Monday, October 17, 2011

Down on the Farm: Corner Outfield Depth Chart

Corner OF is actually a lot thinner in the Giants organization than CF. The Giants scouting and drafting emphasis is, and always has been, up the middle. They figure that if they are strong in the middle of the field, the corners will take care of themselves. To an extent, that's true. It's theoretically easier to find a good first baseman or LF on the open market than, say, a catcher or CF. It's just that the Giants haven't always done that. It should come as no surprise that 2 of the top players on the corner OF organizational depth chart are also on the CF depth chart. The Giants place a lot of emphasis on OF defense and you would expect a corner OF who is capable of playing CF to be a better defender in a corner than one who can't. It doesn't always work that way and that approach may be sacrificing some offense, but on average it's probably a sound approach.

MLB

Nate Schierholtz- 6'1", 205 lbs, B-L, T-R. BD: 2/15/1984. .278/.326/.430, 9 HR, 7 SB in 335 AB. Nate watchers saw a gradual metamorphosis in 2011 from a kid who was up there just protecting the plate, to a MLB player who was looking for pitches to drive. By the time his season was cut short in mid August by a foul ball off his foot, Nate had become one of the more dangerous hitters in an admittedly weak Giants lineup. His HR into the upper deck in Colorado might be the longest I've ever seen a Giant hit one. It was a truly mammoth shot! Nate is the only established major league corner OF currently in the Giants organization. Brian Sabean proclaimed that RF is his next season. We all know how much weight THAT carries. He is a magical defender in RF in AT&T park, one of the trickier positions to play in baseball. He should be the starting RF next season. At age 28, he is early in the prime years of his career with 1000 MLB AB's under his belt and could be primed for a breakout. Next hurdle? Stay healthy all season!

Brandon Belt- 6'5", 220 lbs, B-L, T-L, BD: 4/20/1988. .225/.306/.412, 9 HR's in 187 AB's. Brandon Belt was drafted and developed as a first baseman, but as he showed last year, he is athletic enough to play a passable LF even with virtually no experience there. He rocketed through the Giants system in 2010 while playing at 3 levels in a stupendous season. He also rocketed into the national top prospect rankings. The Giants succumbed to the temptation to rush him to the majors, even moving Aubrey Huff to the OF to make room for him. That move proved to be a bit too much, too fast for the wide-eyed kid from Nacogdoches, Texas and the awkwardness of the situation it created proved to be a metaphor for the Giants entire 2011 season. The fractured hand he suffered just as he was starting his second stint in the majors was another microcosm of the Giants season. Possibly lost in all this is Belt's second half stat line: .231/.296/.469 with 8 HR's in 130 AB's. If you project his HR's over a full season of AB's, you are already in the high 20's and his second half line is a whole lot better. The Giants are currently contemplating whether to send Belt down for more seasoning to start 2012. If he plays in the majors, it will probably be as a LF. IMO, the Giants could do a lot worse, and the price is certainly right.

AA

Francisco Peguero 5'11", 195 lbs, B-R, T-R, BD: 6/1/1988. .309/.312/.446. We discussed Peguero in the CF rundown. He's actually played more RF than CF the last 2 seasons. Performed very well in a league that is notoriously tough on hitters. Allergic to walks. May be a bit of a tweener: Not quite enough D for CF and not quite enough bat for a corner. Logical progression would be for him to start the 2012 season in Fresno.

Roger Kieschnick 6'3", 215 lbs, B-L, T-R, BD: 1/21/1987. .255/.307/.429 16 HR, 13 SB. Roger is starting to get a bit long in the tooth for a prospect. Lost a year of development to a bad back in 2010. Had a pretty good 2011 considering the environment, but slumped at the end of the season. I think he should start 2012 in Fresno where I could see him breaking out. Arm is strong enough for RF.

Wendell Fairley 6'2", 195 lbs, B-L, T-R. BD: 3/17/1988. High A .245/.329/.317. AA .265/.321/.337. Fairley came advertised as a raw, toolsy kid when drafted in 2007. He's never shown any power or speed and was moved to LF early in his pro career. At this point he's an aging prospect with "old player skills." Pretty hard to envision a MLB future for him right now.

High A

Jarrett Parker 6'4", 210 lbs. B-L, T-L. BD: 1/1/1989. .253/.360/.387 with 13 HR, 20 SB. Another guy discussed in the CF mix. Has the size and arm to play RF if his power develops. Plate discipline was the strongest part of his offensive game last year but showed just enough power and speed to give hope for a higher ceiling. I saw him gun down a runner from RF with a throw that would rival anything I've seen Nate unleash.

Nick Liles 6'0", 165 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 7/23/1987. .281/.317/.372. Hits for average and has a bit of speed. Played some LF for SJ in a 4'th OF role. Seems to be more of an organizational player at this point.

James Simmons 6'3", 190 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 9/3/1985. High A .270/.329/.522, 10 HR in 159 AB's. AAA .228/.279/.386 3 HR in 57 AB. I still think James is one of the best athletes in the Giants organization. Based on my own observations, he can't hit a breaking ball to save his life although he seemed to handle them a bit better this year. Showed impressive power in limited playing time in 2011. I'd like to see what he does in a full season with Fresno in 2012. Probably organizational filler at this point, but man, you look at his athleticism and it's hard not to see possibilities.

Low A

Rafael Rodriguez 6'5", 198. B-R, T-R, BD: 7/13/1992 .236/.284/.297. Given a choice between a prospect dominating a level or being dominated, it's pretty safe to go with dominating being the preferable of the two. For a prospect who gets dominated, you have to look for mitigating circumstances. With Raf, it's that he did not turn 19 until half way through the summer and the Sally League can be pretty tough even on seasoned hitters, especially Augusta which has a huge field of play. Not sure where the Giants will send him next season, but he could repeat Augusta for a full season and still be not old for the level. It's kind of tough to project those numbers to anything good, but it's also still way to early to give up on him.

Ryan Lollis 6'2", 185 lbs. B-L, T-L. BD: 12/16/1986. .314/.393/.422, 10 SB. Old for the league with nothing really inspiring about the numbers. Probably on organizational player.

Devin Harris 6'3", 225 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 4/23/1988. .231/.310/.414, 15 HR. I hope Harris gets a chance to play in San Jose next year. I still think he's a legitimate sleeper. with some power and plate discipline. I liked him in college before the Giants drafted him.

SHORT SEASON

Chuckie Jones 6'3", 235 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 7/28/1992. .218/.322/.315. Chuckie had a rough season plagued by nagging oblique strains and playing against mostly older players. I still think he has a high ceiling. Hopefully he fully recuperates this offseason and is able to get a full season worth of AB's next year. Still quite young as he'll start next year at age 19.

Brett Krill 6'4", 195 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 1/24/1989. .304/.350/.488, 6 HR in 207 AB. I first found this guy on Baseball Beginnings, now Baseball Prospect Report, when he was playing for UCLA. His college stats weren't impressive with a BA of .294, but he did show some power. It was the video clips that got my attention. He's a big brawny kid who does not look like a baseball player until he puts it in motion, then you start to see that he's a lot more athletic than he looks. I was happy to see his name go up on the Giants 2010 draft list in round 25. He had a very nice first professional season for Salem-Keizer. I noticed that he rang up several OF assists from his RF post. Brett Krill is a sleeper who I will be watching for in 2012.

Leonardo Ochoa 6'0", 180 lbs. B-L, T-R. BD: 10/20/1989. .265/.330/.451, 5 HR in 102 AB. Ochoa was signed as an undrafted FA out of Canada in 2008. He had a nice start to his pro career in 2009 in Arizona: .288/.388/.405. He then missed the entire 2010 season before re-surfacing in Salem-Keizer in 2011. Another sleeper. Next year should be pivotal in his pro career.

ROOKIE AZL

Leonardo Fuentes 6'4", 215 lbs, B-R, T-R. BD: 11/29/1992. .257/.306/.425, 5 HR in 179 AB. One of several international prospects the Giants have signed in the mid 6 figure range in the last couple of years. This was his debut in the States at age 18. Gotta love the size on this kid. He is already starting to show his power potential. Not sure where we'll see him next year, Augusta? Salem-Keizer? Repeating Arizona? He's got plenty of time to develop that talent. He's a kid we can dream on for awhile. I just have a feeling this kid has an enormous ceiling.

Karl August "Gus" Benusa 6'1", 190 lbs. B-L, T-L. BD: 1/30/1991. .297/.338/.419. Benusa was drafted out of HS in round 8 in 2009. He played in the AZL that summer but missed the entire 2010 season. Hit .313/.389/.500 over his last 10 games this year. It will be interesting to see where he turns up in 2012. I'm glad the Giants are taking more flyers on these HS prospects who are flying under the radar. All it takes is for 1 or 2 of them to reach their potential.

Elliott "Major" Blair 6'1", 181 lbs. B-R, T-R, BD: 2/3/1988. .333/.421/.500, 4 triples, 6 SB in 114 AB. Drafted out of Oklahoma. Had good BA's in college, but very little playing time. Giants scouts must have seen something. Arizona too low a level to get much of a read on a draftee from a major D1 college program, but so far so good.

Christian Diaz 6'1", 170 lbs, B-L, T-L. BD: 7/15/1993. .231/.375/.308. One of the contingent of Puerto Rican high schoolers drafted by the Giants this year. Only got 13 AB's in 10 games. Very young. Again, I'm all in favor of the Giants taking flyers on these kids in the later draft rounds.

Eldred Barnett 6'1", 190 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 5/2/1989. .248/.310/.385. Drafted out of Grambling State. Started off hot but slumped at the end of the season. Kind of a longshot at this point.

DSL

Carlos Cartegena 6'2", 190 lbs. B-R, T-R. BD: 12/22/1993. .147/.291/.231. There was no hitting to speak of for the Giants DSL team in 2011. Cartegena is another of their mid 6 figure signings. Like the size. Hit a couple of HR's which is actually an accomplishment in the DSL. Not sure if he'll repeat this level or if we'll see him in Arizona.

2011 DRAFTEES

Ricky Oropesa They've been trying to make Ricky a 3'rd baseman, but he always seems to end up back at 1B. He has some speed though, and a arm good enough to be a pitching prospect, so I don't think it is out of the question that he could play a corner OF position with some experience out there. Signed too late to get into games this year.

OK, this is a tough one, but here's a stab at ranking the Giants corner OF prospects(Brandon Belt is no longer officially a prospect):

1. Francisco Peguero
2. Jarrett Parker
3. Leonardo Fuentes
4. Roger Kieschnick
5. Chuckie Jones
6. Rafael Rodriguez
7. Brett Krill
8. Carlos Cartegena
9. Leonardo Ochoa
10.Gus Benusa
11. Christian Diaz
12. Wendell Fairley
13. James Simmons
14. Devin Harris
15. Nick Liles
16. Ryan Lollis
17. Major Blair
18. Eldred Barnett.
Bonus: Ricky Oropesa.

Did I miss anyone?

15 comments:

  1. Who's this guy Skyler Stromsmoe at Richmond? Listed as a LF but also a SS, don't think I saw him in your CF/SS reports. Judging from his age he is org filler. He put up the 5th best OPS on the squad in 83 games.

    That Baseball Prospect Report site is a great resource. I'm scared how high he is on Trevor Bauer, he looks like he'll be as big a thorn in our side as Kershaw in a couple years.

    Love his description of a "Dirt Dog" - he uses it for a guy named Jack Marder who played for Oregon, just got drafted 16th by Seattle, I was hoping he'd get picked up by the Giants.

    The top guys are always fun to watch, but the long shots are my favorite. Thanks for the list.

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  2. I love these lists! Gives me a lot of names I'm not familiar with to keep an eye on. I'm familiar with most of the top guys, but will now also add Krill, Fuentes, and Ochoa to my watch list.

    I'm still positive on RafRod also, though obviously a very disappointing season overall. I assume he's going to repeat the Sally League. He was only 18 YO while the average pitcher was 21.9 YO, basically four years older, putting him far behind in experience. Makes Villalona's hitting there more impressive when considering he was even younger.

    He was only 8 hits away from making 100th in the league in BA. His BABIP was .285, vs. league average .314, so that should improve as he catches up in age. Raising it to league average would raise his BA to .261.

    His contact rate was a not bad 81%, which is good as the league was only 77%, so he was not being fooled by the pitchers despite his great difference in ability and physical development.

    And this is in a league of average hitters aged 21.4 YO, he was better than most hitters in avoiding strikeouts and making contact. Given that one of the early concerns about him was his "overly large strike zone", this shows that he's at least making contact, if weak contact, based on that poor BABIP and SLG. Most reports on him is that his power will grow as he ages and develops.

    Of course, he's poor at taking walks, only 0.35 BB/K ratio. But the league is only at 0.42, so he is not that far away either, from average. That should go up as his power kicks in.

    Looking at his monthly stats, he missed half the month of June, so it is possible that an injury is the cause of his poor season. He actually started the season off well in April, very nice, but May sucked, then he missed half the games in June, I would assume by injury (ah, found it: tightness in his groin in late April, he sat out a week, those can linger if not healed up properly, if I recall right; real medical take, DrB?). Then he also missed even more games in August. Of course, it could be that he was held out of games to work on things, didn't see any news about him being injured in August. Still, young guys often jump back in before they are healed (for classic example, look at Nate).

    I think he suffers from overhype early on, probably because he got a larger bonus than Villalona. But most early reports was that Villalona was more developed than RafRod was when he signed, but that RafRod has 5 tools, though some did think that his hit tool was iffy. And so far has been.

    But as I noted, he started out April hitting really well (.290), plus lots of walks per K (5/5) for .343 OBP, and not that many K's (5/62AB). So I still remain very hopeful that RafRod will continue to develop and be one of the Giants top prospects again at some point.

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  3. I think we missed out big by getting Beltran instead of Pence. Pence is a consistent hitter, a good defender, has a little speed on the bases, and has a plus arm. Plus if we didn't resign him in 2013, there would be draft pick compensation. I am sure we could have packaged Wheeler with a few prospects not named Gary Brown to get him. Pence could have been just as nice to protect Posey and Sandoval in the lineup without the age and injury questions. Sabes, you messed up with this one so please redeem yourself this offseason.

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  4. I think it is a fallacy to think the Giants could get Pence without giving up Wheeler and at least Brown.

    The Phillies traded their #2, #4, #9, and #23 pre-season BA rated prospects for Pence. Singleton was rated in the Top 50 by all three BA analysts, 32 to 50, ending at #39 overall. Cosart was rated #70 overall.

    Wheeler was rated #55 overall by BA. Brown would barely make up for the quality based on those ratings above. Astros might want Belt instead to even things up to the Phillies offering, but since you don't want to give up Brown, I assume you are even more against giving up Belt. So that leaves Brown as an appropriate proxy with Wheeler for Singleton/Cosart.

    Plus, they would want additional players. Our #9 happened to be Surkamp, they probably would have took him as even for the last two, Domingo was #9 but very far down the line, they would value someone this close to the majors much higher. So that would be Wheeler, Brown, and Surkamp for Pence.

    Or Tommy Joseph would be another close alternative to Surkamp that they probably would accept as replacement for the other two players.

    Still, I can see them pushing for Belt because Singleton is a 1B/OF, and did really well in advanced-A ball as a 19 YO, Brown who hit as nicely as he did, is much older and didn't hit much better than Singleton, he won't be the offensive force that Singleton could be. Of course, Singleton strikes out a LOT, so there is that risk there that he might not figure it out at higher levels, so that puts us back to equalling him to Brown again.

    I don't see how anyone can talk the Astros into anything less than Wheeler/Brown (plus others), they could make the argument that they want Belt since Singleton is so good and plays a similar position. Wheeler/Brown is the opening bid if you don't want to give up Belt, and I could see the Astros pushing strongly for Belt and settling for Brown, at least that is how I would do it as a negotiator.

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  5. I would have been OK with giving up both Wheeler and Brown for Pence

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  6. Pence has two more years of arbitration left, so does not become a FA until 2014. I would have been OK with giving up an extra prospect or 3 to get that extra 2 years of control. I'm OK with the Beltran deal too, but I can see an argument that Pence was better because you get him for 2 more years. I've made that argument myself.

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  7. Pence put up sick numbers: 324/394/954 in 54 games. He's due for 11MM and 14MM in arb for 2012/13 which is getting expensive, but I imagine Amaro Jr. will hook up a 4 year deal for his 29-32 years. 4/70 or something like that.

    Pence seems durable, but its hard to see if he's a good roll player or a star. Very unorthodox swing, goofy but effective fielding and running. I like him, not sure if giving up the farm for him would have been the move though. Obviously the Phils have a deeper system and are all-in at the table, made it a moot point.

    I'm fine with the Beltran trade, but once again Sabean's impatience creeps in. The Mets were on a different timetable because of Beltran's no-trade clause approval. The what-if is taking them down to their deadline instead of zeroing in on your guy and paying the stated price to get it done. I really doubt they would have traded Beltran to Philly, and he didn't have many teams on that trade approval list. At least Sabean got them to pay 2/3 of his salary.

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  8. Given the above rankings/depth chart, as well as our current needs and FA options...do you think Belt is our LF next year?

    If so, does he stick? Reasonable expectation?

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  9. If the Giants don't sign Beltran, I think Belt is the best option for starting LF next year. Reasonable expectation? That's a tough one. I'll say a BA of somewhere between .220 and .270 with 20-35 HR's. How's that?

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  10. If we could send a reliever to NY for Pagan, I'd be ok bringing Ross back to be the righty filling in behind all the lefty OFs. Or, Burrell and Christian instead.

    Add a guy like Punto or Gonzalez for insurance at SS, or even trade for an Andino from Baltimore, and we'd be pretty solid in my opinion.

    Lucky

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  11. Here is how I saw Pence before the trade, people are getting too assured of their correctness by how well he did afterward with Phils.

    Prior to 2011, for full seasons (3), he hit .278/.330/.466/.796. Average NL RF in 2011: .271/.345/.449/.794. So he basically hit what the average RF hit in 2011, prior to 2011.

    With Astros, he hit a bit higher, .308/.356/.471/828, but his BABIP was .368 and his BABIP for his three full seasons was only .304. And his K's were high and walks were low.

    With Phils, he hit gangbusters, continued the high BABIP at .348, previous high was when he came into league in 2007, had .377 BABIP for 108 games. With Phils, he actually did not hit that extraordinary at home (remember, Rowand hit well there too), .329/.407/.456/.862, which means he hit even better in Houston.

    The key was his road numbers with Phils, he hit .320/.386/.625/1.011, and that is actually close to his home except that he hit 10 HR in 128 AB on the road, vs. 1 HR in 79 AB in Philly. His HR/FB was 15.7% with the Phils, which balanced the 8.1% with Houston this year, averaging out to 10.7% (career 11.9%). Showing how much flukiness is in this number, while with the Phils, his GO/AO ratio ROSE to 1.60 (meaning a huge predominance of grounders than usual), meaning less Flyballs, but somehow still going out.

    This flukiness is also a regression to the mean make up for his poor 2010 road numbers, .260/.298/.416/.714, as he ended up with an overall .299/.351/516/.866 in 2011. His career road numbers are .285/.333/.472/.805.

    For me, I like to focus on a hitter's road numbers, particularly if he is hitting in strong hitter's home parks (like Houston and Philly), as more indicative of what he would do when hitting in a pitcher's park like AT&T plus the other pitcher's parks in the NL West (LA and SD).

    So the way I see it, Pence is roughly an .800 OPS hitter with poor defense (negative dWAR for career, never had positive dWAR in full season), which frankly is not an upgrade over what Schierholtz can produce, which I place somewhere in mid-700 OPS and above, plus best defense in RF in NL, though I will admit is an upgrade over Nate in that Pence actually makes it through a season without injuring himself.

    Still, to kill the farm (and trading Wheeler and Brown would have pretty much tapped it, and if Surkamp was included, for sure tapped it) for a hitter who is not that much of an upgrade over Schierholtz, I wouldn't pull the trigger on it.

    Heck, Pence, in terms of OPS and defense, definitely wasn't much of any upgrade over Cody Ross, on an overall basis, though because he is more balanced between RHP and LHP, I think that is more valuable to the lineup, Cody is more a platoon player. But I think defensive differences would help equalize things, particularly considering we had him already while it would have cost us our farm system just to get Pence.

    That's why I don't see getting Pence to be equal or better than getting Beltran.

    And I have been wondering if getting Beltran cost us the pennant. Ross's offense went south the moment Beltran came in. And Beltran basically wasn't doing anything for us the first month, either adjusting or out injured. It seemed like Sabean's open dissing of our offense was the equivalent opposite of the Wizard giving the Scarecrow a diploma, like pointing out our shortcoming caused our team to deflate, lose it's mojo.

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  12. Oh, forgot to throw out Randy Winn's partial season with us after the trade as another kind of flukey occurrence.

    The difference there is that Winn was already 31, while Pence was only 28 for 2011, so it could be that he physically matured in some way, some guys hit their prime around 28.

    But that is why I dug into his numbers, his strikeout rates didn't improve in any way, neither did his walks, plus his HR/FB was even for the year. The only big change was his BABIP was so much higher than his career, and that was a product of his improvement in line drives in 2011, which normally leads to better hitting and BABIP, but the 19% he had in 2011 only matched what was the MLB average, so that does not really explain the very high BABIP in 2011. Plus, can he really do that again in 2012 and beyond?

    Lastly, we would be paying him over $10M per year for production that in AT&T would be similar to Nate's, who we would probably be paying below $5M each year, heck, maybe even under $3M each year.

    So I'm very glad we didn't trade for Pence, and particularly so that we didn't gut the farm for him. He is not someone I would gut the farm for. Maybe a Hanley, but he wasn't available. Or Braun. Or Longorio. Votto. Not Pence.

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  13. No long discussion on this one OGC, I agree completely with you. I thought that Pence was an improved Schierholz but worried about park factors. The only advantage is the right handed bat, and seeing him crush that ball at PacBell did leave an impression. I do think Pence is a better fielder than his UZR and he has a good arm. But the 2/25 he is going to get plus any extension makes it steep on the back end, and the Giants can't afford to give up the farm right now (or apparently pay some OF 2/25 - ouch).

    Cabrera might have cost us the playoff berth - you turn over 1/4 of your lineup with Kepp and Beltran, OK. But 3/8 and you are really making a statement about the ineffectiveness of your guys, and they were hanging in there. We've beat this to death on your site, but if they cut Rowand and Tejada upon getting Beltran and avoided Cabrera, they would have had a much different mojo. Cody Ross did turn in the worst 2 months of his career after Beltran as well, maybe it turns out different if he's leading off in CF for August like he did in September before HIS injury.

    Pretty frustrating after watching the terrible pitching, especially for the NL pennant. And I think Cabrera did give away at least 3 games with that terrible glove (to go along with Miggy Tejada's half dozen offenses).

    But I don't blame Beltran. They hit a bad skid right when he got here, there was no leadership in the clubhouse, something Freddy or Posey would have really helped with. Huff lost the respect by shrugging off his season as a fluke (Krukow recently threw him under the bus on this) but he's really more of a court jester not a leader. Then the Beltran wrist injury, then the Nate foot injury and things got pretty twisted.

    Beltran came back and tore it up, playing hurt (and yes, making a big deal about it - he is a bit of a primadonna). I think its fine to have a couple of reserved types in the clubhouse though, we have enough introverts as it is. And most likely too many frat boy types. Don Carlos is a perfect nickname for Beltran. And he'll cost more than 2/25 most likely. Go get em Sabes!

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  14. Yeah I meant extravert - we have plenty of characters in the clubhouse, don't need anymore. Between Panda, Wilson and Timmy you're almost up to capacity.

    Brandon Belt got his first HR in the Dominican League. 3-15 with 4Ks/2BBs so far. Frankie Peggs is hitting .294 with 3ks/2BBs of his own.

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  15. I would not put the blame on Cabrera. Crawford was not hitting at all before Cabrera was traded for. In June/July, Crawford hit .177/.256/.227/.483, something had to be done.

    Unfortunately, Cabrera was done.

    But it was not like we were expecting him to be an offensive savior, just that he would at least be relatively competent as a hitter and fielder, and he failed at both. Blame our AL scouts for that one.

    I would blame Beltran's horrible first month for us before I would blame Cabrera, and I would add on the pitching staff's off-month in August as well, before I even get to Cabrera.

    I blame a perfect storm of injuries for getting Keppinger. If Sanchez, then Fontenot, and then Tejada, did not get injured, there would have been no impetus to trade for Keppinger. The Giants probably would have been OK starting whoever among those three were healthy, particularly since Tejada was hitting well for about a month when he went down.

    It was more the obtaining of Beltran and the public acknowledgement by Sabean that seemed to put some cracks in the offense. Whether it was Beltran himself (some called him too cold and detached; remember, Renteria spoke in front of everyone and cried around the start of Sept 2010 to rally the troops), or the fact that him coming in basically pushed Ross, who was one of our more effective hitters up to then, mostly onto the bench, and Rowand even deeper on the bench, or Sabean exposing the offense's kimono, I know everything is just speculation.

    I agree the team was rudderless during the stretch run. Now I think the leaders in 2010 were Burrell and Posey, neither of whom were around this time. Never really viewed Sanchez as a leader.

    Thought last year that maybe Huff was a leader, but he's more the second in command or even the court jester you noted, than a leader. A leader would not have come out of last off-season in bad shape, nor would a leader be all "Oh well" during the stretch run when things were not going well, as you pointed out.

    I think things will be fine once Posey returns to the clubhouse in 2012, I was really impressed with his leadership last season and I think the best example of that was his short but sweet statement at the parade.

    Ultimately, though, I don't really blame the Giants, I mostly tip my cap to the D-backs. The Giants actually hung in there a bit. The D-backs unfortunately hit the turbo after-burners and jetted into the top spot and stayed afloat long enough to flop in the playoffs. I don't think Goldschmidt is as good as he appeared in his short great 2011 season. He was a big difference maker going down the stretch. If he is for real, we will have trouble in 2012 and beyond. I also think the pitchers over-performed a bit beyond what they did previously.

    I think a lot of that is what I would call the Billy Martin effect that Kirk Gibson brought to the team. Billy had that fiery personality that I think Gibson has, and he would come in and push and push and push his team to overperform that first year or so. Then he would wear out his welcome and his act would get a bit old, and soon the team would revert back to their prior mediocrity.

    However, I think Gibson is a better leader than Martin ever was, so I think he can last as an effective manager. But can he continue to drive above average performance (they were over 10 games above .500 in one-run games and few managers can manage that, Bochy among them; his team should regress badly in 2012 unless he is one of the very elite, there are maybe 4 or 5 managers over last 20 years who could do that regularly).

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