A year ago at this time, Giants manager Bob Melvin convinced Bryan Price, his longtime friend, pitching coach and fellow Cal baseball alum, to put on a major-league uniform again. If it were for anyone except Melvin, and if it were anywhere except San Francisco, Price wouldn’t have said yes.
After one season with the Giants, Price has changed his answer. He informed the team last week that he would not return as pitching coach for the 2025 season.
“The chance was too great to pass up, but I also knew going in that it would be for the short term, a year or two,” Price, a San Francisco native who grew up in Mill Valley, Calif., and pitched at Cal, said in a phone interview. “It was a chance to get to work with a dear friend again in the city in which you were born. That was a brass ring I had to grab and I’m really glad I did. I hoped I could make a positive impact on the pitchers there.”
Price narrowly missed playing with Melvin at Cal but they formed a friendship when their MLB coaching careers overlapped for six seasons with the Seattle Mariners and Arizona Diamondbacks. Additionally, Price served as a pitching coach in Cincinnati, where he also managed from 2014-18, and for a season Philadelphia, before joining the San Diego Padres as a senior advisor to Melvin in 2022-23.
Price, 62, had been hesitant to take another coaching job after he had walked away from the Phillies following the pandemic-shortened 2020 season despite having two more years on his contract. But Melvin’s offer and the opportunity to represent his boyhood team was too intriguing to resist. The Giants offered Price a two-year contract when he was hired a year ago but he asked for a one-year deal, instead.
“I felt bad about leaving in Philadelphia and still do,” Price said. “So I wanted to go year by year and see how it goes. And after 40 years in the professional game, spending a lot of time away from home is part of the sacrifice you have to make when you’re younger and trying to cut your teeth, trying to get to the major leagues and stay. At the time, the sacrifice feels like it’s worth it. As you get older and you realize you’re closer to the end than the beginning, there’s a greater appreciation for time with family and the things you want to do in your life. That was my initial pull to leave (Philadelphia) after 2020 and it’s very similar this year.”
Price’s job in San Francisco came with unexpected challenges. First-half injuries to Blake Snell, Tristan Beck and Keaton Winn left the Giants scrambling to cover three-fifths of their rotation. The planned second-half bounce from rehabbing veterans Robbie Ray and Alex Cobb did not materialize.
The bullpen wasn’t in the same state of flux as the rotation despite leading the NL in innings. It’s especially impressive given their workload that relievers finished strong while posting a 3.13 ERA (second in the NL behind Milwaukee) over the final two months. But the Giants also made a fairly dramatic change at closer when they optioned right-hander Camilo Doval, a 2023 NL All-Star, to Triple A in early August. Doval, whose walk rate spiked this past season, spent fewer than 10 days with Sacramento before he returned in a setup role to right-hander Ryan Walker, who is likely to enter spring training as the incumbent closer.
“The bullpen was the strength of our club,” Price said. “They did the heavy lifting and answered the bell time and time again. I was really proud of the bullpen and how they continued to compete even when we were out of it.”
The pitching story of the Giants’ season, though, was the abundance of youth.
The plan didn’t call for the Giants to lead the National League in innings pitched by rookies, but that’s how the season played out. Despite Logan Webb leading the NL in innings pitched with 204 1/3, the Giants’ 536 1/3 rookie innings were second only to Oakland and amounted to more than 37 percent of the team’s total volume. It was also the most innings thrown by rookies in a Giants season since 1975.
Not surprisingly, the overall pitching performance lacked consistency. Although the pitching numbers improved in the second half, largely because of Snell’s dominant, 12-start run that began July 9, the Giants finished the season with a 4.10 ERA that ranked 19th among 30 major-league clubs. Leaning on so much inexperience meant that the Giants slipped in an area that had been crucial to their pitching philosophy; one season after they allowed the fewest walks in the majors (403), the Giants issued the 10th most bases on balls (526).
Left-hander Kyle Harrison struggled with shoulder fatigue while attempting to make it through his first full season, but showed flashes of the potential plus an ability to compete without his best stuff — characteristics that should serve him well especially if he can reestablish the mid-90s fastball velocity that allowed him to rocket through the minor leagues. Right-hander Hayden Birdsong, a 2022 sixth-round pick, made an even faster ascent to the big leagues and his assortment of power pitches were dominant at times when he was able to pair them with count leverage.
“There were real strides there,” said Price, who was especially proud of the way that Harrison competed through adversity. “He was getting us through the fifth inning and often past the sixth and into the seventh. … He pitched like an adult. He threw three pitches for strikes, his walk rate came down, his changeup developed into a usable pitch and his breaking ball became more than just a chase or expand pitch. He has a special fastball that plays at 91 and plays at 95 (mph). I do think we’ll see an uptick in velocity when he develops an offseason program that works for him. His best years are definitely ahead of him.”
“There were a lot of positives both for me personally and for the pitching staff as well,” Price added. “We advanced the ball a little bit. I feel that the pitching is in a good spot to move forward to become a championship-level pitching staff.”
With Harrison and Birdsong expected to hold down places in next year’s rotation, and right-hander Landen Roupp also expected to be in the mix, it’ll be important for the next pitching coach to coax even more growth out of them.
Rebuilding the Giants’ pitching infrastructure will be one of the more important tasks for Buster Posey in his first months as the club’s president of baseball operations. In addition to replacing Price, the Giants never filled the director of pitching vacancy created a year ago when Brian Bannister left to join the Chicago White Sox.
Although the Giants are just as likely to let that “director of pitching” title lapse, they will need new voices to emerge to lead the group. Dick Tidrow was essentially the Giants’ pitching director, among other titles, when he was instrumental in drafting Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum, Madison Bumgarner, Sergio Romo, Brian Wilson, Jonathan Sánchez and others to form the core of three World Series championship staffs.
Former Giants right-hander Ryan Vogelsong, who currently serves as a roving minor-league instructor, is one of Posey’s closest friends in the game. He’s expected to have an instrumental voice in the organizational pitching hierarchy whether he replaces Price on the coaching staff or not. Assistant pitching coach J.P. Martinez and bullpen coach Garvin Alston, both of whom are expected to be retained, are potential internal candidates to be promoted.
Giants broadcaster Javier López is another of Posey’s former teammates who could eventually transition into a role in the front office or coaching staff.
If the Giants look externally to replace Price, they could make an aggressive play to hire pitching coach Ruben Niebla away from the Padres. Niebla is well regarded for his work in San Diego over the past three seasons, including two under Melvin. His contract will expire at the end of the month and it’s expected that the Padres will offer him an extension.
Melvin declined to address his plans for the coaching staff but praised Price in a text message.
“I’ve never had a better coach than Bryan Price,” Melvin said. “Our backgrounds and personal relationship made for a one of a kind work environment.”
Price said he didn’t have many interactions with Posey, but he expressed confidence that the Giants’ new chief baseball architect would bring the right perspective to the work that needs to be done — including the streamlining of the organizational pitching infrastructure.
“He’s a San Francisco icon, he’s a bright guy and he’s a connector of people,” Price said. “He has a lot going for him. Give him some grace to get into the position and surround himself with people will support what he wants to do and also challenge him. And having a guy like Bob Melvin in the manager seat is a huge plus. He’s someone who can manage the clubhouse and work collectively to put the best players and best lineups on the field on a regular basis.”
(Top photo of Price: Darren Yamashita / USA Today)
