SAN FRANCISCO — During his first offseason as Giants president of baseball operations, Farhan Zaidi was quite careful when choosing ways to describe his vision for the franchise.
When asked to offer a big-picture goal for the 2019 season, Zaidi often said he wanted the Giants to play “meaningful” baseball as deep into the season as they could.
Zaidi’s predecessors never shied away from explaining the team’s annual goal was to “contend” for a playoff spot, but competing for a postseason berth felt rather unrealistic given the Giants’ massive struggles over the last two seasons.
Meaningful is a word that can be easily manipulated to fit a variety of scenarios.