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There were a handful of teams in the race to sign Shohei Ohtani in free agency, but he ultimately chose to sign a massive 10-year, $700 million deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers to help reestablish them as the team to beat in the entire league. One team that came up short in their quest for Ohtani was the San Francisco Giants, which has been a tough pill for Buster Posey to swallow.
Posey is now a part of the Giants ownership group, and was part of San Fran's meeting with Ohtani in which they tried to sell him on joining San Francisco. The legendary San Fran catcher revealed that he did everything he could to make Ohtani see his vision, and he still seemed to be rather upset that two-way superstar spurned the Giants and opted to sign with the Dodgers instead.
“I just wanted him to understand my level of love for the San Francisco Giants and city of San Francisco and for him to understand how much I’ve come to appreciate the history here and wanting him to be a part of that history going forward. It was such a unique opportunity. I just feel that him coming to the Giants could have been transformative, obviously for the baseball team but it also would’ve given the city a boost that we’ve all been looking for. That was the pitch: ‘Look, you’ve got an opportunity to come here and do something special that’s going to impact not only people during your tenure but potentially for years and years to come even after you’re done playing.’ And I meant it. I fully believed it.” – Buster Posey, The Athletic
Buster Posey still laments the fact Shohei Ohtani didn't sign with the Giants
Posey, who spent his entire career with the Giants and won three World Series titles with them, is still working on helping improve the team, even though he has now been retired for two full seasons. San Fran has struggled to sign big name free agents in recent seasons, but they had an opportunity to remedy those misses by hitting on Ohtani. Unfortunately, they came up short there as well.
San Francisco was able to land Jung-Hoo Lee on a six-year, $113 million deal shortly after missing out on Ohtani, but there's no comparison for Ohtani in the MLB right now, and missing out on him was a huge blow. Posey's recruiting pitch with the Giants was solid, but there wasn't much they could do, and they will have to try to find a way to get by without having Ohtani on board.
