Why Zaidi believes Giants failed to sign superstar free agents originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
Farhan Zaidi does not believe the Giants have a San Francisco problem.
Even after missing out on superstar free agents like Bryce Harper, Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani in recent years, the former Giants president of baseball operations does not believe there was one common reason San Francisco was unable to close each deal.
Zaidi, in speaking publicly for the first time since he was fired from his role on Sept. 30, was asked directly on Wednesday’s episode of “Foul Territory” why the Giants missed out on signing the aforementioned players.
“When you talk about Harper, Judge, Ohtani, these are like three of the five best players in baseball,” Zaidi told A.J. Pierzynski, Erik Kratz & Scott Braun. “So I guess we took some big swings. Obviously, what happened with Carlos Correa was very unfortunate. But we took big swings and each of those guys — Bryce, I think, had some concerns about the ballpark, that can happen at times when you’re trying to sign a position player. Not always, but it’s something that position players have some concerns with.
“Some guys are just east coast guys and want to be there. I look at Aaron Judge, he had a legacy with the New York Yankees, one of the signature franchises in baseball, and it was just kind of hard to pull him away from that. We tried, but ultimately it didn’t work. And then you look at Shohei, he was building a house in Southern California, obviously the Dodgers have been really successful.
Zaidi ultimately believes each pursuit failed for unique reasons, and that the Giants don’t have an issue attracting star players to San Francisco, as evidenced by the organization’s record-breaking contract for shortstop Willy Adames this offseason.
“I don’t really know that there is a common thread, and we took some swings, and they were swings and misses, and I take responsibility for that,” Zaidi added. “I really push back hard on this narrative nobody wants to play in San Francisco, nobody wants to play for the Giants. It’s a great city, it’s a great organization. I have been so happy in my time in San Francisco and I wish the organization the best and I know they’re going to be able to attract players and Willy Adames just a couple of weeks ago is the last example.”
Zaidi went on to downplay the notion that certain free agents enter free agency already having decided where they want to play next, and each player — just like the average person — oftentimes can go back and forth in making a big decision.
“When I look at the Aaron Judge situation and meeting with him … but I think in general, I think fans sometimes think players have this predetermined notion of where they want to go or what they want to do,” Zaidi explained. “But the reality is, it’s like for all of us, when we have tough decisions, you can go back and forth on them. You might wake up one morning and say “I want to stick with the team that I’ve been with, I have a lot of loyalty to them, and it’s been great here’ and there might be other days you wake up and say ‘man, I’m sick of this place, I get boo’ed here and people don’t appreciate me here, it’s time for a new beginning.’
“I have really noticed that in some of these free-agent pursuits, whether it’s a superstar or not, players have to think through things, and they might think one thing one day and another thing the other, and you just have to stay persistent in your pursuit and hope it winds up in your favor. I just think in some of those cases that we talked about, the players themselves went back and forth about whether we were in the lead or not.”
In Harper, Judge and Ohtani’s cases, they ultimately decided that playing for the Giants was not the correct decision.
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