season Preview: San Francisco Giants

ANTICIPATED STARTERS:
1B: Brandon Belt
2B: Joe Panik
SS: Brandon Crawford
3B: Eduardo Nunez
LF: Mac Williamson OR Jarrett Parker OR Gorkys Hernandez, but probably not Hernandez because he's bad
CF: Denard Span
RF: Hunter Pence
SP: Madison Bumgarner, Johnny Cueto, Jeff Samardzija, Matt Moore, Matt Cain
RP: Bunch of good dudes that throw hard, and Mark Melancon

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OVERVIEW

Smart people who like the Giants, including Grant Brisbee at McCovey Chronicles, have acknowledged that projection systems do not believe the Giants will win their division. PECOTA has them pegged as a good team, but also happens to believe that the Dodgers will destroy the world. All systems appear to like their chances of getting a playoff spot. 

The 2016 Giants finished further out from the division title than the standings convey. Although they finished four games behind the Dodgers, the standings fail to show that the Dodgers had wrapped up the division a week before the season ended, and the Giants continued to fight for a spot throughout the final series. 

With that said, the Giants led the division for the majority of the season, and were actually one of the league's best teams at the half-way point. The team's top two pitchers performed well throughout the season, while offseason pickup Jeff Samardjkhiosdhojsndshakosdhishdjsd struggled at times. Still, he turned in a somewhat typical 2.6 WAR season in the middle of the rotation.

Personally, I think the projection systems have overstated the Dodgers' starting pitching and underestimated the Giants' lineup. This should be an extremely tight division. The projection systems correctly consider the Giants to be a top five team in the NL, but I believe that they are a potential top five team in MLB... ​

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