What on earth was the SF Giants' plan for LHP Kyle Harrison?

The SF Giants handling of Kyle Harrison has JD Salazar asking if the team had a cohesive plan for the franchise's best pitching prospect in years.

The SF Giants would like to make the playoffs. If they, oh pretty please, could, of course. So long as it's reasonable. You wouldn't want to do anything stupid, like trading away a future young star for an underdog's chance at a title. You need those young stars to eventually become the betting favorites, the kind of team that trades away young stars to take the underdogs' chances and stack them on top of their own.

SF Giants SP Kyle Harrison pitches against the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park on August 22, 2023 / Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports

With that said, what on earth are the Giants doing with top pitching prospect Kyle Harrison? In a year full of rookie debuts and surprises of all varieties, Harrison was supposed to be the prize gem. The best lefty prospect in the game. The Giants' real trade deadline pickup. The next Bumgarner. The guy that, even if nothing else really panned out, would be San Francisco's latest and greatest franchise player.

Instead, after one historically dominant start and four statistically bad ones, Harrison was optioned back to Triple-A Sacramento, presumably for the rest of the season. And yes, he hasn't been great, not when he's allowed more than a homer per outing. That's been a problem, and some problems you just can't fix under the pressure of performing at a major league level.

Harrison's problems, though, seem largely down to refining his command and dealing with reduced fastball velocity, which has dipped from the mid-90s down to the 91-93 mph range. Tweaks that, it should be noticed, Harrison has successfully made in the middle of games since his callup. Tweaks that manager Gabe Kapler asserted were "very small" and "nothing glaring." Tweaks that professional players and coaches get paid gargantuan amounts of money to instill and execute.

Despite that, in the midst of a stretch run where the Giants are both fighting for a playoff spot and trying to establish an identity, Kyle Harrison will not be a part of the team. He'll be in Sacramento. "Developing."

Kapler also mentioned that fatigue may have played a role in Harrison's downtick during his past few starts. Rookies do tend to peter out as the season goes on, which we've seen plenty of this year. But that explanation makes no sense in the universe where the Giants did everything to baby Harrison’s usage all season.

He never pitched more than five innings in a minor league game this year and rarely threw more than 65 pitches. 19 of Harrison's 21 minor-league starts this year saw him record between two and 12 outs. I covered one of his best minor league outings of the year, a four-inning, one-hit performance that covered just 50 pitches before he was pulled. He's thrown just 93.0 innings this year by design.

Kapler's concern, though, points to broader issues within the Giants organization. Harrison threw 91 pitches in his home debut, just his second big-league start. He hadn't thrown more than 65 pitches in an outing since June. A laudable effort, of course, but afterward, Harrison threw 91 and 90 pitches in his following two starts. He hadn't thrown 90+ pitches in three consecutive outings since June of 2022, a full calendar year. 

Either Harrison needed clearly defined pitch counts in order to ramp up more responsibly, or whatever evaluation process in the organization is so opaque and arbitrary that not even the manager can explain what's going on. Whatever's happening, it's not good for Harrison, it's not good for the Giants, and it's certainly not popular with the fans, who can't tell what kind of team they're running over in San Francisco anymore.

Nothing about this situation makes sense. Very little this season has. The Giants claim to want to win, but their unproven rookie pieces were untouchable at the trade deadline. The Giants claim to want to develop, but Harrison, Schmitt, Luciano, Meckler, and Beck are all back in Sacramento. They fuss around with guys who are still a year away, and they can't make stars out of guys who are plenty old enough. They promise to supplement a young core with top-end talent, but neither superstar nor breakout prospect is anywhere to be found.

Therein lies the concern. Kyle Harrison was supposed to be the safety net, the one guy that no matter what, would be leading the charge into the next great era of SF Giants baseball. He is a talented and tantalizing young player. But this organization sent him back to the minors after just five starts. If they can't trust their coaching staff to turn their prospects into stars and they can't trust their front office to turn free agent negotiations into franchise players, then it's hard to see how this team will be worth watching for the next decade.

Maybe there's a plan in there, somewhere. But if there is, I certainly can't see it. It makes me wonder who can.