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Thinking about the 2008 Opening Day yesterday the idea of a long march kept coming up.
Unlike seasons past this year did not come with anticipation, optimism or that sense of excitement that I’ve come accustomed to. Instead the stories that have floated about have been about worst spring record in Giants history, the collapse of Noah Lowry and a starting shortstop projected for a -5.3 VORP.
But this morning (I work Tuesday through Saturday so I have the day off) while watching the Tigers and Royals I noticed that ESPN will be showing the Giants game here in Salem, Ore.
And I was happy.
It wasn’t something I thought about, just an instinctive reaction, like when an underground band you’ve fallen in love with is unexpectedly on the radio.
It made me remember that for all the pain and suffering I’ve been expecting baseball will still be fun. The Giants will still play regardless of the changes and mishandling from the top down that has killed any chances of the team competing this season and there is a chance that there will be moments where I do not claw at my eyes and cure my fate.
Last night George Will did an introduction for the Braves, Nationals game. he said that coming into the year we know each team will win 60 games, lose 60 games and that the real fight is for those other 42.
Well, maybe for most. But for us Giants fans all we have is (maybe) those 60 wins. But I’m starting to think that I’ll still be able to enjoy it.
Filed under: Transactions
As I’ve been running through my Brian Sabean retrospective I’ve been running into some interesting things during the data crunching.
While checking into Sabean’s draft record I made a chart of every win share a team has drafted and how many of those were actually earned with the drafting team during his time using retrosheet, the Lahman database and Dave Studeman’s win shares database
But if you think that it takes around five years to start evaluating a draft, I was only looking at draft between 1997 and 2002, or six years. That works to compare Sabean against his peers, but not so well to get ideas of how franchises are doing at holding on to homegrown talent.
So I took it back to 1992 and ran it to 2006 (Lahamn doesn’t have retrosheet IDs for player debuting in 2007, which messes up the numbers) to get up to a better look and ran the numbers again. Here’s the full list:
Pct. of Drafted Win Shares Kept
Team WS Kept Pct TBA 496 380 77% PIT 734 544 74% PHI 1158 820 71% MIN 1164 795 68% MIL 740 466 63% OAK 1665 1019 61% HOU 1248 757 61% CHA 740 446 60% CIN 851 507 60% ARI 536 311 58% COL 1279 730 57% WAS 1092 620 57% ATL 868 470 54% ANA 871 470 54% TOR 1393 724 52% BAL 663 340 51% DET 995 500 50% SLN 1322 640 48% KCA 1213 563 46% NYA 756 319 42% LAN 599 251 42% SFN 956 390 41% CHN 710 289 41% BOS 1098 441 40% SDN 688 269 39% FLO 712 272 38% SEA 1159 435 38% TEX 1151 411 36% NYN 744 240 32% CLE 934 267 29%
Best Teams
What surprised me was that the top of the list was full of small and mid-market teams (Oakland, Minnesota, Pittsburgh) and the bottom 11 contained both New York teams, Boston and Los Angeles.
Minnesota did it by getting the most out of Tori Hunter, Corey Koskie and Jacque Jones with players such as Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau and Michael Cuddyer looking to add more value this year. Of course Hunter and Jones will help offset some of that.
The A’s appearance at the top has a couple of significant points. The first is that next time I do this I should include amateur free agent signings, which saves them from the loss of Miguel Tejada. The other is that Billy Beane and company have absolutely owned the draft and gotthe most out of their investments. Not only did they draft more win shares than anyone else they were sixth in keeping that talent.
The highlight of their list may be that through 2006 they’d won the Giambi battle, 166 to 118 win shares.The bad part is that their list is also full of players who still have years to contribute to the other side of the list, such as Andre Ethier, Jeremy Bonderman and Mark Teahen with veterans such as Eric Byrnes and Tim Hudson still productive (I hear Barry Zito is still hanging around somewhere, as well). It’ll be interesting to see how this group progresses and maybe in 10 years the A’s don’t look quite so well in this stretch.
Worst Teams
The Indians appearance at the bottom of the list is a function of two things; The cutoff date of the list and the players they picked up just before it.
The Indians had a great draft in 1989, picking 13 players who would make it to the majors, including Jim Thome in the 13th round and Brian Giles in the 17th. But Thome would end up blocking the two players who have contributed the most win shares to other teams from Indians’ drafts since 1992, Seasn Casey (145 win shares) and Richie Sexson (129).
Not surprisingly, the draft pick who has contributed the mos to the team is C.C. Sabathia at 77 win shares.
For the Mets, the big market team lowest on the list, the sin hasn’t been losing great players but a slew of role players. The top-3 who have contributed the most to other teams are Preston Wilson (102), Terrance Long (71) and Jay Payton (65). The two biggest misses on the list are A.J. Burnett (60) and Scott Kazmir, who should be much higher after the next few years if they can stay healthy.
The Rangers list was surprising to me mainly because I forgot they had drafted Rich Aurilia (160), Carlos Pena(39) and Aaron Harang (37). Losing Mark Texiera last year isn’t going to help when we look at this list next year.
And there is one big reason the Mariners are at the bottom. He resides in New York.
The San Jose Mercury News and its 12 reporters are saying that Kevin Frandsen has ruptured his Achilles tendon and may be done for the year.
Either the Giants got lucky picking up almost the exact same player earlier this week or Brian Sabean is clairvoyant.
It’s hard to get worked up about this from a “How does this affect the Giants chances?’-angle, because all it means is that the Giants will still have a terrible offense and win less than 75 games. but it’s terrible for Frandsen who was already starting to get frustrated about being banged up when he finally had a shot to win some playing time.
It’s odd how an injury to one player who wasn’t guaranteed a starting job can affect a team such as the 2008 Giants.
This kills the competition he had with Ray Durham at second, makes third base even more of a sinkhole and basically solidifies that Brian Bocock will start the season in San Francisco after the Jose Castillo pick-up dropped it from 100 percent to 99 percent certain. It’s almost funny to think the Giants have mismanaged the roster so much that the best young, near-major league ready player they have was just sent to AAA (free Nate Schierholtz!) while the service clock on a shortstop that hasn’t even played above A-ball will be starting soon.
So the opening day infield? If the team is serious about playing Rich Aurilia at first, then it’s him, Durham (if he has the strength to stand after all), Bocock and Castillo.
Bocock should be fine in the field but lost at the plate. Castillo could be both or play passable defense. Durham could be league average offensively or a black hole if he repeats last year and Rich Aurilia should not be a major league regular.
If you look at those four and Dan Ortmeier, the other first base possibility, none had an OBP exceeding .333 at any level and none had one higher than .317 at the major league level. PECOTA has none of them projected at higher than Aurilia at .329.
None of this is a surprise (Except for Castillo. I only recently discovered he was not very good at baseball) , but it’s still worse for losing Frandsen. He was to be one of the few youngish players to watch and root for this year. It’s sad to see that possibly that wont happen.
Filed under: Brian Sabean, Giants, Transactions | Tags: sabean, trades, Transactions
More and more the general manager is becoming the new star of major league baseball.
Over its history men such as Branch Rickey have rose to fame (or infamy) for trades and more recently free agent signings, but the players and manager were the face of an organization. They were the ones on the field for 162-plus games, always available to the lens of a waiting photographer or television camera.
But GMs such as Billy Beane, Theo Epstein and others have taken more public roles and more blame and reward for the state of the franchise.
Brian Sabean has been the general manager of the Giants since Sept. 30, 1996. In that time the team has come one win from a World Series and finished with a winning record in all but three seasons.
The problem is that those three seasons have all come consecutively with a fourth most likely on the way. The criticisms have been well documented; over reliance on veterans, wasting of draft picks and more recently poor trades.
This is the start of what I hope will be an in-depth look at nearly every transaction Sabean has made with the Giants, including trades, free agent signings and the amateur draft.
Like how every win and loss cannot be attributed to the manager, not every transaction is 100 percent the decision of a general manager. But what I hope to find are general trends about the way players are selected in the Sabean regime and the success of those moves.
Let’s start with trades, shall we? Using the Lahman database, Retrosheet transaction database and Dave Studeman’s Win Shares database (and borrowing heavily from his work here) I tallied up the Win Shares doled out in Giants trades over Sabean’s term. I used only shares credited to the dealing team (so the Giants aren’t hurt by Keith Foulke’s years with Boston or helped by Jeff Kent’s years in Houston and L.A.). I think this helps measure what each team got out of the deal and not just the talent sent around.
Sabean’s biggest success and failure have arguably been in his dealings with other teams. Today I’m going to start with his top-5 trades. Eventually I’ll hit his top-5 duds and then finish up with a look at how his success has changed over his tenure with the team.
1. Nov. 13, 1996: Matt Williams and Trenidad Hubbard to the Cleveland Indians for Jeff Kent, Jose Vizciano, Julian Tavarez and Joe Roa.
Here’s how the immortal Bruce Jenkins summed up what has turned out to be one of Sabean’s best moves as general manager:
The Giants claim they have a master plan for the offseason, and here’s how they kicked it off yesterday: They pulled off a trade that makes them infinitely worse.
The day the trade was announced I remember my dad reading the paper and declaring he was no longer a Giants fan. He wasn’t the only one, by far. Williams was that important to the makeup of the team, at least in the mind of many Giants fans.
But Sabean escaped with his first major victory. It’s amazing to look back and see how little was thought of Kent. Basically he was a decent-hitting middle infielder who happened to be a jerk. Of course he turned out to be a power-hitting middle infielder who happened to be a jerk.
In the Chronicle’s write up of the trade the lede mentions that Matt Williams was traded for three players but does not mention any of them by name. And when they are named, Tavarez gets first billing.
Before the trade Kent’s best OPS+ was 11 in 107 games for the 1994 Mets. He had lower than 120 once in his time with the Giants, winning the 2000 MVP award.
Overall the trade netted the Giants 176 Win Shares over the players’ careers, gaining 194 while giving up only 18 (Williams left Cleveland after one year). While Kent gained the majority of that, even Vizcaiano (17) and Tavarez (12) added double-digit value.
Sabean had one other trade that netted more than 100 Win Shares, and it occurred less than two weeks later.
2. Nov. 26, 1996: Allen Watson and Fausto Macey to the Angels for J.T. Snow.
From a Chronicle piece dated Nov. 14, 1996:
Sabean conceded the Williams trade by itself “wouldn’t bode well on how we plan to set up our offense,” and said he’s talking to four teams about a first baseman who finally can fill Will Clark’s shoes and protect Bonds in the lineup, which had been Williams‘ job.
Snow, already the owner of two Gold Gloves, was coming off a year in which he hit just .257/.327/.384, good for an 81 OPS+. Not exactly a protector of Bonds. Little did everyone know Sabean had already picked that piece up.
In his first year as a Giants Snow hit 28 home runs and 104 RBI. It would be his best offensive season. Still, Snow added defensive stability in the infield and around league average offense at the plate for eight seasons.
Watson would go 18-19 in two years with the Angels. The trade would net the Giants 125 win shares, 136 for Snow and losing 11 for Watson.
3. July 30, 2001: Armando Rios and Ryan Vogelsong to the Pirates for Jason Schmidt and John VanderWal.
To believe this was made to counter the Dodgers getting James Baldwin. Here’s what the New York Times had on Armando Rios the day after the the trade:
In the deal, the Pirates got outfielder Armando Rios. Rios has produced decent power numbers — 14 homers, 49 runs batted in — in his second full season in the big leagues, but his poor play at Pac Bell Park — .218, three home runs — kept him in an occasional platoon with the 39-year-old Eric Davis, even though Davis is hitting .204.
Not exactly a ringing endorsement. In his two seasons with the Pirates Rios would earn 2 win shares. Schmidt on the other hand would win the 2003 Cy Young Award (Something that will get you thrown out of Borders: Crossing out Eric Gagne’s name in all the baseball encyclopedias) and earn 80 win shares.
Fianlly tally: 79 net win shares.
4. Nov. 18, 1997: Joe Fontenot, Mike Pageler and Mike Villano to the Marlins for Robb Nen.
Your classic prospects for experience, except for the fact the team trading experience had just won the World Series weeks before.
Nen was part of the Great Florida Fire Sale of 1997 and luckily landed with the Giants to replace the departing Rod Beck and Roberto Hernandez, picked up at the trade deadline that year in a deal we’ll get to later. At the time the trio of prospects was thought to be a decent haul:
To get Nen, who had 35 saves for the world champion Marlins, the Giants gave up three pretty good pitching prospects, Mike Villano, Joe Fontenot and Mick Pageler. … Fontenot, 20, was the Giants’ first pick in the June 1995 draft. This season, he was 10-11 with a 5.53 ERA at Double-A Shreveport. Other clubs had inquired about him before, but he was untouchable until last night.
Nen of course would never pitch after 2002, playing through injury to get the team to the World Series. his five years would still be good enough to earn 71 win shares. The trio would pick up zero for the Marlins.
5. July 31, 1998: Jason Brester, Jim Stoops and Darryl Hamilton to the Rockies for Ellis Burks.
This would be Sabean’s second consecutive big deadline-deal after picking up Hernandez, Wilson Alvarez and Danny Darwin from the Chicago Whitesox the previous July. It was also technically the second the year as well, since the Giants had earlier picked up Joe Carter. And as we saw with Schmidt it wasn’t his last deadline deal.
Sabean felt the team was getting too many people on base and not driving them in, so he traded his leadoff hitter for a power guy.
Burks played well down the stretch and then had two great years in the Giants outfield. Hamilton played 142 games for the Rockies before being traded at the deadline again the next season, this time to the Mets.
You’ll notice that four of the five happened between 1996 and 1998. This way of measuring trades will naturally favor older transactions as it allows for more build up of value. I plan on addressing that as I wrap up the trade part of the series.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: brandon inge, Doom, Giants, Joe Crede, spring training
I told myself back in November that I wouldn’t sweat this year. The Giants had reached the territory of the Royals, Pirates and Washington Generals and would be MIA for the year.
And really, I was hoping for historically bad. Bad enough that in future years people could look at their terrible local sporting club and say, “Well, at least we’re not the ‘08 Giants.”
But watching the team struggle the way it has, with a 7.47 ERA and 23 errors, well, maybe this isn’t going to be as fun as I thought.
Maybe it will all get better when real games start and I can be sure all those guys with ‘SF’ on their hats are actually trying. Right now I can still cling to the hope that maybe a few of the miscues and monumental collapses are the result of early season rust and the unavoidable spring injury. Hell, Ichiro started out 0-21 this spring.
The team will be bad, whether or not Joe Crede or Brandon Inge come to town (fun stuff in the notes of the link). It may not even keep the Giants from being the worst offensive team in baseball any of the next three years. But what I worry about now is whether I’ll be able to enjoy the collapse like I convinced myself I could.
Weren’t we not supposed to worry about the pitching staff?
As we discussed last time, do not worry about spring training stats. They’re completely meaningless. Unless, of course, they become historically and frighteningly bad.
| San Francisco | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | ERA |
| Lowry | 1.0 | 0 | 4 | 4 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 23.14. |
I mean … really … how is that even possible? Afterwards Lowry complained of not being able to grip the ball and now he’s been diagnosed with tendinitis, which he said was the cause.
That last link has Lowry’s official comments on the outing, in which he seemed to be pretty upset that some had brought up Rick Ankiel and other pitchers that lost their control suddenly.
For the record, here’s Lowry’s comment after the start, which he gave to the Giants PR staff instead of talking to reporters (not that I can blame him):
“There’s not much to say when you don’t throw one strike. I’m just upset that my spring has started the way it has.“
He said that the reason he didn’t bring up the injury was that he wanted to talk to the coaching staff about it first. It’s all reasonable and there’s no reason to suspect otherwise, but it’s still scary to see something like that. Especially when you look at Lowry’s BB/9 rates, which jumped from 3.16 in 2006 to 5.02 last year.
Is he having trouble dealing with an early season injury or slowly losing his grip on his career? Probably just the former but this is yet another troubling situation to watch, joing Omar Vizquel’s injury, Dave Roberts starting in left, where Kevin Frandsen will play and the rules stipulating that every team employ corner infielders.
Let’s see, if Cain and Lincecum can start around 60 games between them that only leaves 102 other contests to suffer through.
The 2008 Giants! We’re competitive 37 percent of the time!
