{"id":998,"date":"2026-06-02T06:38:26","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:38:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=998"},"modified":"2026-06-02T06:38:26","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:38:26","slug":"kurtenbach-baseballs-bargain-bin-franchises-are-exposing-the-sf-giants-grift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=998","title":{"rendered":"Kurtenbach: Baseball’s bargain bin franchises are exposing the SF Giants’ grift"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
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I told you it would get worse.<\/p>\n

And boy, did it ever.<\/p>\n

Because the San Francisco Giants, losers of 10 of their last 13 games, aren\u2019t just a bad baseball team \u2014 they\u2019re a 26-man piece of performance art on how to set money on fire while tripping over your own shoelaces.<\/p>\n

Read more Hall of Famer Rick Adelman, former Warriors head coach who is 10th-winningest coach in NBA history, dies at 79<\/a><\/p>\n

And the most damning indictment of this sprawling, high-revenue disaster isn\u2019t simply that they lose a lot \u2014 as much as anyone in baseball.<\/p>\n

No, it\u2019s who they lose to, and exactly how they look doing it.<\/p>\n

So far this season, the Giants have been wholly, embarrassingly outclassed by the Tampa Bay Rays (swept), the Arizona Diamondbacks (swept twice), the Colorado Rockies (lost two of three), and continued the trend in the first game of a four-game set on Monday in Milwaukee, where they allowed 16 consecutive runs after going up 2-0.<\/p>\n

These are lower-budget and downright bottom-budget operations doing the buttoned-up little things to win against the loose-in-every-way Giants. And while, in the case of everyone but the Rockies, those teams are beating most everyone else, too, that should provide no consolation.<\/p>\n

The Giants are a big (but should be bigger) budget behemoth that can\u2019t do the big things right, and also, for good measure, are doing every conceivable little thing wrong.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

That\u2019s the core of this team\u2019s grift. It\u2019s a spectacular failure of imagination and execution.<\/p>\n

Imagine going on the radio, or standing in front of the local media, or being at a podium in a televised press conference, clearing your throat, and declaring your grand vision for your team:<\/p>\n

You\u2019re going to win with run prevention. You\u2019re going to win with elite defense. You\u2019re going to dominate the base paths. You\u2019re going to be a team that always carries an edge.<\/p>\n

Buster Posey did that.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

And then, within the subsequent season\u2019s first two months, his team was repeatedly and consistently dog-walked by poverty franchises executing that exact blueprint.<\/p>\n

Humiliating doesn\u2019t begin to describe it.<\/p>\n

Yes, the Giants have looked their absolute worst against the exact teams whose style they\u2019ve desperately tried to emulate.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re the world\u2019s worst cover band, and yet they\u2019re more expensive, in all respects, than the real McCoys.<\/p>\n

The Rays operate on a budget found deep in the couch cushions. The Diamondbacks spend a bit now but are generally a draft-and-develop organization.<\/p>\n

The Rockies? They\u2019ve been an embarrassment for a decade, yet they looked like a playoff team against this Giants squad this past weekend.<\/p>\n

The Brewers had the best record in the National League last year, the best record in baseball since the start of May, and have one player making more than $10 million a season \u2014 former MVP Christian Yelich. (The Giants have five.)<\/p>\n

And these teams routinely school San Francisco in the most basic, fundamental aspects of the sport.<\/p>\n

Hitting the cutoff man. Taking the extra base. Throwing actual strikes when it matters.<\/p>\n

The Giants, ostensibly flush with cash and cutting-edge analytics, look like they\u2019re learning the rules via a large language model that\u2019s rife with hallucinations.<\/p>\n

\u201cTake out the rookie center fielder (just called up from Double-A) after one at-bat in a game that\u2019s a blowout,\u201d the machine (I refuse to believe a human came up with this plan, even after manager Tony Vitello copped to it) suggested on Monday.<\/p>\n

Read more QB who led Serra to a CCS title last season no longer at the school. Where will he play?<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a spectacle of ineptitude. It\u2019s checkers vs. chess, except the Giants are merely eating the red and black discs.<\/p>\n

When you preach pitching, defense, and base running \u2014 the basics \u2014 you\u2019d better actually practice pitching, defense, and base running. Because we know they\u2019re not doing the advanced stuff.<\/p>\n

Instead, San Francisco has already fired its third base coach, turns every routine fielding play into an adventure, and has pitching that has fallen off a cliff. The one reliable starter they had boasted this season \u2014 Landen Roupp \u2014 allowed eight earned runs on Monday.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t a mere slump to be waited out \u2014 a bad start that will right itself in due time, even if it\u2019s too late to do anything of worth this campaign.<\/p>\n

No, this is endemic.<\/p>\n

So, what\u2019s the move? The current roster is a sinking ship taking on water faster than the public relations department \u2014 sorry, the front office \u2014 can bail. Posey is running out of fan appeasement buttons to push.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s only one reasonable path forward, and it requires swallowing whatever pride remains in the executive suite.<\/p>\n

Sell the furniture. Sell the copper wiring in the walls. Get absolutely anything you can for anyone who isn\u2019t bolted to the floor with long-term team control on the rookie scale.<\/p>\n

Stop pretending this is a playoff contender. Stop insulting everyone\u2019s intelligence with false hope.<\/p>\n

Instead, bring up the kids. As many as you can. All of them that are worthy of a call-up, and even a few that aren\u2019t. (The Giants had a head start with that when they called up Jonah Cox.)<\/p>\n

Clear as much of a path as possible and give the minor leaguers as many opportunities as humanly possible to see if anyone in the system actually knows what they\u2019re doing. Keep giving Bryce Eldridge five at-bats a game. Keep running out young starters with the hopes that the next outing is the one where it all clicks.<\/p>\n

There are 102 games left in this agonizing slog of a season, and in sports, you can only sell one of two things: wins or hope.<\/p>\n

Wins aren\u2019t coming \u2014 none that are meaningful for this campaign, anyway.<\/p>\n

So start building some hope.<\/p>\n

I know ownership is afraid of a full-scale rebuild. This isn\u2019t that, because the team is starting the process while already at the bottom.<\/p>\n

No, this is a new build. Hopefully it works.<\/p>\n

Because the only logical objective remaining is getting a massive head start on 2027. Everything else is just expensive noise.<\/p>\n

Because last week, I said that rock bottom was yet to be found for a Giants team that was just swept by the Diamondbacks. The Rockies series and Monday\u2019s opener with the Brewers made that statement look prescient.<\/p>\n

And yet the nadir has still not been reached.<\/p>\n

Just wait for Tuesday\u2019s game in Milwaukee.<\/p>\n

One-time Giants top prospect Kyle Harrison is on the bump.<\/p>\n

The local kid. The lefty that the brass swore was the bedrock of the future rotation.<\/p>\n

Well, the 24-year-old has a 6-1 record, a hilarious 1.57 ERA, and a pristine 1.03 WHIP.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s struck out 61 batters in 51.2 innings and looks like a legitimate National League Cy Young candidate.<\/p>\n

Read more Man dies following triple shooting in downtown San Jose<\/a><\/p>\n

And he\u2019ll be pitching for the Brewers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

San Francisco Giants: It’s not just that the Giants keep losing games, the story is how they lose \u2014 and who is beating them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":997,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"\nKurtenbach: Baseball’s bargain bin franchises are exposing the SF Giants’ grift - Next City Digest<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=998\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kurtenbach: Baseball’s bargain bin franchises are exposing the SF Giants’ grift - 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