figure’s calculated).

Then 2 errors on the Corbin Caroll steal that gave AZ 2 more runs. Lapses in crunch time here. pic.twitter.com/7XP3lbndIG

— Danny Emerman (@DannyEmerman) September 20, 2023

Kapler’s post-game comment invoking the new, though seldom-used, “20% catch probability” defense felt unnecessarily mealy-mouthed, more likely to evoke a “come on!” than a “makes sense.” I look at that play, though, and I see a weird swing that clearly created a slicing, knuckling ball that Haniger might’ve read as bound for foul territory. A hustle dive makes sense from a fanbase desperate for something exciting to happen with this terrible team, but there was also a chance that the dive could deflect the ball or go by him and allow Corbin Carroll and Luis Perdomo to run wild.

So, thinking it through, Haniger’s defense or hustle has nothing to do with the the Giants’ decision to effectively bench their second-biggest free agent addition of the offseason, the guy who, allegedly, was on their radar from the outset of free agency as the dude they planned to pair with either Judge or Correa.

“At some point I’ll have the conversation with Hanny about what we think…”

Wonder what Haniger thought when he read or heard this. I can’t believe Gabe Kapler would imply that he hasn’t yet spoken to a veteran player the team spent big money on in the offseason for the express purpose of saving their bacon about how they intend to pick their spots with him and see him as more of a part-timer.

It’s hard to read that quote in Slusser’s tweet as anything less than a failure of communication. For a team that’s been dying before our eyes, I guess it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that the clubhouse is fracturing. But what the hell is going on here?

Mitch Haniger has faced right handed pitching 1900 times in his major league career and hit .250/.322/.458 (.780 OPS). That had to have been part of the calculation when the Giants formulated their 3-year, $43.5 million deal. They gave him everyday player money and now because of a sample size of .194/.255/.361 over 157 PA spread out across 5 months they’re rethinking their projection?

That can’t be it. It’s almost too absurd to believe. It’s true that September is basically Haniger’s first month of this season where he’s been an everyday player, and the results have been terrible — .178/.245/.400 17-4 K-BB (15 games, 49 PA) — but does all of their internal measurements show really show that he’s an immediate bust? I don’t think the Giants overpaying for a platoon bat is something that scares them. They just did it with Joc Pederson, after all, but there was zero indication up until the Kapler answer that it was trending this way.

Does Pete Putila have something to do with all this? We saw some movement behind the scenes with personnel (Brian Bannister moving on, most notably), but has he instituted some internal reviews that have turned up new results that conflict with the team’s prior scouting of the player that led to the deal he got? Hmm. Haniger will be 33 next season…

Or maybe this is all temporary while the Giants try to infuse a little vim and vigor into a moribund lineup. Maybe they’re thinking Haniger makes sense as the primary DH in 2024. No matter the reason, it’s pretty wild to think that the Giants, supposedly run by a superior, rational, data-driven management group have wound up doing a lot of what “normal” teams do: aggressively promote players to distract people with something shiny and new when things aren’t going to plan, poorly communicate with their players, and realize even before the ink has dried that they signed a bad long-term deal.

That’s just how it seems. The reality could be far less dire. At the same time, I don’t get what Gabe Kapler’s intention was with his response to Susan Slusser’s question. Okay, that’s not true. I’m sure his intention was “to answer her question as clearly and sufficiently as possible,” but the outcome of his press communication process was that it compelled me to write this article wondering why the hell the Giants are changing their plans with a guy who has barely played this season. Did they really not foresee him missing a lot of time?

It really puts things in perspective if, despite the Moneyball revolution and technological advancements in training and scouting, the Giants already know after 218 plate appearances that they can’t coach up this player to be the guy they thought he was. I guess the next logical follow-up question for the Giants is, “How do you see Mitch Haniger contributing to next year’s team?”

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San Francisco Giants owner Greg Johnson wants to keep the Gabe Kapler-Farhan Zaidi duo intact for the foreseeable future.

Johnson made good on his promise last month to keep Kapler and Zaidi in the Bay Area. The Giants owner is standing behind Zaidi after his opt-out clause expired several months ago, per the San Francisco Chronicle’s Susan Slusser.

On the other hand, Gabe Kapler’s tenure as Giants manager became tenuous during the team’s recent six-game slide. Greg Johnson brushed off the rumors and also stood behind Kapler. The former emphasized both Kapler and Zaidi will be around for the 2024 MLB season.

San Francisco Giants owner Greg Johnson reiterated what he’d told the Chronicle last month: President of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi and manager Gabe Kapler aren’t going anywhere. https://t.co/HJcte3jom4

— San Francisco Chronicle (@sfchronicle) September 15, 2023

The Giants (75-71) are currently second behind the NL West-leading Los Angeles Dodgers. San Francisco is fighting for a slot in the best-of-three Wild Card series in the posttseason.

Despite the Giants’ up-and-down season, Johnson feels Kapler is still his manager moving forward.

“Gabe’s done a great job navigating us through some challenges this season. We rank third in MLB in playing time allocated to rookies, and Gabe and his staff continue to do outstanding work supporting and developing those young players,” Greg Johnson said.

For his part, Farhan Zaidi confirmed San Francisco was in hot pursuit of New York Yankees slugger Aaron Juge in the offseason. Although the Giants missed out on signing Judge and Carlos Correa, Kapler felt San Francisco’s opening day roster was formidable. Unfortunately, it hasn’t turned out that way. The Giants had an 81-81 win-loss record in 2022 and they’re teetering on the brink of mediocrity again.

To make matters worse, the Giants are currently 13.5 games behind their long-time nemesis, the Dodgers. With Zaidi and Kapler coming back, the Giants hope to make significant progress in the 2024 MLB season.

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Following devastating mass shootings in Texas and New York this month, San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler said Friday that he will remain off the field during the pregame national anthem moving forward.

Kapler, who has championed issues relating to race and social injustice, made his intentions known in an essay published on his personal website Friday and to media members before the Giants played on the road against the Cincinnati Reds.

“I just don’t plan on coming out for the anthem going forward, until I feel … better about the direction of our country,” Kapler said. “That will be the step. I don’t expect it to move the needle necessarily. It’s something that I feel strongly enough about to take that step.”

The action harkens back to former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who began to kneel during pregame national anthem in 2016 to draw attention to social injustices faced by the Black community.

Kaepernick has not played in the NFL since that 2016 season, although he did have a workout with the Las Vegas Raiders this week.

Kapler said he has struggled mentally and emotionally since Tuesday’s shooting at an Uvalde, Texas, elementary school that left 19 children and two teachers dead.

“I knew that I was not in my best space mentally and I knew that it was in connection with some of the hypocrisy of standing for the national anthem and how it coincided with the moment of silence and how those two things didn’t sync up Well for me,” Kapler said. “But I couldn’t make sense of it in real time, and it took me a couple of days to pull all of my thoughts together and to be able to articulate them clearly.”

Kapler’s decision follows the plea for better gun control measures from another San Francisco coach. The Golden State Warriors’ Steve Kerr, whose father was shot and killed in 1984, used his pregame media time Tuesday to insist the United States Senate do more about gun control.

On Friday, Kapler posted his essay titled “Home of the Brave?” to his lifestyle website, kaplifestyle.com.

“But I am not OK with the state of this country,” Kapler wrote, expressing disappointment that he did not offer any sort of protest for this week’s school shooting before Friday.

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Following devastating mass shootings in Texas and New York this month, San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler said Friday that he will remain off the field during the pregame national anthem moving forward.

Kapler, who has championed issues relating to race and social injustice, made his intentions known in an essay published on his personal website Friday and to media members before the Giants played on the road against the Cincinnati Reds.

“I just don’t plan on coming out for the anthem going forward, until I feel … better about the direction of our country,” Kapler said. “That will be the step. I don’t expect it to move the needle necessarily. It’s something that I feel strongly enough about to take that step.”

The action harkens back to former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who began to kneel during pregame national anthem in 2016 to draw attention to social injustices faced by the Black community.

Kaepernick has not played in the NFL since that 2016 season, although he did have a workout with the Las Vegas Raiders this week.

Kapler said he has struggled mentally and emotionally since Tuesday’s shooting at an Uvalde, Texas, elementary school that left 19 children and two teachers dead.

“I knew that I was not in my best space mentally and I knew that it was in connection with some of the hypocrisy of standing for the national anthem and how it coincided with the moment of silence and how those two things didn’t sync up Well for me,” Kapler said. “But I couldn’t make sense of it in real time, and it took me a couple of days to pull all of my thoughts together and to be able to articulate them clearly.”

Kapler’s decision follows the plea for better gun control measures from another San Francisco coach. The Golden State Warriors’ Steve Kerr, whose father was shot and killed in 1984, used his pregame media time Tuesday to insist the United States Senate do more about gun control.

On Friday, Kapler posted his essay titled “Home of the Brave?” to his lifestyle website, kaplifestyle.com.

“But I am not OK with the state of this country,” Kapler wrote, expressing disappointment that he did not offer any sort of protest for this week’s school shooting before Friday.

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As details of the elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, continue to unfold, San Francisco Giants manager Gabe Kapler wrote on Friday that he is “not okay with the state of this country” and that he “felt like a coward” for not protesting “the lack of delivery on the promise of what our national anthem represents.”

Moving forward, Kapler told reporters on Friday that he doesn’t plan on taking the field for the national anthem “until I feel better about the direction of our country” and that he needs more time to consider specific actions he might suggest be taken to prevent more tragedies of this type, such as stronger gun control laws.

Kapler, in a blog post published earlier Friday on his lifestyle brand website, said he was disappointed in himself for not making some sort of protest during the playing of the national anthem Wednesday.

An 18-year-old gunman killed 19 children and two teachers Tuesday at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. In Buffalo, New York, 10 people were killed May 14 when an 18-year-old gunman opened fire in a supermarket. Both gunmen were using AR-15-style assault rifles.

“When I was the same age as the children in Uvalde, my father taught me to stand for the pledge of allegiance when I believed my country was representing its people well or to protest and stay seated when it wasn’t. I don’t believe it is representing us well right now,” Kapler wrote.

“… Every time I place my hand over my heart and remove my hat, I’m participating in a self congratulatory glorification of the ONLY country where these mass shootings take place. On Wednesday, I walked out onto the field, I listened to the announcement as we honored the victims in Uvalde. I bowed my head. I stood for the national anthem. Metallica riffed on City Connect guitars.”

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Kapler said he wanted to make some sort of gesture, but said he was conscious that it could be misunderstood as an act meant to be offensive “to the military, to veterans, to themselves.”

“My brain said drop to a knee; my body didn’t listen. I wanted to walk back inside; instead I froze. I felt like a coward. I didn’t want to call attention to myself. I didn’t want to take away from the victims or their families.

“… But I am not okay with the state of this country. I wish I hadn’t let my discomfort compromise my integrity. I wish that I could have demonstrated what I learned from my dad, that when you’re dissatisfied with your country, you let it be known through protest. The home of the brave should encourage this.”

Prior to Friday’s game against the Cincinnati Reds at Great American Ball Park, Kapler said he plans on refusing to take the field for the national anthem to protest the nation’s political direction following this week’s school shooting in Texas.

“I don’t plan on coming out for the anthem going forward until I feel better about the direction of our country,” Kapler told reporters. “I don’t expect it to move the needle necessarily. It’s just something that I feel strongly enough about to take that step.”

Kapler is the latest example of how several notable sports figures — including Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr — have used their platforms over the past few days to plead for action to combat gun violence.

On Thursday, the social media teams for the Tampa Bay Rays and New York Yankees collaborated in an effort to raise awareness about gun violence in the United States. Throughout the game, the teams posted identical facts — attributing where they got them — in concert with each other to their combined 4.25 million followers on Twitter.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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SAN FRANCISCO – Brandon Crawford opened July with 12 hits in his first 23 at-bats and released 1,371 OPS, making him the most dangerous hitter in the Giants lineup of the past week.

Despite Crawford’s persistence, Giants manager Gabe Kapler routinely put him fifth on the line-up and did so for Wednesday’s series finale against the St. Louis Cardinals. It seems Crawford’s production, coupled with Buster Posey, Brandon Belt and Evan Longoria Kapler’s injuries, would justify bringing the club’s top home run hitter up in order, but the Giants have no plans to do so.

Against right-handed starters, the Giants prefer the bat cleanup of left field player Alex Dickerson. Against left-handers, the Giants racket want to bring Darin Ruf to fourth place. With Dickerson hitting .227 with a 94 OPS + for the season, which is six percent below the league average, Giants fans have wondered why the club won’t make a change.

Before the game on Wednesday, Kapler shared his perspective.

“This is about how the opposing team plays against us late in the game, what we can do with our freedom and flexibility,” said Kapler. “It’s not about the best hitters hitting the highest in order. If that were the main consideration, we would write the lineup differently every day. ”

The Giants prioritize flexibility in order to achieve a cheap matchup against relief mugs in situations with high leverage. So if an opponent brings in a left-handed player to gain a draw advantage over Dickerson and Crawford, the Giants can counter that by replacing Ruf or another right-handed outfielder, Austin Slater, from the bench.

“It’s nice to have the guy who you are going to hit (the bat) for at the start of the left-handed run,” Kapler said. “I’m not saying we will always do anything or we will never do anything, but you saw that we are going to hit Dickerson really consistently.”

The Giants usually use a pinch hitter for Dickerson late in the games, as Kapler has replaced him in nine of his last 13 games. They also regularly replace LaMonte Wade Jr., their left-hander who has never scored a hit in 24 careers against left-handers.

By hitting Wade and Dickerson near the top of the line-up, the Giants give them more chances to hit right-handed starters before turning off the bench to their right-handed thugs when the teams are left-handed.

Dickerson arrived in San Francisco after being abandoned by the Padres in 2019 and immediately became an offensive catalyst. Despite fighting injuries and a handful of break-ins, he posted an OPS of around 0.900 in his first two years at the club.

The left-handed hitting the bat has yet to go the kind of run on the plate this year where he put the Giants offensive on his back, but the coaching staff know they can.

“I think in the past few days (Dickerson) had some of the better bats we’ve seen from him in a long time. I think we’re seeing a more confident person at the plate. I think you can feel his energy in the shelter. He knows that his swing is better at the moment than it was a few days ago. ”

Dickerson’s disappointing numbers in 2021 are currently more blatant than ever during the season as the Giants are without so many of their best players, including three in Longoria, Belt and Posey who usually stay in the line-up whether the club is right or right facing left-handed pitchers.

A healthier line-up that doesn’t rely as much on taking advantage of move advantages or covering up discrepancies could have Crawford in the cleanup, but for now the Giants will have to rely on fill-ins like third baseman Jason Vosler and backup catcher Curt Casali more Production to offer.

Vosler won the Triple-A West Player of the Week Award with 12 hits, including three home runs in 25 at-bats, before being recalled to the Giants on Tuesday. The rookie infielder sent a flyball onto the warning lane, which required left fielder Dylan Carlson of the Cardinals with a game-saving, jumping grip in the ninth inning towards the end of the game, but the Giants hope he will propel the ball further while Longoria is out .

With Belt and Longoria may be ready to return from the injured list by the third or fourth week of July, and Posey may be available by the weekend, the Giants believe help is on the way. Meanwhile, players in critical spots will be counted on in order like Dickerson to help the Giants overcome the injuries.

“It’s hard to safely replace these guys,” said Crawford of the team’s injured starters. “It is definitely great to try to get through this with a few wins and not throw off too much would be huge. We have good players who stepped in and did well. We just have to try to keep it that way. ”

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