Sometimes, the truth does not always set you free. When your toddler shows you their drawing of a cat, it is best to say “yes, that is a beautiful drawing of a cat” instead of “that looks like three-day old vomit, not a cat.” When the wife asks if these jeans make her look heavy, well, you know what the response there is.
The fact is, sometimes a truth is better left unsaid. The truth can be implied, maybe even understood in an unspoken manner. But when certain truths come to life, they can take on a whole life of their own. Giants President of Baseball Operation Farhan Zaidi, who has had a rough week and a half with headlines, may have added another one this week after having a chat with the San Francisco Chronicle's Susan Slusser last month at the winter meetings, and unleashed a truth that is certain to sit in a bad way not just with Giants fans, but with Bay Area locals in general. Bolding is mine.
“I don’t know if we would say San Francisco is an idiosyncratic market, but I do think maybe it is more that way than it was 20 years ago,” president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi said at the GM meetings last month. “I think it’s a little bit of a polarizing place among players in terms of the desire to play there. This is sort of totally independent of the competitive situation, but geography, politics, whatever.
“When we’re doing our research on free agents and we find that players aren’t really that happy even coming into town for a three-game series, they’re probably not going to be that excited to play there for a long time. So I think that’s part of what fueled our strategy of targeting guys with Bay Area ties. … Free agency is really, really competitive, especially at the top of the market. Even when you think you can sign a player, you’re probably not, that’s just how it works. So when you don’t think you’re going to sign a player, you’re definitely not going to sign him.”
What this boils down to is Zaidi is saying that the Giants struggle to attract top free agents because players do not want to play in San Francisco due to various political and sociological factors. It is hard to know how true that really is, but in a league full of mega-millionaires, it is not that crazy to assume most of them will lean more to the right than the left politically. It is also hard to quantify how much that impacts a players decision making as well.
It is no secret that San Francisco has its problems. Homelessness and drug use in the streets prompted Mayor London Breed to issue a state of emergency last winter in response to the growing epidemic in the Tenderloin. The state of emergency played a role in why Seiya Suzuki decided to sign with the Chicago Cubs and not the Giants last offseason. Other players have noticed, such back in August of 2021 when pitcher Noah Syndergaard took to Twitter to bash the city for its rampant homelessness and drug issues.
San Francisco has a tough reputation outside of the Bay Area. That is an undeniable, and very hard to swallow, fact. I have friends from the East Coast who I met when I was in college at the University of Miami who, when I initially brought up that I am from the San Francisco Bay Area, would ask me really derogatory questions about the city that I cannot print here. Even to this day, 10 years after meeting them, they still have negative connotations about San Francisco despite having never visited the region. The few that have always tell me how the city is nothing like the media portrays it, though that only does so much to quell their overall notions of the city.
San Francisco does get a bad rap from the media too. Every major city has the issues that San Francisco has. Chicago, where Suzuki ended up playing, has some of the worst gun violence in the nation. Los Angeles has a long and brutal history of gang violence. Homelessness is as much a problem in Miami and New York as it is here. But San Francisco has become an unfair poster child for all these problems.
We can debate why that is all day. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that San Francisco is home to Nancy Pelosi, and favorite boogeyman of the right. Maybe it has to do with the city's long history of liberal progressiveness that irks certain areas of the nation. Regardless of the reason, San Francisco is the GOP’s posterchild of the dangers of leftist polices. While watching Miami Hurricanes football games on the ACC Network or Bally Sports in 2018 and 2020, I saw a few political attack ads demanding voters in the south reject San Francisco politics. Conservative commentators never back down from a chance to drag this city through the mud just to get clout within their base. Whether deserved or not (my vote is not but I am biased), San Francisco is an unwilling and easy punching bag for those who live to reject progressive policies.
Where Farhan has erred here is by admitting that such issues present a roadblock for the team and are a detriment to team building. By him acknowledging the political and social strifes, he grants them more legitimacy. Is it so hard to imagine a free agent thinking “Well if HE thinks the city has political issues that drive players away, why should I go there?” Never mind that most Bay Area athletes do not live in San Francisco’s city proper, or even in the Bay Area at all. Most Giants players call Scottsdale home in the winter. Farhan’s job is to sell playing for the Giants to players, and with the team already struggling with credibility around the league, admitting that the social and political climate is a negative only makes the sell job harder. The Giants can continue their strategy of pursuing players who grew up in the area, but this is not college football where dominating the local recruiting scene can lead to wins. You have to branch out to the rest of the country in professional sports.
It also will not sit well with the fans. I hear enough about the issues San Francisco has from people 3,000 miles away who have never set foot in this city. I have family that live in the area that cannot stop bashing the city for all its faults. Twitter is chock-full of these same comments. Giants fans who live in San Francisco and the surrounding area hear this enough, and we do not need to hear it coming from our own president of baseball operations. It is a bad look for the Giants. It is a bad look for San Francisco. And it is a bad look on Farhan Zaidi at a time when he cannot afford such looks.
This is not even taking into account the notion that Zaidi is using politics as an out to explain why the Giants are having an all-time dismal offseason. It is Farhan’s job to sell players on playing here. A good salesman can sell anything, no matter the hurdles presented. If Farhan cannot make that sales pitch and convince players to sign in San Francisco, regardless of any warts either real or perceived, then is it fair to ask if there is someone else who can?
The good news is, there is still time left in the offseason and free agency to make a move that will make everyone forget what Farhan said to Slusser. But to some fans, these comments may be a straw that breaks the camel’s back in their support of this front office (I know two morning show hosts who are very much in that category). But winning does cure most, it not all, ills, and Farhan needs to start winning again. Badly. Today would certainly be a good day to sign Carlos Correa. Just hope he does not ask any political questions.
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