Why the San Francisco Giants Latest Signing is Quietly Good News for the A's

The A's may stand to benefit thanks to the Giants most recent signing

Jul 14, 2023; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA; San Francisco Giants hat and glove on the bench against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the first inning at PNC Park. Mandatory Credit: Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images | Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images

The San Francisco Giants are having a fairly .500 offseason, much to the dismay of their fans, while signing players that may help them incrementally, but not push them over the edge into real contention in a tough NL West.

Their latest signing, catcher Eric Haase, agreed to a minor-league deal with the club that includes an invite to spring, and would pay him $1.6 million if he makes the 26-man roster. He also has an opt-out after spring training, per Jon Morosi.

What does any of this have to do with the A's? Well, if Haase ends up making the roster at any point during the 2026 season, there is a strong likelihood that former first-rounder Daniel Susac is headed back to the A's farm system.

The basic gist of the Rule 5 Draft is that you can select any eligible player not on a 40-man roster from another club, but those selected players then have to remain on that team's 26-man roster for the entirety of the season, or be offered back to the team they were drafted away from.

Now, there are some small loopholes that could keep Susac with the Giants, even if Haase makes the roster at some point. The first, and most direct way, would be if Susac suffered a season-ending injury that kept him out of action. He wouldn't be on the 26-man roster any longer, but he could stay in the Giants organization.

The less direct path would be Patrick Bailey suffering an injury which opened up the spot for Haase after Susac was already on the club. Of course, that would entail Haase not using his opt-out clause at the end of camp. Presumably that's there if he doesn't make the roster, so even the Bailey injury scenario may not work.

Haase, 33, has played eight seasons in the big leagues, and has spent the past two with the Milwaukee Brewers. He hasn't had a ton of playing time in either of those years, managing 69 and 77 plate appearances in 2024 and 2025, and that's partially due to him running a strikeout rate above 40% each season.

He's a career .228 hitter with a .278 OBP and an 85 wRC+. He's also fairly fast, especially for a catcher, ranking in the 74th percentile in sprint speed (28.3 feet/second), and he has a tremendous pop time of 1.88 seconds, which is among the best in baseball.

Susac has yet to make his MLB debut, but he spent all of the 2025 campaign in Triple-A Las Vegas. His surface level stats looked pretty good, with him hitting .275 with a .349 OBP across 97 games, but he was also playing in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League, so his nice numbers amounted to a below league average bat (97 wRC+) last year.

He has some pop, knocking 18 homers a year ago, and he was walking at a solid 8.6% clip, but he also struck out 26.8% of the time and ran a .342 BABIP, which is extremely high. The MLB league average BABIP last year was .291.

Susac has plenty of upside, but the Giants will want to see how he performs in camp this spring. The fact that they brought in Haase at all seems to be a signal that they're ready to move on from Susac, if needed.