SAN FRANCISCO -- When Farhan Zaidi took over as president of baseball operations for the Giants, he took about a full year to get a lay of the land. Zaidi soaked everything in during the 2019 season, and when it was over he moved quickly to bring in Scott Harris as his general manager and Gabe Kapler as his manager.
With the GM job once again open, Zaidi doesn't plan to wait long to fill a big hole in the front office.
On a Zoom call with reporters last week, Zaidi said he anticipates the Giants hiring a replacement for Harris "relatively quickly," and ideally before the GM Meetings that will take place in Las Vegas the second week of November. Zaidi said he has spent the last few weeks discussing the organization's needs with other high-ranking members of the baseball operations group and whether Harris' responsibilities could be spread to several others.
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Bay Area and California sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
The preference right now is to hire one person for that role and bring in another fresh voice. Zaidi said he already has benefited from having a new perspective now that Buster Posey is part of the ownership group.
"I think it's going to be a great thing for us to have some fresh perspectives in the organization," he said. "A new general manager could certainly bring a fresh perspective on our roster, player development, evaluation philosophies. Buster being part of our leadership group and having influence on our roster going forward and how we approach free agency going forward, that's going to be huge for us as well.
"It's a good time for us to be bringing new thoughts and ideas into the group and Buster is a huge part of that and a new general manager certainly would be as well."
While the rest of the offseason will include plenty of juicy rumors, searches for executives are usually done completely behind closed doors. Harris was not a known candidate in 2019 until the addition was announced, and his departure to Detroit happened so quietly that most members of the Giants organization found out through social media.
San Francisco Giants
Find the latest San Francisco Giants news, highlights, analysis and more with NBC Sports Bay Area and California.
The Giants have already interviewed several candidates to replace Harris. They are believed to be focused on assistant general managers from clubs that have had recent success in player development, an area where the Giants continue to lag, even with all the changes made since Zaidi took over.
RELATED: Why ownership was right path for Posey
Getting a new GM in place this month would allow him or her to get familiar with the organization before free agency opens, a key factor given how big this offseason will be. The Tigers wasted no time after clearing out their own baseball operations department, hiring Harris in the middle of September so they could get a head start on the offseason.
That allowed the Giants to get a head start on replacing Harris, who left big shoes to fill. Zaidi called the Harris move "a big loss."
"He did a great job for us over the last three years, but as an organization he had our full support and we're really happy for him to get this opportunity with a great organization in Detroit," Zaidi said.