Fifty games is 31% of a season — not the logical time to raise the white flag, rev up the tank engines, and start a three-year rebuilding plan.

The Giants don’t think like that. They sure didn’t hire Buster Posey to be cynical about the present or to abandon this moment and point toward a distant-future revival. He definitely didn’t take this job to perform any kind of major surrender.

However … the Giants are 20-30, 10 games under .500 for the first time since July 2019 (yes, they never dropped this low during the Gabe Kapler or Bob Melvin tenures), they’re scored the fewest runs in MLB, they’re already nine games behind the Chicago Cubs for the final National League wild-card spot, and they trail seven other teams in that turbo-charged race.

The Giants, loaded with under-performing big-money players, are stalled out and getting lapped. They know they’re getting lapped. And there’s very little they can do about it that would actually make sense.

“I’d love to tell you there’s gonna be big moves coming and we’re going to be adding something big to the roster,” Posey said during a tense and interesting segment on KNBR Thursday morning. “But we’ve gotta be playing well to do that.”

Posey also bristled at any suggestion that, after trading Patrick Bailey and demoting Ryan Walker, the Giants have begun a “quiet rebuild.” Again, Posey and this franchise aren’t set up to quit on a season in May.

They need to keep filling up Oracle Park, they need the TV ratings, and they need to believe that they money they’ve invested in Rafael Devers, Willy Adames, Matt Chapman, Logan Webb, and Jung Hoo Lee will pay off with, at the very least, a drive back to .500 by August or September.

But Posey is a realist, too — the best thing the Giants have going right now is the farm system he’s built up over the past 18 months and the worst thing they could do is sacrifice any significant prospect for the chance of a short-term boost this year.

It’d be much more practical, and wiser, if the Giants can make similar deals to the ones Posey pulled off last summer, when he traded relievers Camilo Doval and Tyler Rogers for a grab bag of prospects.

Posey didn’t call it the start of a rebuild back then and he won’t use that word this year, either. But 50 games have been enough to burn through the Giants’ optimistic phase and now they’re probably well into their pragmatic secondary plans.

Let’s take a look at some points of pressure as the Giants get set for a six-game homestand against the White Sox and Diamondbacks, starting Friday:

For a team that has to figure out ways to win on the margins, the Giants sure find ways to lose games on the margins.

A lot of this would seem minor if the Giants had even an average offense, but they sure do not. Which amplifies every slight miscue or continued baffling hitting approach. The Giants just aren’t a buttoned-up team, which at some point has to reflect on the coaches.

Vitello is the flash point, of course, for obvious reasons. And ultimately, if the team can’t play at a high level, Vitello will get much of the blame. But I don’t know if we’ve seen the best of Vitello so far, and I just don’t sense that he’s gelled with this coaching staff. (And the coaching staff definitely hasn’t gelled with the players).

It’s a little cliche to fire the hitting coach a few months into a lousy season, but I suspect that Hunter Mense is not a long-term answer for this team. Third base coach Héctor Borg has been extremely iffy with his baserunning decisions. And pitching coach Justin Meccage hasn’t exactly seemed like a dynamic figure in there.

Somewhat notably, none of those three had previous connections to Vitello before this season. Of course, Vitello had almost no connections to anybody in professional baseball coming into this job; but maybe after a few months of this, Vitello and the Giants’ front office have a better idea of the kinds of coaches who might work best with him and this roster.

The Giants brought Eldridge up when most of their main guys were in terrible slumps and they could plot out regular playing time for the top prospect.

Since then, Devers and Adames especially have revved up a bit. And Casey Schmitt has been the team’s best hitter all season. Which has made Eldridge a part-time player — he started five of the 10 games on this last road trip.

As Posey repeated on Thursday, if they’re going to get back into this, they’re going to need Devers, Adames, and Chapman to lead them there. But at some point Posey is going to stop saying that because the big-name futility will have become too much to ignore.

None of those guys should be outright benched. But do they all need to play every day when they’re leading the Giants off the cliff?

Soon enough, it will be time to get Eldridge in the lineup at least four or five times a week. He’s only hitting .156 with a .510 OPS and 10 strikeouts in 32 at-bats so far this season. But he has one home run, which is the same as Chapman in 186 at-bats. And Eldridge’s expected career arc has a very different shape from here on than what we’re likely to see from Devers, Adames, and Chapman.

Vitello can get Eldridge regular time at DH or first base by sitting Chapman once or twice week (with Schmitt at third), Devers once a week (Eldridge or Schmitt at first base), and Heliot Ramos, once he’s healthy, once or twice week (with Schmitt in left field). If the Giants at all feel comfortable with Schmitt at shortstop, they can sit Adames once a week, too.

Eventually, the Giants likely will have to think about trading from their stockpile of very young elite prospects, especially since Josuar Gonzalez, Luis Hernández, Jhonny Level, Gavin Kilen are all shortstops.

Heck, the Giants might also use their fourth and 29th overall picks in the upcoming draft on a shortstop or two; you keep drafting talented shortstops because they can move to other positions or because other teams always want to trade for talented young shortstops.

But right now, there’s no urgency for Posey to make a final call on any of these guys. Let them continue to bloom in the Giants’ system. They’re all untouchable … until the moment the Giants feel like they’re one major piece away from contention. And that won’t be for a little while.

Also, the Giants are currently tied for the fifth-worst record in baseball. Nobody in the organization wants to think this way, but if they don’t pull out of this swoon, would it be so terrible to land another top-five pick in 2027?

Devers is owed an average of $30.1 million a year for the next seven seasons through 2033 (with some slight deferrals that bring the actual value down a little bit).

Adames is owed $28 million in each of the next four seasons through 2030. And he has a full no-trade clause.

Chapman is owed $25 million in each of the next four seasons through 2030. And he also has a full no-trade clause.

These deals look awful right now, including the contract for Chapman, which pre-presidency Posey helped get to the finish line and was sealed by the Giants giving Chapman the no-trade clause.

But all of them were done because the Giants didn’t have any strong alternatives for those crucial roles. They’re all still playing regularly now because the Giants still don’t have killer alternatives.

OK, what will the Giants do when and if they have better options ready to go at those positions?

Adames can be moved to second base next season, unless the Giants have already signed a 10-year contract with Luis Arráez (Posey’s unqualified success story this season). Devers goes through too many massive slumps to be considered an elite player, but that kind of money plus that terrible on-base percentage probably makes him untradeable unless the Giants are ready to pay down a huge chunk of the remaining $200-plus million after this season.

I think Chapman is the likeliest to generate some interest on the trade market and obviously Schmitt can move right into third base; but of course, that no-trade clause will be a sticking point.

My conclusion: The Giants are going to be paying a lot of money for descending players. The money is spent. The Giants will have to accept that.

They’re a rich franchise. If they keep giving all of these guys prime spots and skimp everywhere else because they made these three mistakes, that’ll only compound and extend the errors.

I agreed with Posey when he didn’t go out of his way to acquire an established closer last offseason and I agree with him now when he says he has no regrets about that decision, even after some high-profile bullpen blowups.

Closer value is volatile. Just think: a few years ago, Camilo Doval was one of the best relievers in the league. Now … well, not so much.

Would the Giants be better off this season if they had a good closer? Yes. Unquestionably. But they’d be a lot worse off than they are now if they spent big money or gave up assets for a closer who then blew up on them.

And the Giants’ closer situation actually isn’t as terrible as all that. The big screw-ups just look worse when a team is desperate for any possible win.

Yeah, I looked it up: The Giants have converted 60% (9 of 15) of their save opportunities this season. The MLB average is 62%.

The Padres’ bullpen is awesome. Their late-innings guys can take over games. They also are converting save opportunities at a 69% rate (18 of 26).

A 7% differential — is that enough to howl about for hours? Not for me.

I think the Giants really only have two pending free agents who might get them something interesting — that’d be Arráez and Robbie Ray, who has been solid this season until he got blasted in his last start.

I don’t expect this to signal any big downturn for Ray. He’s still pretty good. I think he’ll have value on the market. I also think Posey would flinch at the idea of trading Arráez, but again, he’ll have to be pragmatic about this in July.

Can the Giants steal a good young player from a contender for either Arráez or Ray? That’s what the Brewers did when they traded Caleb Durbin to the Red Sox for Kyle Harrison. Oh wait, that might not be the most enjoyable example for the Giants.

I’ve always said that a lot would have to happen for Giants’ ownership to even consider firing Posey, who, after all, is a member of the group.

A possible 95-loss season would be a lot to deal with, for Posey and for everybody else; but I don’t think that would lead him to the firing line or cause him to quit in frustration.

I think there’s enough going on in the farm system to keep Giants fans engaged in this administration. I think Posey will come up with a plan — probably already is plotting it out — that deals with the sunk costs and maximizes the prospects.

And who knows, maybe everybody’s spirits will perk up when the Giants might play non-terrible baseball the rest of the way. But that would be the biggest surprise of all.