Entering Friday night’s game against the Washington Nationals, the San Francisco Giants were keeping ominous company. They’d hit nine home runs through 19 games, which wasn’t the fewest in franchise history, but the fewest since the ’80s, when baseball players were 160 pounds, wore fuzzy wristbands, had perms and were named Biff. It was the same total as the 2008 Giants through as many games, and that team had just two players hit more than 10 home runs: Bengie Molina, with 16, and Aaron Rowand with 13.
But nobody cares about a team’s first 19 games. A team’s first 20 games can tell you a little bit about it — everyone agrees that’s a sample size worth writing about. Which means the Giants had exactly one game to get their act together and impress folks before the first half-meaningful round number of the season.
And for exactly one game, the Giants got their act together. They hit three home runs for the first time this season, doing so in a 10-5 win. Heliot Ramos hit the longest home run, Casey Schmitt hit the funniest (with T. rex-bent arms) and Drew Gilbert hit the briniest. Now the Giants are up to 12 homers through 20 games, and the historical company isn’t quite as miserable there.
Home runs through 20 games, 1958-present
Rank
Season
HR
1
1981
7
1
1980
7
3
1985
8
4
1992
9
5
2008
10
5
1998
10
5
1975
10
8
1979
11
8
1976
11
8
1974
11
This year’s Giants aren’t exactly hobnobbing with the Barry Bonds or Willie Mays-era teams yet, but they’re out of the bottom tier. If you’re looking for some perspective, consider that the 2023 Giants hit 32 homers in their first 20 games. J.D. Davis and Blake Sabol led the team with five apiece. I don’t know what to do with that, either, but it sure says something about the first 20 games of any season.
This isn’t just an excuse to wax nostalgic and remember some punchless guys, though. The Giants’ power outburst on Friday night was a great reminder that there’s no path to the postseason (almost up to a 1-in-5 chance!) without many more home runs. We’re talking a lot more. They have to be pumping them out like the Davis-Sabol Giants of old, which doesn’t sound too intimidating when it’s put that way.
Take Ramos’ home run, his first of the season. He was extra demonstrative rounding the bases, and rightfully so:
Ramos was emotional because he now had one home run, which is one more than zero. He should not have zero home runs. He will never, ever be a helpful player with zero home runs. He needs at least some home runs. Now he has one.
Matt Chapman also has one home run. Rafael Devers has two home runs, which puts him in a tie with ex-Giant Mauricio Dubón. He should not be in a tie with that particular ballplayer. Not without a head start of 400 at-bats.
The 2026 Giants, who got off to one of the most disappointing starts to any season in recent memory, cannot win with these kinds of numbers. Before the season started, a creative Giants partisan could conjure up all sorts of successful scenarios for 2026, and it wasn’t outlandish to hope for a surprisingly effective pitching staff. It was only slightly unlikely.
It seems clear that this team’s strength will not be preventing runs. It wasn’t expected to be, but the early returns are exactly what the exit polls were suggesting. Adrian Houser and Tyler Mahle might eventually offer more quality starts than not, but they’ve combined for exactly zero in seven tries. Landen Roupp has pitched like Logan Webb and Webb hasn’t, pitching better than his results would indicate, but still getting lit up with surprising and concerning regularity.
The bullpen is suddenly trending toward some kind of equilibrium, with pitchers such as Keaton Winn, Caleb Kilian and Erik Miller stacking up more effective outings than lousy ones. However, it’s still a bullpen that’s going to have serious, extended growing pains. At best, they’ll get out of the rest of the team’s way and stay mostly anonymous, but they’re not likely to be the key to the team’s postseason fortunes.
No, the team will need to slug its way there, even though it’s effectively punting two lineup spots, at least in terms of stocking them with power hitters. Luis Arraez and Jung Hoo Lee are both having nice road trips, and they’re still expected to be a part of whatever goes right with the Giants lineup, but they’re not going to provide many home runs — or any, really; a couple here and there, at best. Patrick Bailey is also in that group, although Daniel Susac’s start on Friday night — with Webb on the mound and a right-handed opposing starter — is more than a small hint that the Giants are willing to be creative behind the plate in the search for more offense.
None of it works without Devers hitting long, hilarious home runs that clang off various structures, though. None of it works without Ramos or Chapman getting as hot as Willy Adames got when he pulled his numbers out of the gutter, or at least stringing together enough good weeks — with enough home runs — to get their numbers back to their career averages.
There are other paths to success, but they quickly become fantastical. Bryce Eldridge is hitting for average and taking walks in Triple A, but he has also hit just two home runs. Jesús Rodríguez and Nate Furman are off to a similar start, knocking singles and a few doubles all over the place. Drew Gilbert’s home run on Friday night was his first in the majors this season, but he had one in Triple A, which means he’s hit as many as any of his former River Cat teammates on the season. With, again, two home runs.
Power probably isn’t coming from the minors, in other words. Eldridge will hit for more power, but it’s still unreasonable to expect him to shoulder a heavy burden in the 2026 Giants lineup. That’s a “nice to have,” not a must-have. It can’t be.
The Giants need Chapman, Devers, Ramos and Adames to hit for power and plenty of it. There’s no other plan, at least none worth talking about at the moment. After a slow start, Adames came around, and at least two of the others are showing signs, with Chapman going 3-for-5 and driving in three runs on Friday night and Ramos hitting a long home run to dead center after falling behind in the count. Devers’ struggles will get their own article, but 40 percent of the time, he’s not missing a pitch by a foot; he’s hitting into a hard out. He’ll come around, even if that mantra is sounding less and less convincing with each hitless game.
On Friday night, the Giants got power and production out of the middle of the order, and they won comfortably. That’s the entire plan, along with Webb and the rest of the rotation pitching as well as they’re capable of. It’s convincing when it works. It’s just been far too rare.