Was there baseball in San Francisco Before The Giants?

Answer 1

Certainly- there was very good minor league Baseball on the coast long before any major league expansion. The leagues were mostly, if not all, independent of the major league teams and so they did not readily give up their stars. Some players who probably could have played in the big leagues stayed on in Pacific Coast League teams because major league teams did not want to risk the cost of buying their contracts . Joe Dimagio played on the San Francisco Seals, I think, until the Yankees coughed up the money to buy his contract.