The SF Giants' slow start is a trend that has spanned much of Farhan Zaidi's tenure

The 2024 season is expected to mark the beginning of a long era in which SF Giants teams compete and reach the playoffs. However, their slow start has dampened the inflated expectations for this Giants squad.

There are many variables as to why the Giants got off to a slow start. Blake Snells The initial problems and the current trip to the injured list were anything but helpful. Plus new batsmen like Matt Chapman And Jorge Soler Possible explanations include adapting to the new environment and baserunning errors early in the season that are resolved as the season progresses.

However, this is far from the first slow start the Giants have had in recent memory. They have a surprising habit of starting slowly.

2019 was the first year of Farhan Zaidi's presidency. The Giants had decided to hire the former Dodgers and Athletics manager in the 2018 offseason, and he was left with an aging and stunted roster full of veterans on hefty contracts that were now a detriment to the team.

At the start of the season, Zaidi had barely started rebuilding. Bruce Bochy was still the coach, but had stated that this would be his last coach leading the team from the sidelines. The Giants would go 1-3 in March and 11-15 in April on their way to a record of 77-85. A slow start that was followed by record profits in June and July before finally collapsing later in the season.

2020 was a terrible year and few were worried about baseball as the pandemic raged on. It was anything but a typical year, as it was announced that a 60-game season would be played almost entirely behind closed doors.

The Zaidi's rebuild had begun, but the Giants still had several big contracts on their books, such as: Brandon Crawford, Johnny CuetoAnd Jeff Samardzija. Buster Posey would opt out before the season and the Giants would spend the entire year without their franchise catcher.

That would be the case too Gabe Kapler In his first year as manager, the Giants would go 4-4 in July, the first month of the season. They would never really make it in 2020, falling 29-31 to miss the playoffs on the final day of the season. However, the start was slow again, understandable given the circumstances.

2021 was the first full season after the pandemic and the Giants distanced themselves from their big contract veterans but were still deep in the rebuild. At least that's what we thought.

In Kapler's second year as manager and Zaidi's third year at the helm of the front office, the Giants won 107 games, the most in franchise history, and captured the NL West title from the Dodgers, who won 106 games. They would eventually lose a hard-fought division series to the same Dodgers that gave them the distance before falling in the fifth game. This was a rare exception to the slow start rule, as the Giants went 16-10 in April. However, only July had a worse win rate.

In 2022, we were all riding high after having one of the craziest 100+ win seasons in recent history, and many of us were looking forward to the second round. However, this shouldn't be the case. The Giants would falter early, middle and late.

They would finish with exactly 81-81. A huge disappointment considering last year's success. The Giants started April hot at 14-7. With the 13th/14th However, in May they would immediately come back down to earth. It may not have been the first month of the season, but it was quickly after and the Giants never recovered.

2023 would be the time of change. All the veterans were gone, except for Brandon Crawford and he would leave after the season to sign with the St. Louis Cardinals. Kapler was fired shortly before the end of the season and his coaching staff was largely expected to be let go.

The Giants would attempt to play competitive baseball again, but failed again. They would finish 79-83 and miss the playoffs by a wide margin. They were 0-1 in March and 11-15 in April before posting back-to-back winning months and eventually collapsing.

There has been a clear pattern since 2019 that the Giants typically falter in either the first or second month. In three of the five years they would have records of .500 or less in the first month, the first month was one of the worst monthly records of 2021, and in 2022 they would collapse in May. Does this pattern mean anything? Probably not. Am I afraid that this season will not be the exception of 2021? Scared.