SAN FRANCISCO -- As the postseason got underway around baseball on Tuesday, Farhan Zaidi sat in the home dugout at Oracle Park and fielded an array of questions about the state of the Giants during a season-ending press conference with local reporters.

It certainly wasn’t where he envisioned himself being when he took over as the club’s president of baseball operations in November 2018.

Tasked with turning the Giants into perennial contenders, Zaidi’s regime has delivered only one winning season in the past five years, with the club finishing 79-83 in 2023 following a second-half collapse that cost Gabe Kapler his job as manager last week.

“Results-wise, sitting here with the playoffs starting, talking about the end of our season, finishing under .500, that’s a disappointment,” Zaidi said. “That’s not where we wanted to be. Our goal is to never have these kinds of press conferences. We should be in the playoffs every year.”

After falling short of the postseason for the second consecutive year, Zaidi has vowed to rethink everything, beginning with his next manager. Zaidi said the Giants are still putting together a list of possible replacements for Kapler, though he expects to begin interviewing “at least one or two” internal candidates by the end of the week.

Third-base coach Mark Hallberg, bench coach Kai Correa and bullpen/catching coach Craig Albernaz are among those who could garner consideration, along with special assistant to baseball operations Ron Wotus.

If the Giants look to bring in a fresh voice from outside the organization, they could potentially target former A’s manager Bob Melvin, whose status with the Padres remains up in the air following a massively disappointing season in San Diego. Rangers associate manager Will Venable, Astros bench coach Joe Espada and Dodgers first-base coach Clayton McCullough also drew interest from Zaidi during the Giants’ previous managerial search in 2019. Another possible candidate, Mariners bullpen/quality coach Stephen Vogt, caught for the A’s and Giants during Zaidi’s time with both clubs.

Zaidi, who will be entering the final year of his contract, said he’s open to hiring a first-year manager and reiterated a desire to have a new hire in place before the start of free agency.

“We want somebody who will be an effective recruiter as we go into free agency,” Zaidi said. “Like every organization, we want to sort of build a brand of players wanting to come here and play here. I think the manager is a big part of that. There are guys who don’t have managerial experience, but maybe they just ended long playing careers and they have relationships and they can be effective recruiters and be sort of attractive leaders for players. That’s definitely going to factor into it.”

Zaidi said he expects finalists to eventually meet with ownership representatives, including chairman Greg Johnson, president and CEO Larry Baer and Buster Posey. Ace right-hander Logan Webb has expressed a desire to be involved with the conversations, as well.

“I think players have sort of varied levels of interest in it,” Zaidi said. “He’s very interested, and I’ve already had a couple of conversations with him. I’ve had kind of informal conversations with a number of players, their feedback on the state of the clubhouse and what they think would be good qualities or helpful qualities for this group of players in a new manager. I will probably be soliciting Logan’s thoughts and I am expecting some unsolicited thoughts as well. I think he’s very interested -- and he should be. I value his input, for sure.”

Here a few other notes from Zaidi’s wide-ranging session with reporters:

Luciano could get his chance
With 13-year veteran Brandon Crawford headed for free agency, the Giants are likely to head into 2024 with a new shortstop. Zaidi said he expects Marco Luciano, the club’s No. 2 prospect, to have an opportunity to succeed Crawford and build on his promising showing in the Majors this year.

“As we sit here now, we want to give Marco Luciano the chance to be the everyday guy next year,” Zaidi said.

As for the rest of the roster, Zaidi said he plans to focus on improving the defense and getting more athletic, which were also two of his priorities last year. He hopes rookies like Luciano and center fielder Tyler Fitzgerald can be part of the solution and help stabilize the Giants’ defense up the middle by getting more opportunities in 2024.

Open for trade business
Given the thin class of upcoming free agents, Zaidi didn’t rule out the possibility of trading prospects to acquire more established players this offseason. Between Kyle Harrison, Keaton Winn, Tristan Beck, Sean Hjelle, Mason Black, Carson Whisenhunt and Hayden Birdsong, the Giants have a surplus of young arms who they could move to fill other holes on the roster.

“I think even at the Deadline this year, we were very open to trading just about anybody,” Zaidi said. “I imagine we’ll have the same outlook this offseason.”