Five takeaways from the SF Giants 2024 schedule

Next year's SF Giants schedule is out, and our Sean Keane breaks down five early takeaways from the calendar.

MLB released the SF Giants schedule for 2024, and there's a lot to talk about. So let's get right to it!

We present the #SFGiants 2024 schedule 🗓️ pic.twitter.com/YooMgoi21i

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) July 13, 2023

1. The toughest road trip comes early

The Giants have a ten-game road trip starting April 30 where they head to Boston for three games, play a four-game series in Philadelphia, and then fly to Colorado for three games. It's a brutal way to end a road trip: Flying 1600 miles to play at altitude, without a day off. That's a trip through three of the top five hitters' parks in baseball over the past three years - Coors Field and Fenway Park are 1-2, while Citizens Bank Park is No. 5. If the Giants' pitching staff can survive that buzz saw of a road trip, the rest of the season gets a lot easier.

We present the #SFGiants 2024 schedule 🗓️ pic.twitter.com/YooMgoi21i

— SFGiants (@SFGiants) July 13, 2023

2. They're playing the "Field of Dreams" game in Willie Mays' old ballpark

The Giants will travel to Birmingham, Alabama on June 20 for the annual "Field of Dreams" game. The game will take place at Rickwood Field, where a teenage Willie Mays played for the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro League. It's also happening the day after the Juneteenth holiday, so it's a well-timed tribute to the history of the Negro Leagues. 

Sure, it might have only happened because the Dyerville, Iowa site is under construction, but we aren't going to quibble with tributes to black history and what MLB called the Negro Leagues' "greatest living player" Willie Mays. Though we would argue that Mays has been all of baseball's greatest living player since roughly 1954.

3. There are no Dodger games in the last nine weeks

Not that we are going to miss seeing Max Muncy and Mookie Betts in September, but it feels odd for the Giants-Dodgers season series to wrap up by July 25. But that's the case this year, a result of the new, balanced schedule that limits teams to just 13 games against division rivals. That means that the Giants and Dodgers cease direct hostilities after a final four-game series at Chavez Ravine in late July.

The G-Men only get the Padres early and late, playing them in seven games in the first two weeks, including the season opener May 28 and the Giants' home opener on April 5. Then it's five months of no Manny Machado or Fernando Tatis Jr. until the teams play the first two weekends in September. The Giants-Rockies season series ends July 28, after a scheduled doubleheader July 27, while there are six games against the Arizona Diamondbacks in the final month.

4. The Giants' free agent misses are all coming to town

Aaron Judge will be playing his first-ever game at Oracle Park when the New York Yankees visit May 24-26. If he asks for tickets for his family, the Giants should pretend to be really interested and then give the seats to Michael Conforto and Mitch Haniger's families instead.

Carlos Correa has played five games in Oracle Park in his career, sort of a low number for a guy who played eight seasons in the AL West. He and the Minnesota Twins are coming to town July 12-14, assuming his ankle doesn't fall off.

We won't speculate as to where free agent Shohei Ohtani will land, but in a totally unrelated bit of information, the Los Angeles Dodgers are in town May 13-15 and June 28-30.

5. The end of the season is weird

In the stretch run, you want to see baseball teams playing their closest rivals as they battle for the playoffs. Or, I guess you want a team to make a strange cross-country road trip playing unrelated teams with two weeks to go.

That's how the Giants close the season, with a bizarre Baltimore-Kansas City-Arizona journey before a three-game homestand with the St. Louis Cardinals. Nine road games, 4500 miles of flying, facing teams from three different divisions. The stakes have never been lower!

Of course, writing this down means that the Diamondbacks and Giants will be locked in a fierce playoff battle next September, after SF makes a deadline deal for the Royals' Matt Duffy, and an intense Orioles rivalry begins when Adley Rutschman and Patrick Bailey have a bare-knuckles brawl at the All-Star Game. And this will look foolish. But until then, this September schedule is decidedly weird.