The San Francisco Giants Might Not Be the Worst Organization in the History of Pro Sports After All
The Giants let Carlos Correa go after a physical exam they reportedly didn't like. Now, the Mets seemed spooked, too.
On Wednesday I wrote about how Steve Cohen was great for baseball when he swooped in to give Carlos Correa $300 million after the superstar shortstop got jilted at the altar by the Giants.
It was a fascinating saga that began when the Giants allegedly found something weird in Correa’s mandatory physical examination, then hastily canceled his introductory press conference that was scheduled for a few hours later with a one-sentence email that offered no explanation. Because of HIPAA concerns, the Giants’ president of baseball operations, Farhan Zaidi, was not able to say “Just kidding guys! We x-rayed Correa’s whole body and found out it is being held together by silly string and nacho cheese, so we decided not to give him $315 million to play shortstop for us for the next 12 years. Thank us later!” Instead, Zaidi said nothing, and simply wished Correa well when he pivoted and signed a similar deal with the Mets.
As the Giants front office and ownership group stayed eerily silent, the team’s fans went DEFCON 1 apocalyptic. It wasn’t just that the Giants lost out on Correa. It was also that they had failed to land Aaron Judge, and Bryce Harper, and Trea Turner and Corey Seager, and Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer and Manny Machado, and every other MLB superstar that ownership had promised the team’s loyal fanbase it could absolutely afford, while the club’s division rival Dodgers and Padres gobbled these players up like snickerdoodles on Christmas. Signing Carlos Correa wasn’t just about signing Carlos Correa. It was about signaling to fans that the people in charge of the team cared about fielding an exciting product worthy of the rising costs of attending a baseball game.
Making matters worse, Zaidi had gotten Giants fans all lathered up on September 12th by telling the media (back when the club was 68-73 and 29.5 games behind the Dodgers) that “it’s going to be a big off-season for us.” Having Correa for seven days, then losing him over a physical no fan could put on their binoculars and view for themselves, made Giants’ supporters want to rip up their season tickets and burn their Buster Posey jerseys:
And those were just fan tweets I could find that didn’t use the f-word in every other line.
As the Giants maintained their dignified/infuriating silence, the SF media scrambled to fill in the blanks of what the hell happened. First came the tidbit that Correa had flown to San Francisco not only with his wife and child but also his brother, his parents, and his wife’s family for the introductory press conference. Correa had been so not-worried that his perfunctory physical would turn up anything bad that he and his wife actually spent last weekend house hunting in San Francisco. To twist the knife even further into the kidneys of Giants fans, a local real estate agent told the SF Chronicle how lovely the Correas had treated him, and how excited they were to be moving to San Francisco.
On the day of the aborted press conference, the Giants had planned an all-day Correa love fest on their flagship radio station with loads of guests lined up to talk about how, after a somnambulant season that saw them fall light years behind the Dodgers and Padres, San Francisco was back, baby! That press blitz obviously got canceled.
After the press conference that never was, Correa was even supposed to take a cheesy cable car ride through SF in celebration. That was nixed, too. The poor guy was even suited up for his presser when he got word it was canceled and the deal was off. My sister is a luxury wedding planner who has dealt with high stress cancelations for various reasons. In none of those scenarios was the bride already dressed.