The SF Giants should not be getting this outspent by the Golden State Warriors
With the offseason on the horizon, rumors are already swirling around the SF Giants. In fact, NJ.com reporter Randy Miller reported the Giants will "spend whatever it takes" to sign Yankees star outfielder Aaron Judge this offseason. Miller expects the team to make several big moves, and he mentioned the success of the nearby Golden State Warriors as something putting added pressure on the Giants to make a splash.
SF Giants CEO Larry Baer and Golden State Warriors majority owner Joe Lacob talk. (2013)
Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports
On the surface, it seems reasonable that the Warriors NBA dynasty would worry the Giants, especially after the Dubs opened a new arena down the street from Oracle Park. However, Golden State has also been astronomically outspending the Giants in recent years.
Look at how much the Giants and Warriors have spent between player salaries and luxury tax fines, something present in both MLB and the NBA, since the start of Farhan Zaidi's tenure in San Francisco.
SF Giants and Golden State Warriors (payroll + luxury tax)
2019
Warriors*: $197,779,144
Giants**: $182,810,115
2020
Warriors: $96,941,196
Giants: $66,710,217
2021
Warriors: $288,179,277
Giants: $165,869,140
2022
Warriors: $349,311,972
Giants***: $171,645,667
2023****
Warriors: $363,543,190
Giants: $109,647,804
*Warriors salaries are calculated using HoopsHype's payroll information and Spotrac's luxury tax tracker.
**Giants salaries from year-end 40-man rosters, per Cot's Baseball Contracts.
***Since Cot's has not released final 40-man roster payroll for 2022, the 40-man roster tax number is used here.
****Estimates based on current guaranteed contracts, assuming the Giants decline the club option for Evan Longoria and Carlos Rodón opts out.
No one argues spending guarantees winning, but it's how owners show where winning ranks on their priority list. The Warriors have made it clear they are willing to spend more than every other team in the league to win. The Giants have seemed content middling without increasing payroll.
To be fair to the Giants, San Francisco's payroll would have been larger than the Warriors in 2020 if not for the COVID-19 pandemic shortening the MLB season. However, that's only true because Golden State prioritized getting under the luxury tax line once star guard Steph Curry suffered a season-ending injury.
Still, even if you credit the Giants for a potentially larger payroll in 2020, Golden State undeniably outspent them in three of the past four seasons between player salaries and subsequent luxury tax penalties. That's an unprecedented sea change in Bay Area sports.
While historic payroll information is difficult to find, data from HoopsHype and The Baseball Cube confirmed that the Warriors had not spent more than the Giants on player salaries in a season dating back to at least 1990. Given the economic history of the NBA and MLB, it is likely the Warriors had never spent more on a roster than the Giants before 2019.
Hiring Zaidi was a shift in tone for Giants ownership. The team's previous top baseball operations decisionmaker Bobby Evans has become an easy person for the fanbase to critique, but he was running the franchise in a different era. The Giants were clearly trying to spend up to the luxury tax line every offseason.
The Giants payroll in Evans' final season (2018) was just over $209.5 million, easily the highest in franchise history. In fact, while there have been three full seasons since Evans was fired, the Giants payroll in his four years at the helm all rank among the five highest in team history, with Zaidi's first season (2019) ranking third.
Giants ownership openly said they wanted to hire Zaidi to bring in a "fresh approach." While they refused to discuss a rebuild publicly, the organization emphasized they were no longer focused on maximizing the roster in the immediate future.
The Giants have proven closer to competing than many thought. Despite meager spending in free agency as the team's payroll declined, the Giants won 107 games in 2021 and have hovered around .500 in the three other seasons since Zaidi took over.
The fact is, signing just one player like Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Zack Wheeler, Gerrit Cole, George Springer, or Freddie Freeman would have very likely given the Giants at least one more postseason berth under Zaidi and possibly pushed them past the Dodgers in 2021.
Angels infielder Anthony Rendon breaks his bat in a swing during a game against the SF Giants. (2021)
Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports
Yes, the Giants could have made a move they regret, like signing Patrick Corbin or Anthony Rendon, who are currently on two of the least team-friendly contracts in MLB. However, it's important to remember that franchises overstate the impact of one bad signing.
First off, even Corbin and Rendon would have helped the Giants in at least one season if they had signed them. Corbin posted a 3.25 ERA in 202 innings pitched in 2019 (the first year in his six-year, $140 million contract) and would have gone a long way towards stabilizing a Giants rotation where Tyler Beede, Dereck Rodriguez, Shaun Anderson, and Drew Pomeranz all made at least 16 starts and recorded ERAs worse than 5.00.
In the pandemic-shortened 2020 season (Rendon's first after signing his current seven-year, $245 million contract), the Giants were just one win away from reaching the playoffs. Rendon was excellent. He hit .286/.416/.497 with the Angels and appeared in 52 of 60 games. Maybe the Giants could have prevented the Dodgers from winning the World Series with a postseason run to remember.
Those performances would not have fully justified the moves, but neither one would significantly limit the Giants now if team ownership were willing to spend up to the luxury tax line. Let alone past it, like the Warriors.
Rendon and Corbin signed contracts worth a combined $58 million per year. The Giants were $58.3 million below the luxury tax line in 2022. If the Giants had Rendon and Corbin on the books right now, they would still be a projected $65 million under the tax line heading into this offseason, more than enough to pursue Judge and other upgrades without incurring a penalty.
Obviously, teams have financial limits, but the Giants are miles away from reaching that point. More importantly, they have the flexibility to risk making a mistake. The Giants dynasty that won three championships from 2010-2014 proved a team could overcome multiple albatross contracts to build a long-term contender.
SF Giants lefty Barry Zito throws a pitch during a game at AT&T Park. (2013)
The Giants signed left-handed starting pitcher Barry Zito to a seven-year, $126 million deal prior to the 2007 season and outfielder Aaron Rowand to a five-year, $60 million contract the following offseason. Neither player lived up to expectations, but the Giants won two World Series over the span of both contracts anyway.
The disparity in payroll between the Warriors and Giants is even more of an indictment on Giants ownership when looking closer. The Giants paid off Oracle Park in 2017. On the other hand, the Warriors spent $1.4 billion on the Chase Center, which opened right before the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019. Yet, it has been Golden State's ownership showing no hesitation maintaining the highest payroll in their respective league.
2022 should serve as a particular embarrassment for Giants ownership.
Coming off a 107-win season, the Giants increased the team's Opening Day payroll by less than $6 million from 2021 to 2022, more than $45 million less than the franchise's all-time high. While final calculations have not been made, the end-of-year payroll for the Giants 40-player roster was likely around $171 million.
The Dubs missed the playoffs in the 2020-21 season. Still, despite massive luxury tax implications, they increased payroll by slightly more than the Giants. The Warriors had a payroll of $175,858,992 for a 15-player roster in the 2021-22 season. They incurred a luxury tax bill of more than $170 million.
Golden State spent two times more on a 15-player roster coming off a season when they missed the playoffs than the Giants spent on a 40-player roster coming off a historic 107-win season in 2022. With the Warriors currently projected to spend more than $360 million in the 2022-23 season, the Giants will need to spend a lot this offseason to avoid getting doubled up once again.
The business of sports has changed over the past few decades. The NBA has emerged as a true financial peer to MLB. It's not necessarily an indictment of the Giants that the Warriors are now able to spend a similar amount. But if the SF Giants do not spend big soon, they will not be a peer of the Golden State Warriors for long.
