We’ve heard the Aaron Judge to the Giants rumors by now, but this one is a little more definitive.
Buster Olney, one of the premier MLB reporters for ESPN, said on Wednesday that he expects the Giants to offer more for Judge than the Yankees, and mentioned them as the only team he’d put in that camp. He believes San Francisco is going to make an extremely hard push for the prospective AL MVP this offseason.
“I do think that some team will jump in with a bigger number than the Yankees are going to offer. I think that number is going to come from the San Francisco Giants,” Olney said on “Get Up”.
“I know they are waiting in the weeds for the offseason to begin, and they are going to pursue Judge, who grew up about 100 miles from their ballpark.”
Judge, 30, grew up in Central California, as a Giants fan. If he’s going to suit up for his boyhood club next season, it’s going to take over $300 million to get him to the Bay.
“The contract he’s going to get in the offseason is going to start with the number three, as in $300 million dollars,” Olney said.
“People around baseball are skeptical that he would leave the Yankees, that they would actually let him leave,” Olney said. “… I’m going to say 60 [percent chance] that he stays with the Yankees.”
Those aren’t terrible odds, assuming that the Giants would be the next most likely with the amount of cash they are supposedly willing to offer, and the proximity to Judge’s home town.
San Francisco aggressively pursuing Judge makes sense, and not just because he’s arguably the best player in baseball. The pressure is on San Francisco’s front office after an extremely disappointing season where they missed the playoffs after winning 107 last year. The .500 year hurts even more when you consider the Giants didn’t make nearly the type of splashes their competitors did in the offseason, despite having cash to spend.
It’s the type of thing that doesn’t look great to the fans, and it’s something Farhan Zaidi needs to rectify fast if he wants to avoid the hot seat at this time next year.