For Schmitt’s sake

Marco Luciano’s handling by the Giants has been weird, but it can at least be partly explained by Casey Schmitt’s recent hot streak

It’s hard to make sense of the San Francisco Giants’ treatment of Marco Luciano. The top prospect was touted as the club’s next shortstop right before they signed another shortstop just in case. They traded away DH Jorge Soler to free up some at-bats for Luciano but the call-up of Jerar Encarnacion in early August limited the opportunities Soler’s departure appeared to create. Thairo Estrada was placed on waivers and outrighted to Sacramento to open up second base and then that vacancy started to be filled by a committee of infielders curiously headlined by Donovan Walton.

One way to explain the recent jerking around is that the attitude around Luciano has shifted. The coddling of the prospect being judged on speculation and projection and hope has curdled into the much more cruel rubric of results. Luciano is a liability on the field, his power has betrayed him at the big league level, and the club’s announcement that he’ll be shifting his defensive focus to the outfield to compete in an already crowded field feels on par with a banishment to Siberia. In other words: he’s no longer a prospect, but a problem—a problem that the team has clearly tired of trying to figure out. If the decision-makers weren’t burnt out and over it, Luciano would be with the Giants right now hacking away at his demons with a baseball bat in front of big league crowds.

After clearing the way of Ahmed, Soler, and Estrada for the Giants top prospect, Luciano himself became a roadblock that had to be moved with remaining plate-appearances and innings in 2024 put to better use elsewhere.

Enter Casey Schmitt.

With the arrival of the Giants’ new iron man Matt Chapman at third base in the offseason and his subsequent 6-year extension, Schmitt appeared to be out of a job. Boxed out from the hot corner, pushed off of short by Nick Ahmed, then Tyler Fitzgerald’s power surge, with second base not even a consideration given Thairo Estrada’s glove work at the position and Brett Wisely’s hot start with the bat and Luciano… He was on the periphery of the infield conundrum. Around but not the focus, and Schmitt spent a lot of time in Sacramento with a bleak outlook in terms of career growth.

Then things started to break his way. Opportunities like a platoon-role at second or temporary coverage at third for Chapman on the paternity list became available, and credit to Schmitt for making his play hard to ignore in those brief windows…which is what Heliot Ramos did and Tyler Fitzgerald did and what the Giants kept waiting for Luciano to do.

Bob Melvin is obviously intrigued by Schmitt. His reputation as a steady glove and live arm is obviously an attraction after a season of shaky defense (though in terms of range, Schmitt has been dinged by advanced defense metrics) that was hard to watch from a fan’s perspective. Imagine being around the game for as long as Melvin, who just left an impressive glove corps in San Diego, to deal with the growing pains of players like Luciano and Fitzgerald and hear their dugout bickerings.

Schmitt is basically Matt Chapman without the money or track record—a ridiculous comparison that still feels somehow, maybe a little, kind-a prescient.

Andrew Baggarly wrote a similar article to the one you’re reading right now with better contacts, quotes, stats, and structure than mine that compares Chapman’s and Schmitt’s time in the minors. Schmitt hit for a higher average with lower strikeout-rate than Chapman but skipped through Double-A after a month’s worth of games, and had to figure out a lot at the plate while shuttling between Triple-A and the Majors. The glove has been ready and is adaptable, the bat is a work in progress that might just need more time. Baggarly is to Chapman, as I am to Schmitt: Less developed, less refined…but shucks, there’s potential, right? … Right?

So why give Schmitt playing time instead of Luciano? They are arguably pretty comparable offensively: their power is often undermined by their hair trigger swing decisions, both are pretty platoon limited, and both would benefit from more exposure to Major League pitching in a less stressful environment. What differentiates them is simple and obvious: Results. Luciano entered the results-based business right as Schmitt started to hit, and hit loudly. His .240 has been an improvement—but its the power that’s turned heads.

In 106 trips to the plate, Schmitt’s hit 6 home runs—a 5.7% ratio (HR to PA) that’s higher than Matt Chapman’s, Heliot Ramos, Tyler Fitzgerald’s or Michael Conforto’s. His .220 ISO (a stat that measures how often your hits go for extra bases) is a smidge under Fitzgerald’s team-leading mark of .223.

For Schmitt’s most recent homer, he annihilated a flat cutter from Eduardo Rodriguez in the Giants win over Arizona on Monday.

His bat pounced on the ball so quickly it was like the wood swallowed it whole. The ball sounded like it popped. That swing is direct result of Schmitt’s forward adjustment in the box and further exposure to whiplash of pace-changes common at the big league level. In theory, Luciano has this kind of bat-speed and strength to punish mistakes too—he just hasn’t shown it off yet. Schmitt, on the other hand, has gone 6-for-14 with 5 RBIs, 1 HR, 3 BBs and 3 K since being called up on September 18th while covering two different defensive positions.

That kind of pop from a utility infielder is enticing. A player who can provide a late-game platoon advantage at the plate while providing depth at three infield positions is a handy card to have tucked up a manager’s sleeve.

Putting Luciano’s early boot in the context of Schmitt’s hot stretch makes things a little more palatable in my mind. Schmitt might not have the organization rank of Luciano, but he’s listened to critique, adjusted, developed, worked hard then produced. I have no doubt Luciano did three of those four things… The Giants have decided that results matter (crazy!), even when they really don’t right now, which might explain this inconsequential push for a winning record with Schmitt as the hot hand, rather than Luciano as the vaunted one, remaining with the club in these final days of the regular season.