In 2019, the Giants had a hole in their rotation. They took a look at the options, and thought that maybe, just maybe, they could turn Drew Pomeranz from the 6.08 ERA pitcher he was in 2018 into the 3.32 ERA pitcher he was in 2017. They couldn’t. But in just four relief appearances, he showed the Brewers enough that, along with Ray Black, he fetched the Giants one (1) shiny Mauricio Dubon.
Mauricio Dubon also didn’t end up working out for the Giants, but that’s neither here nor there.
In 2020, the Giants thought they had something that the rest of the league didn’t. They saw untapped potential in Kevin Gausman and Drew Smyly, and staring down a rotation with more holes than sure things, they signed them to one-year deals. Smyly was good, but injured; Gausman, once he built up his arm strength, was excellent. The plan worked very nicely.
In 2021, the Giants thought they had something that the rest of the league didn’t. They thought that Anthony DeSclafani would be able to thrive after the league cracked down on sticky stuff on the mound, and liked Alex Wood’s potential to rebound from his 12.2 bad innings in 2020. They were right on both counts, and the team set a franchise record for wins. The plan worked magnificently.
In 2022, the Giants thought they had something that the rest of the league didn’t. They liked Alex Cobb’s stuff and his peripherals, and figured that a half season of Matthew Boyd, once he got healthy, would be like a big trade deadline acquisition. It was the same strategy that had worked for two straight years, and had netted them a prospect the year before that, when it didn’t even go well. This is what the Farhan Giants do, so why wouldn’t they do it again?
Then you look at Alex Cobb’s stats and you realize, ah, yes, this is why they wouldn’t do it again.
It’s important to note that it’s not like the Giants were wrong about Cobb. He has had shown great stuff this year, and he has gotten a ton of ground balls, and he has struck out a lot of guys, and (last night’s game notwithstanding) has done a good job limiting walks. His fastball is almost 2 MPH faster than in the previous best season of his career, so it’s not like all of this is coming out of nowhere.
Coming into last nigh’s game, Cobb’s FIP was 3.07 and his fWAR was 1.1, in just 57 innings. Baseball Prospectus had him as the 46th best pitcher in the majors, just two spots behind Clayton Kershaw, and the difference between them was entirely accounted for by the 6 additional innings Kershaw has thrown. In other words, all of the statistical indicators that lead to success have been flashing TRIPLE WIN and dinging loudly while you reach down to collect your quarters.
Sure, slot machines don’t give out quarters anymore, but here’s the good news for my metaphor: there wouldn’t be any quarters anyway, because it hasn’t actually worked.
After giving up 3 runs in 6 innings last night, Cobb has a 4.71 ERA on the year, and it’s safe to say that on the whole, he’s looked like it. The second anything goes wrong, it feels like an automatic crooked number on the board for the other team. Innings just snowball on Cobb, and before you know it the Giants are facing an insurmountable 3-run deficit. You don’t look forward to his starts. Why would you? This happens just about every time.
But you can’t blame him for all of it. You just can’t. Cobb has had too clear of a run of bad luck and bad defense. His BABIP is .344, well above the norm for anyone. Only 58.5% of the runners he’s put on base have been stranded, compared to a 75% average around the league. And as we all know, the reason for that is that the defense has been awful.
Can you blame Alex Cobb for that? No. Can you blame Alex Cobb for not getting out of the situations that the defense puts him in? I mean, a little. You want a pitcher who pitches through those situations. On the other hand, if a pitcher faces those situations multiple times a game, where he should have gotten the third out already but the defense let him down, well, how often can you expect him to get four outs or five outs or eight outs in an inning? That’s too much to ask of anyone.
So yes, the Giants’ strategy was to find those undervalued arms, sign them to one-year deals, and watch them thrive. But their strategy was also to sacrifice a little on defense to score some runs. And the failure of that second strategy, with the offense and defense both being worse than the Giants can live with, has meant the failure of the first.
Because Alex Cobb can’t be successful when his defense can’t catch the ground balls he gets on 5 out of every 8 balls in play. He can’t be successful when his offense can’t pick up the mistakes they make in the field. Alex Cobb, as today’s title says, is the downside of the Giants’ strategy, because the position players around him are failing him.
Cobb is doing a ton of things right. With a better supporting cast, that would mean something. With this supporting cast, it doesn’t.