A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball

I am seeing bad things for the Padres this year. Their pitching staff, so dominant for most of last year, is going to fail them this year. I’ll take Bumgarner/Lincecum VS Harang/Stauffer all day long. And their hitting will be as bad as usual. I’ll be surprised if we don’t sweep them in this little 2-game series……

The right side of the blog, once the home of my glorious bikini babes, you will find a boring wasteland of words. Please review the page that says “This week’s posts of the day!” There are 9 of them. Please vote for your favorite for *post of the week*. The winner will take one step closer to securing the Safeway(!) gift card at the end of the year……

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I was only about to catch the first two innings of the game—took the rest of the game in on the box score and a drive home listening to Marty Lurie. Some things I wasn’t able to understand: How did Zito make it through 6 innings throwing an 83 mph fastball? Was his curve ball unhittable? Why was Runzler allowed to pitch to all those right handers? Thames hits lefties quite well. Did Aaron Rowand actually hit a home run? Box scores don’t lie, do they? And it wasn’t in the box score but Lurie was skewering Tejada for swinging at a pitch at his shoe tops when apparently he should have been taking. It must have been ill timed because Lurie wouldn’t skewer chicken much less a Giant. Huff had a bad game in rightfield but it’s hardly like he’s forgotten how to play the position. If anything, he should have had more time this Spring to re-acclimate to the outfield. Some of you guys remember “Zito’s Law”–*when he pitches, bad shit happens*. Again, I didn’t see most of the game but it sounds like his law was in full effect last night…….

Ok, what do you want me to do with the BB’s? We love ’em but I’m wondering if it’s time to move on from them. Cast your vote, I will consider the results in my decision…….

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Unfortunately, all signs are pointing to Zito taking the hill this evening at 5pm. Bad idea. I’m sure that Barry is saying all the right things to the medical staff. He’s a gamer. Game on. When your skills have eroded to near career ending I guess all you have left is your *game face*.

There is an awful lot of manly-manly-ness in baseball. There’s no crying in baseball. There’s no whining in baseball. And for the most part you wouldn’t ever beg out of the starting line up because you feel sore…..

But this is different. Zito was in a major car crash. His neck and back, at the very least, have to be awfully stiff and sore right now. For a pitcher, stiff and sore is not exactly the way your back is supposed to feel when you take the mound. Besides his obvious range of motion issues in his wind up, how do you think he’s going to cover balls hit near the mound? How’s he going to cover first base? Jeez, how’s he even supposed to check the runner at first base if he’s having trouble turning his neck?

This is a guy who was throwing 82 mph fastballs in Spring Training. And now he’s been in a car crash. That new ‘stash isn’t expected to improve anything either. I am firmly entrenched in the “ABZ (Anybody But Zito) Camp”. I would have wished to see Zito skip a start and move Bumgarner up to pitch tonight. Hell, the could have called Voglesong up to pitch and I would have preferred it. ABZ, baby.

I love being wrong so let’s see Zito prove me so. But I think what we are going to see is a guy gingerly take the mound armed with his game face and little else and leave about an hour later in the third inning after giving up a bunch of walks/hits and runs.

Don’t ever listen to what the player says. They all lie. He’s not fine…….

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Yeah, yeah, still basking and all but I can still call out my team for sloppy play while still gettin’ my bask on, can’t I? When we go up 3-1 the game is supposed to be over. With our pitching staff, that’s just the way it goes. But when you factor in mental mistakes and some general bad luck, I guess we can’t count on mailing in a win. The  President of the Under Achieving Club (Posey) says “I don’t know if I’m trying to do to much. Maybe it’s being anxious and jittery and trying to go out and get the ball.” You could take that quote and throw a blanket on the rest of the team. They’re playing tight and when you play tight you play dumb and bad things happen. That’s what’s going on with us right now. This isn’t *opening season jitters*. They better get used to how to handle this because they are going to be spending the entire season defending their crown. EVERY team is going to be gunning for them. And somehow, we need to manage that pressure into the execution of plays. Right now we are just executing ourselves…….

Flap Fantasy Baseball Standings

Get ready for games like this all year. I don’t mean the score, but the energy and the way teams are gunning for us–that’s going on all year. If we lost 10 in a row and head into Minute Made Park, the Astros would be as pumped as they can get to take down the World Champions. We wear the target 24/7……

The Good:

Brandon Belt: I am obsessed with players who take pitches and walks. OBSESSED. Besides the obvious benefits of working a count in your favor and piling pitches on to a pitcher’s arm and getting a pitcher into the stretch, getting on base is sort of an essential pert of the game and you can’t do that trying to hit line drives all day long. Brandon Belt did it all last night in terms of taking pitches and working counts. Grade: A-

Timmy: He wasn’t as dominating as Kershaw but he was awfully good and he hit Uribe which is also good if you like story lines and the rivalry. Grade: B+

Pat the Bat: He sent me right back to last July when he sent that laser beam into the left field bleachers at ATT. I said it then and I stand by it: that was the loudest I’ve ever heard it at ATT (I was sitting near the bricks down the RF line). Of course, he also made an error but that’s what you get with The Bat–hitting and fucking up in the field. Grade: B

Pablo: He made a great catch in the 6th, it was a catch he doesn’t come close to making last year. Grade for losing Weight in the Offseason: A+

The Bad:

That 6th inning Laurel and Hardy play by Posey and Pablo. Assuming Pablo didn’t give Posey an automatic signal to throw I’d say that play was 75% on Buster, 25% on Pablo (Pablo did seem to half heartedly call for the throw but Posey’s decision to throw it, as well as the throw, was atrocious). Grade: F

Tejada: His throw to 2nd was a joke and he went 0-4. He also looks old. Grade: F-

The Batters (minus Belt and Pat the Bat): It was Opening Day so I’ll cut them a little slack but they were ridiculously impatient, refusing to take pitches and swinging at anything Kershaw threw up there. Pablo looked especially bad and the ESPN announcers were almost rude in how they attacked him for it. Unfortunately, he fed their attack with a few examples of his most absurd, wild off balance swings I’ve ever seen. Grade: D-

If this were last year, a loss like this would have bothered me more. I simply haven’t built up enough stamina to perseverate on a loss. We are the World Champions and the b-a-s-k-i-n-g continues on…….

Current Flap Fantasy League Standings:

I’m hardly one to ever bring the slightest bit of attention to myself (by the way, my new nickname is *Big Shady*— please make a note of it) but it’s “Prediction Day” and time for a “look at me” moment. In truth, this will be the lamest Prediction Day since we started doing them back in 2007. Back then, we actually could form some genuine disagreements on how good or bad the team was. I came in with 74 wins that year (took a lot of heat for that ‘doomer view, by the way) and I wasn’t too far off as they stumbled in with 71. The next year I thought they were in complete disarray and predicted they’d win 63. They were, in fact, pretty bad but not as bad as I thought and they won 72. 2009 was an easy call, I knew they’d win 88 and that’s what they did. Bingo–on the freakin’ nose, baby….but I digress……

By the beginning of last season, everyone was pretty much on board (I said 90 wins) and we were all pretty much clumped together in the late 80’s—early 90’s win total area. I think Ed and Stix both nailed it cold with 92 (correct me if I’m wrong or if I overlooked your 92 call) and then of course there was the “Perfection Prediction” from That Fucking Clown who told us we would be winning the world series in 2010. That man knows his predictions……

This year, frankly, will be a little underwhelming. If we were all clumped together LAST year I can only imagine what 2011 will look like as we prepare to defend our world series title as WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS OF THE WORD. But what the hell, it don’t cost nothin’, throw yours into the wind and see which way it blows…….

I’ve already said that I think we are going to start the season slowly. With 22 of our first 33 on the road and Brain Wilson and Cody Ross sidelined we are in for an uphill battle in April. We also have to deal with the obvious new issue of all teams gunning for us–when the WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS shows up in your yard, you are trying just a little harder to take that team down. And there’s a risk of us playing a little tight as we adjust to this new role of WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS OF THE MOTHERFUCKING WORLD (sorry, I’ve probably repeated that title to myself in my head about 5 million times since Cruz swung through that pitch). And with little information coming out about Zito’s car accident from last night, I will avoid giving you my opinion on his impact on the first 60 days of the season and just hope the best for him that he isn’t seriously injured…….

With all that said, I think we start out 15-18 over our first 33. Not a great start but nothing to panic over. The baseball season is a long haul and after our first 33 we have 129 to go with most of those at home. So while I think the Spring is going to drag a little I think we turn up the volume big time across the Summer months. We’ll have to go 77-52 after our slow start but I don’t see any reason what we can’t do that and end the year with another 92 wins. So that’s how I see it fellas. Toss your number into the ring……

Well, at least it’s an early game today and then a quick trip down to LA. For me, the Bay Bridge Series has disintegrated into Dead Men Walking. Did you see Anderson’s at bat in the first game? I shouldn’t call it an at bat, he was standing there with a bat watching pitches go by. He must have been steamed to watch Dirrrrrty swing away freely in the next inning. Come on, if you’re so afraid of your pitcher getting hurt swinging a bat or running out a ball in play then you have some conditioning problems….

I’d rather see all the teams use the final day before the regular season as a get-away-day and just take care of the mental prep for the game versus LA. How many of today’s player’s are going to be doing anything other than going through the motions? Actually, that’s how you get hurt sometimes…….

Brandon Belt…..Come on!!!!!!!!!!!! ……er……down?

We find out later today. He didn’t do anything to leverage Sabean into keeping him on the opening day roster but the Ross injury has absolutely brought him into the mix. And if the Giants are really thinking of Huff in RF and DeRosa at 1B then I am doing an about face and saying give Belt the job. DeRosa is a fine little “fill in the blank” guy and he’ll help us out in that role this year. But he’s just a *guy*. His spring training of ’11 was pretty much exactly the same as his spring training in ’10 (when he was still injured).

2010: 6 runs, 14 hits, 19 total bases, 1hr, 6 rbi’s, 3bb’s, .639OPS

2011: 6runs, 14 hits, 18 total bases, 1hr, 6rbi’s, 3bb’s, .707 OPS

Blah, blah, blah….underwhelming.

While Belt didn’t go all “Randy Elliot”  on us, he definitely had his moments and showed his star potential. Is he ready? Who knows, only one way to find out. If he’s overwhelmed by mlb pitching THEN you go the deRosa route. And while it would be a smart buisness decision to call him up on April 11th or later (to delay his service time by a year), the Giants are making so much money right now I would think they could eat that year. Remember, if Belt is the real-deal it isn’t that important to delay him a year since Sabean will likely buy out his years anyway the same way he’s done with his other studs……..

Now that it looks like an almost certainty that Wilson won’t be available on Opening Day, Bochy has some thinkin’ ta do. We’ve got a lot of quality relievers in that pen but how many of them do you trust to close out games? Closing is one of the most difficult jobs in all of sports (in my opinion). The main contenders for the job are: Romo, Affeldt, and Casilla. Mota actually used to close a million years ago but I doubt Bochy is thinking about using him now. Kroon has the most experience but probably won’t make the team.

Forget what Bochy is going to do. What would YOU do?

The Giants wrapped up a Spring that has to be considered a success— no major injuries, everyone got their work in, the vets did what they had to do and the kids showed some good promise. But, like all teams, we are heading into the season with some question marks:

1) When will Wilson be available? If I’m Marc Kroon I take the assignment to Fresno and give it 30-45 days. There will be a clearer picture by then–either Wilson comes back fine, Romo et al fill in admirably or Kroon gets the call up to be our closer. Either way, he pitched very well this Spring…….

2) Is Pablo ready to be “Pablo ’09” or just a skinny version of last year’s train wreck? I’m cautiously optimistic on him reverting to form…….

3) When will Belt get called up? If they wait till April 11th the Giants delay his service time a year. That’s just good business. Could it be that simple? I’m still not sure who is going to play first base with Huff heading to the OF for at least most of April……

4) Zito—the grand daddy question mark of them all. He should do what Prince did a few years back and change his name from *Zito* to *?* That would be so perfectly zen of him……

Not that badly…..

Too much is being made of having to play our first 22 of 33 on the road. If anything, I am EXPECTING them to start slow. The Giants wouldn’t admit this, but I bet they start the season playing a little tight—World Champs, everyone is gunning for them—if they go out trying to prove that last year wasn’t a fluke it wouldn’t shock me if they play a little tight in April. Couple that with the uncertainty of Wilson, Ross being hurt, Belt starting the season in Fresno, Freaking Rowand playing, AND the fact that we are playing most of our first 33 on the road? That’s a slow start waiting to happen, baby….

But it doesn’t mean a thing. You play 162 games, not 33. We are going to hit the Summer months with most of our games at home, Belt manning the 1-bag full time and I think we are just going to steam roll June through August (barring any major injuries)……

Baseball isn’t like football, a sport where a fast start is usually so important. So I’m not going to sweat FOR A SECOND what is likely going to be a slightly under .500 April. And you shouldn’t either……

UNFUCKINGBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YOWZAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!

WE ARE THE CHAMPS OF THE WORLD!!!!!!!!!!

YES YES YES YESSSSSSSSSSSS  ))))))) TREMENDOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WE DID IT ! ! !

I feel…peaceful

San Francisco

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG IAM COMPLETELY NUMB THIS TEAM IS UNBELIEVLABLE 56 YEARS OF TORTURE IS OVER.GOD I LOVE THIS TEAM!!!! And All of the FLAP NATION!!!!!!!!!!!

I can’t believe we’re the World Champs having to trot out shitty lineup after shitty lineup each and every day.

And oh yeah, we did it with NO Whitey. I love this team. I love all you guys and gals.
I’m so happy for everybody.And I’m so happy for our beloved “Blockhead.”
Plain and simple; Bochy is the goddamn man.

I can die happy now. There are NO WORDS…

I’m tearing with pride like a father looking at his kids…

I’ll write about this more tomorrow, I’m sure. For now, I’m just so happy for these guys, everyone of them. We’re going to sit down to the cassoulet now, then to the bar “en parade”… my Clover is on ice… I just kissed Lisa and Zeke and Bea… Bea didfn’t like being third…

VICTORY!!!!!!!

Woo-Hoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OMG!!! We did it!!

Just downed my last Old Milwaukee and it was nice and cold! Damn World Champs! Kinda nice! Gotta get one of those Tee shirts!

What a team!!!!!!!!!!

Unreal. So happy, but don’t know how to act!!!

Thank you, Giants!
Thank you, Flappers!
Thank you, Flav!!!

So happy…..

Yes, warrior heroes in the annals of history, as Twin rightly said it. I am numb and speechless. As I said in the new thread — lovely video by Magnus — our hearts can never feel that same hunger again. Ever. Our hearts are wild with joy, and some of that wild joy will always reside within if we choose to tap it. I mean that. And thanks again, Craig, for this cathedral.

I feel vindicated, relieved, validated, whole, serene, humbled, moved, grateful. I used to think it would have to be a letdown after all these years (I’m 62 on December 18). It’s not.

I am honored to be the first (or the last) to Comment on this immortal video: a humane and warm tribute to our beloved and immortal heroes, true warriors; and to the long and sweet-tortured — and now redeemed — fierce loyalty of Black and Orange Nation. Our hearts are now bursting with wild joy — and our hearts will never again be quite empty (or hungry) quite the way they were. Ever. Again.

No coincidence that the birth of the Flap leads immediately to a World Championship!

Where were you 10 years ago Flav? Well done and I am really speechless…Go Giants!

Some golf tomorrow, some boozing and cigars heading to a wipeout on election day, life does not get any sweeter in a 48 hour period!

We’re all winners tonight.

What a season. The San Francisco Giants are World Series Champions. I am so happy.

Flav, thanks to you, and thanks to one and all here on the Flap for making this season one for the books. I’m numb, I’m completely numb at the moment. I don’t think it’s sunk in yet. Bruce Bochy just told Jaymee Sire he feels numb as well. I know how ya feel skip. I know how ya feel.

Thanks skipper, and thanks thanks to you all. I just heard Flem’s call of Rent’s HR.
He had a Peter Brady voice change moment when he said it’s “gaaaaawnnnn.” You guys gotta check it out. It’s a winner. Goddamn. We won. We really, really, won. Let’s start the parade!

Thank you too, Craig. It’s been over an hour and I’m still shaking with joy, speechless and ecstatic all at the same time. I may not sleep tonight and don’t really care. Congratulations to every one of the great Giants fans here. What a special team. Long-suffering no more: World Series champions!

sweet dreams…is this for real? is it?

I echo every word Te said.

Just watched your video. I started laughing and laughing at the pure joy of it all. Thanks for letting us all get together..

The Flap made it all the sweeter for this SoCal Giants fan..

i’m just now starting to come down. the boys and i went busting out onto the street and just howled.

bless the flappers (and the splashers).

the giants are the world series champions.

i burst into tears when i first said that (surprised the boys! heck, it surprised the shit out of me).

San Francisco Giants. World Series Champions. I’ve been waiting to say that for over 45 years. It looks and sounds even better than I ever imagined. I called my best friend since we were in second grade. Giants fans together. He saw my number on his phone. He picked up the receiver and greeted: “Fucking Giants – World Series Champpppppppsss!” Priceless…

I can’t even begin to know how the players must feel–I know I am emotionally and physically exhausted.

Since I can’t verbalize it to them, I will say it here before my friends in Giants-dom: Dad, Grandpa, they won! They won!

The World Champion San Francisco Giants.
I’m still trying to absorb that. That’s going to take some time to sink in.

Woke up this morning on the North East coast of North Carolina and the SF Giants were still the World Champions. Went back and watched the highlights and started tearing up all over again.
Thank you Flav, thank you Flappers and most of all, thank you the 2010 World Champion San Francisco GIANTS.

Like I’m sure many of you did, I had to check the interwebs again when I woke up this morning to make sure this wasn’t some cruel, sick joke. It’s not! The San Francisco Giants are World Series Champions! Getting teary eyed again just typing this.

These men will be heroes in SF for as long as they live- and beyond…

Barry’s really dealin’ these days, isn’t he? 2.49 Spring ERA. Sparkling. Of course his 1/1 bb/so ratio is a bit hard to swallow. He’s holding opponents to a .197 ba–of course when you’re walking guys all day long it’s kinda hard to get the bat on the ball. But hey, Zito got a 2.49 ERA this Spring. Last Spring, his ERA was 6.35. The year before it was 5.12…

Of course, nothing Zito ever does is a harbinger for anything that is about to happen next. Therefore, I have what is quite possibly the most difficult contest we’ve ever held here at The Flap…..

What will Zito’s ERA be for the month of April? We could have 1,000 people participate in this one and it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if no one came within a full run of his actual ERA. But have at it, email me your pick to bigflavor77@gmail.com. I will throw some Giants schwag at the winner…..

Speaking of contests, it’s time to vote on the POTW— to the right you’ll see a page titled “This week’s Posts of the Day”– Click on it and you will find 7 entries. My personal favorite, if I read this correctly, was Ted actually doing a Capt Kirk impression with his post. That was gold. But maybe I was reading too much into that and he was just drunk. 🙂

If his right calf injury is as serious as it looked, this could have some fairly far reaching implications to the opening day line up. Schierholtz could go from “guy we’re trying to ditch” to our starting right fielder. Who else could Bochy run out there? Maybe DeRosa? He could put Huff out there and that would be another reason we could see Belt opening day—but with the Giants just needing to delay Belt’s service time by 10 games or so, I would be surprised to see that happen. If it did, the easy chop would be Ishikawa. Tough one to swallow, I like Ishikawa……..

The Bonds trial hasn’t made any sense to anyone (including me) but I think I’ve finally figured out why it’s happening: ego. If you are the D.A., how would you rather spend your time? Prosecuting dirtbag drug dealers and murderers? Or prosecuting Barry Bonds where you get to see your name in the paper every day and sit 10 feet away from the HR King for a few weeks? What a sad joke this all is………

With our stellar ST record, I was surprised to see us near the bottom of the league with a .258 batting average. The Milwaukee Brewers are hitting a mind blowing .337 as a team. Crazy. We’re 4th in the league in ERA which is no surprise. I WAS surprised to see the A’s 2nd to last in team ERA at 5.65. That staff is one of the best in baseball….

Wilson is saying he’s going to be ready for opening day. Uh huh. Right. Something still isn’t sitting right with me about him, specifically how he conducted himself in the off season. If you are going to brag about your hooker-laden trip through Thailand, show up on late night tv shows dressed like a fool and associate yourself with Charlie Sheen (winning!) then you better be able to answer the bell when your job starts. And he just hasn’t been able to do that. First the back injury and now an oblique thing has popped up. To me, that’s a guy who just didn’t take care of his core this Winter. And for a pitcher, you just have to do that. He can SAY he’s going to be ready for opening day but even if he is physically able to pitch he simply hasn’t thrown enough innings to be READY for opening day. He’s pitched 5 freaking innings….

Brian Wilson has earned the benefit of the doubt for all he’s done in his career for us. But these core injuries are an ominous sign. And when you put yourself out there the way he did this off season you’re also gonna need to be accountable for the flip side of the fame and focus that you bring on himself. There’s a fine line between winning(!) and, well, not winning……

I don’t read the Splash regularly anymore so maybe some of you can correct me. But it seems to me that this *hatchet job* came out of nowhere. Or has Schulman been regular reporting on how bad Tejada has looked this Spring? If he hasn’t been doing that, then his blog thread seems to be odd. And here’s the thing, it’s not even a hatchet job. He goes off on the guy in his first paragraph saying he can’t hit, his arm is weak and he has no range. And then he immediately follows it up with “oh but by the way, I’m sure he’ll be fine in the regular season” with no reasoning behind that prediction at all.

Huh?

Look, if you’re going to write so many inflammatory accusations and then immediately write that the dude is going to be fine then you should have never written the blog post in the first place. I haven’t read ANYTHING that has consistently said Tejada looks awful this Spring. I haven’t read anything about him looking good, either. For the most part, the news coming out of Arizona has been largely positive about the team and the players.

So why did Schulman feel the need to so obviously draw negative attention to Tejada? Was that his weird way of trying to defend him? Jeez, if that’s what he was doing then it’s a good thing he’s not one of Barry’s lawyers. And again, since when did Tejada need that type of defense? No one is writing or saying anything consistently bad about Tejada’s Spring performance. Therefore, there was no need to defend him.

It’s my suspicion that Schulman wrote that blog post for no other reason than to watch the lemmings at the Splash fight with each other. Throwing raw meat into the shark tank can be fun to watch, I guess, at least for some people.

The bottom line with Tejada: at this point in his career he should be playing 3rd base. That’s not an inflammatory comment it’s just a fact. And with his power declining he’s at a crossroads there, too. If he tries to bang the ball out of ATT all day long, he’s done. But he could salvage his OPS and be valuable to us if he takes advantage of the gaps in our park and hits 35 doubles. And I posted all of this before Spring Training even started and I used actually numbers to support my claim…..

So there, I was hardly unnecessarily negative about the guy, I’m just looking at him objectively, and I didn’t go out on some dumb ass limb and say that “I think he’ll be fine when the season starts” since there’s no reason to throw that little piece in unless he’s simply afraid of seeing Tejada in the clubhouse. Which, frankly, after that random blog post that contradicted itself and was written for no reason, maybe he should be……

and just for the hell of it……..

If Bochy is playing Belt at 1B and Huff in LF this late in the Spring season I’m assuming the Giants are seriously considering having Belt break camp as the starting first baseman. Either that or Bochy is just taking a casual look at what the LU COULD look like with Belt and Huff in it and a split squad day is the best time to do that.

I’m having a hard time understanding why Pat the Bat isn’t automatically considered out starting LF this year. You like OPS? You get it from Burrell. After he got away from the weirdness of AL pitching he put up the following OPS numbers for us in 2010:

June: 1.021

July: ugly. But this was proven to be his 1-off month

August: .932

September: .864

His well documented World Series failure was an aberration to an otherwise outstanding year. If you think Belt is going to bust out of the gate with OPS’ in the .900’s every month then by all means, give him the job. I just don’t subscribe to the theory that a guy beating up spring training chumps should be handing a coveted starting 1b job at the major league level.

Do you all know who Chris Davis is? He’s a monster. Or at least, he’s supposed to be. We’ve been hearing about his 40HR potential for a few years. So far, we’ve gotten zip out of him. But spring training? Oh baby, Chris Davis OWNS spring training. In 2009 he banged out 5hr’s and hit over .300. In 2010 he hit .364 and this year he’s tearing the cover off the ball at a .409 clip with four bombs.

And yet in 2009, at the mlb level he hit .238. Last year he hit .192 and bounced back and forth from AAA. He’ll probably do more of the same this year…….

I’m not saying Belt would fail if he started the year with us. I’m saying, he’s still an unknown at this level. And we have a perfectly good, known quantity right now in Pat Burrell (unless you want to argue against the value of OPS as a stat). I hope Belt starts in Fresno and The Bat starts the season in LF………

On another baseball related note: The Mets released Oliver Perez yesterday. A few days before they released Luis Castillo. And this is being done by a team that is apparently on the brink of financial ruin. And yet they still ate 18 million in contracts. I hope Sabean takes note and finally pulls the trigger on releasing Aaron Rowand……..

OK, I’m breaking my own rule right now. Spring training stats don’t mean anything. They just don’t. And yet, Darren Ford leads the majors in stolen bases, in only 20 at bats. I know he’s picked up a lot of those with PR opportunities and that’s the point.

What makes more sense, carrying a guy on the roster who makes a ton of money who’s largely worthless, or carrying a guy on the roster who makes nothing but can literally win games for you off the bench? Actually, forget Rowand, I’m tired of talking about his dumb ass. If Belt doesn’t make the roster it’s fairly well confirmed that Burrell will start in LF. The pattern last year was to give Burrell his 3 at bats and then take him out in the 8th/9th before he could fuck up anything in the outfield. Nate is loosely penciled in as the guy to do that. But why not have it be Ford? He only plays center field so it would have to be Torres who moves to LF, but I like the idea of using Ford off the bench every time we’re in a tight game and need a secret weapon as a PR. Then just send him in when The Bat gets ready for his early shower.

Look, it’s either Rowand or Nate that has to go. Nate’s fiddling around with his usual underwhelming Spring stats and Rowand is sucking hind tit as he will be doing for the rest of his time in the big leagues.

Darren Ford is more valuable than either one of them in terms of a guy who can win a game by himself literally any game he’s put into. If that’s not value I don’t know what is………

I still don’t think it’s going to happen but there are enough national news articles on it right now so it’s worth kicking around again. Let’s say Sabean hands the first base reigns over to him. I’m actually fine with the idea (all I ever said was that I was certain it wouldn’t happen). Who goes?

Not as easy a question as you might think…

Travis Ishikawa? You could make a case to bounce Ishi but I wouldn’t do it. His defense alone should keep him on a major league team. JT Snow played for 7 seasons after his final 20 HR season in 1999. And I do believe that Travis Ishikawa will be a hitter in this league. How good isn’t an issue. He’ll be good enough to start for a few years with his defense saving him for that period of time……..

Pat Burrell? Negative. The Bat will lose his gig if Belt makes the squad but he could be a valuable RH power bat off the bench. Plus, he could spot start against pitchers he’s murdered (that list is long) and who knows, if he gets hot Bochy could keep running him out there till he cools off. The fact that he is only making a million dollars is another reason why it would be stupid to release him……..

Nate The Less-Than-Great? I don’t think they would have to release Nate, they could trade him for shit the way they traded Franny and Lewis. If they ditched Nate to the Indians for cash and some decent porn, I would give a half hearted thumbs up on that move. I like Nate but he just hasn’t seized his many opportunities. Plus, he shaves his beard in that George Michael’s 5 o’clock shadow thing and I hate that………

Aaron Rowand. I just don’t see a reason to keep your worst outfielder on the team just because he makes a lot of money. What do the Giants care about 24 million? They could eat 24 million during a 7th inning stretch. Release him, move on and never speak  his name again (unless you are recalling his glorious catch to save Dirrrty’s no hitter)…….

So if it comes down to releasing Rowand or trading Nate, and I’m Neukom, I release Rowand. It’s time. End this nightmare now……..

If you look to the right you’ll see a widget that says “This Week’s Posts of the Day”– review the entries carefully, there are six to choose from.

#1 is from Loo, one of the favorites to win the Safeway Card.

#2 is from Macdog, my main man on the scene in Philly

#3 is from Zumie–normally one of our most level headed bloggers, showing up here with a bit of an edge

#4 is a tandem post from Denny and Ted

#5 Ted strengthened his shot at winning this week with yet another entry

#6 is from Ferrethead. This one was actually from our Fantasy Baseball Message Board but the venomous potty mouth usually unseen from such a lady was impossible for me to ignore, so I posted it here.

So there ya go, 6 entries this week. I’ll probably close the voting tomorrow am. Blogger with the most total POT-week’s at the end of the season wins the coveted Safeway Card……

Quick pick highlights for the Tourney:

1 ) Princeton to beat Kentucky

2) St. Peters to beat Purdue AND THEN Georgetown

3) Notre Dame, Washington and St John’s will go to the Elite 8

4) Ohio State will win it all

Toss out your best predictions in this thread. The best ones that actually come true will find their way to a widget on the right side of the blog….

16 days to go till it matters…….

Giants still have a lot of guys batting over .300. Of course, when one of them is No Whitey Stewart who is currently toting around an OPS of .897, you take these numbers lightly. Vogelsong has a sparkling 2.13 ERA but he’s walked 7 in 12.2 innings pitched. Pablo and Huff lead the team with 3 bombs a piece. Lots of other guys are doing things too, you can check out all their stats here:

http://tinyurl.com/49pngvw

Hey, here’s a shocker out of Arizona: RIch Harden has been……drum roll….shut down again! I have never seen an individual anywhere in the world (sports or otherwise) have so many lat problems in their life. I said it when it happened, it’s like clockwork. Harden “feels some discomfort” and they decide to give him “a few days off, maybe a week. There is no problem”. Then he hits the 15 day DL. Then the 60 Day. If there was an Olympic event in “Sitting on the DL”, RIch Harden would be a gold medal winner……

And their stud closer Bailey is out again with an elbow problem. Again.

The A’s get injured by the dozens every single year. How can this happen to a team EVERY….SINGLE….YEAR. To me, this has to be related to some kind of conditioning philosophy flaw that Beane has when he hires the trainer and the conditioner. They’ve gone through several so it’s not like it’s one guy’s problem…..

Either that or the A’s just hire a bunch of pain-intolerant sissies (actually, I’ve heard for years that Harden is EXACTLY this). But that wouldn’t explain the rest of them…….

I guess it could also just be chalked up to bad luck……

Sorry, ANOTHER A’s thread! But when your team is The Champion of the World with the best record in Spring Training and no holes to fill anywhere on the roster, you have to start reaching for topics……

If you asked him, and he was honest, where would he say he would most prefer to play out the rest of his career? He won a World Series with the White Sox, would he enjoy a return to those glory days? He said earlier this Spring that one of the greatest moments of his life was getting a standing ovation at a Bears game when he was flipping the pre-game coin. Imagine that, Aaron Rowand getting a standing ovation….

Maybe he’d like to go back to Philly where he had his best offensive years. They freaking love that guy in Philly……

THe White Sox are pretty set at OF with Pierre, Rios and Quentin, but those corner guys could get injured any second and Rios is always good for one brutal half of baseball every year. Maybe he starts as the 4th guy and takes over when the inevitable happens?

Philly’s OF is less determined. Victorino has CF locked up but Ibanez has worn out his welcome in Philly. What about a L/R platoon with him until one of them sucks worse than the other and is demoted to the bench for good? Heck, even a trade for Ibanez makes sense—give both of them a change of scenery….

He couldn’t possibly pick the Giants as his dream team, right? How bad is it going to feel for him having Andres Torres calling him off balls all game long? And with our fans on their toes ready to give the dude the booing he deserves, wouldn’t he appreciate a fan base that is at least willing to give him a chance?

So learn how to play left field, chump. It just might make your over-paid/under-producing ass easier to move…….

I get that they are “stretching him out”, seeing if he can be a starter. But yesterday unfolded strangely with Runzler finding out he was the starting pitcher when he found a baseball and a copy of the Dodgers roster in his locker. Then, according to the Chronicle, Runzler “unaccustomed to the role, asked starting pitchers what their normal pre-game routine is”. Huh? If we have been reading about the possibility of converting Runzler to a starter since last December, why would Runzler be wandering around the clubhouse on March 12th seeking out this information? Shouldn’t Raggs/Gardner have been at least TALKING to him about this, if not actually having him practice it?

Weird.

That will be at least moderately interesting to follow. There is so much I don’t know about the legal system. For instance, I read that Barry’s lawyers are working to get voice mails he left in ’94 for his girlfriend thrown out as evidence. Apparently, the prosecution says that Barry sounds “irritated” on the voice mails, and that since irritability is a sign of steroid use, the voice mails FROM NINETEEN NINETY FOUR!, would support the accusation that he was on steroids.

Huh?

Sorry, but if that’s an example of evidence I wouldn’t be sweatin’ this too hard if I was Barry. I’m assuming some of you legal guys could shed some light on why the prosecution would use something as evidence that seems like a total reach and why the defense would be trying to get something that seems so trivial thrown out……

Barry Bonds is an asshole. He was born irritated……..

Being 11-4 isn’t anything to complain about. Or care about. There are a few minor disappointments so far this Spring:

1) Brandon Belt is showing us why he’s going to start the year in Fresno. Hitting .250 with a .323 OBP is just not good.

2) Marc Kroon isn’t getting much of a look. He’s nearly the career saves leader in Japan and he throws close to 100 mph. He’s only pitched 3 innings so far this Spring, I was hoping to see more of him.

3) Rowand is hitting .111 and is hurt. The .111 isn’t much of a shocker but the fact that he can’t even make it onto the field is a disappointment. Sabean can’t “Pittsburgh” anyone with Rowand unable to even play.

4) We are stuck with another year of El Presidente. Stewart is doing nothing, as expected. I still don’t understand why we don’t have a credible back up for our best hitter/player….

Kansas City has the best record in the AL right now, by the way……

5 innings, 1 hit, no runs? We’re all good right? Yeah, right. I hope no one gets sucked into believing that this guy is doing anything other than submitting one of his random, unexplainable work efforts. Zito is like a really bad famous artist–you don’t know what you’re looking at or why you’re looking at it. Yet there it is before you, in all it’s unglorious glory….

SOme would argue that yesterday’s performance is a good thing. There is no “good thing” in the world of Barry Zito. It’s all bad. He is NOT a competent starting pitching at any slot of one thru five. He needs to be judged as a member on our starting staff, not any random staff in baseball. I don’t expect us to be able to find someone as good as our *other* four. But winning one game since last July 16th is unacceptable as anyone’s #5. Certainly ours.

So I’m not going to say anything about yesterday’s performance other than continue to wonder what the Giants are planning on doing  after he starts the season 0-3 with a 6.52 ERA…….

The *beat guys* (I love that term) seem to be suggesting that one of the relief spots is going to come down to Vogelsong or Runzler. I’m not sure how that makes any sense. For starters, one of them is RH and one is LH. And then there is this difference: one of them sucks and one of them has a ton of potential and an electric arm.

Assuming you can unglue your eyes from the babe emerging from the sea, as if from nowhere to love you long time, please take a moment to look above her. You should see a *page* to click on. It says “March Week 1 Posts of the Day”. There are six entries for this *week*. Please review them and vote to the corresponding number in the Poll. If you don’t think any of them are better than the current POTW you can vote for #7.  As I said earlier, the blogger who gets the most POTW’s gets a $50 gift card to Safeway at the end of the season. $50 plus the adulation and admiration of the Word Wide Flavor Nation should be more than enough……

A quick check of the Spring Training stats show us that most of our guys are hitting the ball well right now. Ross, Torres, DeRosa and Posey are all hitting over .400 with Posey murdering the ball at a .643 clip. Rowand is not duplicating last Spring and is now hitting .111 and is on the shelf for a few days with a bad hammy. That’s not good, he’s tough to trade to Philly if he’s hurt……

The thing I like about this start is the number of hits with RISP. I haven’t seen a stat on it but every time I turn on the radio it sounds like someone important to this year’s team is driving in runs (Sandoval especially)….

With nearly half the roster hitting .300 or better, even though it’s Spring Training, the offense is doing just fine. I wish I had something to complain about but I don’t. I guess I’m a little tired of Renel as the PA announcer. I think  we could use a change in that department. Other than that, I got nuthin’…..

Warriors owner Joe Lacob was being interviewed in Philadelphia yesterday. He was asked a question about bloggers and he responded with this: “They aren’t real fans because they don’t buy season tickets.” Well excuse me Mr. Lacob, but you can go fuck yourself. If this guy is so far out of touch with reality that the only fans of his team that he’s willing to acknowledge are the ones who hand over thousands of dollars a year to him, as I said, he can go fuck himself. Joe Lacob should fall down on his knees and thank God that there are any Warrior fans anywhere! I’m not going to list off the obvious reasons why Warrior fans don’t ALL buy expensive season ticket packages. The reasons are obvious, or at least they should be to anybody but a fool….

What does Lacob think about the fans who buy walk-up tickets? I wonder if he’s able to hide his disdain for them. “Look at that family of four,” he thinks to himself. “Vile beings, only willing to purchase a single game ticket. Despicable…”

I don’t go to Warrior games anymore for a lot of reasons. One big one is that I just hate the commute from the South Bay at that time of day. But the other main reason is that…..they suck. And they’ve sucked forever. If they improved and I decided to jump on the band wagon I wonder if Lacob would refuse to sell me a jersey if I’m not a season ticket holder? I’ve got a City shirt that I bought at the last game I went to a couple of years ago. I guess I should stop wearing it…..

What if I watch a game on TV? Is that a no-no in Lacob-World? From now on, I’ll just feel too guilty to watch a W’s game on tv knowing their owner thinks I’m a fraud…..

Let me start by saying, I LOVE Brandon Belt. It’s an exciting story. A 5th round 2009 pick and he’s almost ready for The Show? It’s not too often that your college batting average/OPS is worse than your pro batting average/OPS. Someone has gotten a hold of Belt and taken him to the next level. And if you’ve ever heard this kid interviewed, he is a rock solid person who has learned how to handle the media at a very young age. He still lives in the small Texas town he grew up in……..

Sorry, barely had time to get the BB up this morning. There just isn’t that much newz coming out of AZ today. Ford blasted a bomb, where did that come from? Posey hit one 450 feet; nice.

Twin threw out a topic at the end of the last thread about our surprising defensive stats last year. This is “talk about whatever you want day”. baseball, football, your opinion on the BB of the Day. Whatever. I’ll check back with you guys later.

I’ve been reading Bruce Jenkins, like you all have, for the better part of two decades. On Saturday morning, his column, The 3-Dot Lounge, used to be the first thing I’d check out over breakfast. I’ve since discontinued my subscription to the Chronicle in protest of their pathetic treatment of Barry Bonds after he broke the HR record. But I digress….

Watching all these NBA players agree to buy outs got me to start fantasizing again about the Giants buying out Zito’s contract. He’s owed 57.5 mil through 2013 plus the 7 mil buy out option in 2014. Can someone explain to me why the Giants can’t buyout Zito’s contract? If the NBA players union has no problem with it why would the baseball players union take a negative stance on it? I did some light googling on this and came up with almost nothing on whether or not a baseball team can buy out a player’s contract.

Pretty typical Spring training game yesterday: Belt showed off lots of skillz prompting calls from the blog world for his coronation. I’m done with my “Spring Performances Don’t Matter” rants…..I think. There’s certainly no harm in the fans getting excited about a new young player. As long as Sabean doesn’t fall into the trap, I’m cool with it. Belt is going to start in Fresno regardless of what he does here. But getting off to a great start certainly is nice to see……

For the same reason, I can’t get too down on Zito (although it would be harder to get *downer* on him than I already am). Pitchers are just trying to find their way to proper mechanics during the Spring, especially the first start. Walking 5 of 13? Whatever, that only matters if he does it in April…..

I’m bumping the Flap Fantasy League to 16 teams. It means we will have less great players to stock our rosters with but it’s the same playing field for everyone so it doesn’t really matter. If you want to play and are a vet-Flapper, shoot me an email. We’ve already got new faces registered and I’ve got invites out to a few others who expressed interest. I also have some requests from bloggers I don’t know but I’m really more inclined to invite people who hit the Flap with some degree of regularity. I’d even be fine with some of few lost souls at The Splash who might want to play. Anyway, I probably won’t close out the league for another week or so. Send me an email if you want to play. bigflavor77@gmail.com . Ten bucks to play, just to keep you interested, top 3 pay out. You can paypal me or check/money order me. And you don’t need to know how to play, BLADEinCOLORADO won it all last year and it was the first time he’d ever played………

If you are interested in joining The Flap’s Fantasy Baseball League, let me know. I’m going to cap it at 12 teams. There were a few guys who stopped playing mid season last year–that’s a big no-no and they won’t be invited to play this year. All of the other guys who played have first priority but regardless, we should have at least 3 openings for new players. Email me if you’re interested. bigflavor77@gmail.com If you are a regular contributor here you will have priority. If you’ve never played before don’t worry about it. Why? See the next paragraph.

I’m still kicking around the this year’s prize. Last year’s winner was BLADEinCOLORADO, who had never played fantasy baseball before. He won the prestigious “Broken Headed-Rich Aurilia Bobblehead”. His award sits quietly on my desk at work awaiting a mail address from him so that I can deliver it…..

It’s possible that I might make this year’s league a pay league. Nothing extravagant, $20 or so, just to keep people interested. The KEY to playing in the league is playing all season. No quitters. Oh, and NO WHITEY! Obviously, any $ I take in would get dispersed to the winners of the league (probably top 2 if we go with 12)

Invites have gone out to 9 of last year’s contestants. Four of you have already re-signed. Please respond to the invite in a timely manner or I’ll have to give your spot away.

DeRosa and Sandoval have both gotten off to hot starts. If either or both had a great Spring would that surprise you? What about the pitchers? Zito and Suppan suck. If either or both excelled it would at least be a mild surprise. In fact, none of those four guys succeeding would be SHOCKING; merely, nice surprises.

Marty Lurie doesn’t see how DeRosa finds any regular playing time. I disagree. He’s really more of a 2nd/3rd baseman but he can play LF, 1st base and even shortstop. I know he doesn’t want to play the OF, so if he has a rockstar Spring I could see them putting Huff in LF and moving DeRosa to 1st base. He would have a lot to learn in a short amount of time, but that’s what Spring Training is for–it’s what Aubrey Huff used ST for last year (learning the nuances of playing first base).

I have little to no interest in what Zito and Suppan do this Spring. They could easily channel the ghost of Wellemeyer and fool us into believing they’re back. I could see Suppan bailing at the end of camp and rejoining the Cardinals (if he had a good Spring)……..

And what are we to expect from Dan Runzler this Spring? Maybe I’m missing it, but I haven’t seen any discussions about converting him to a starter (rumors we heard over the Winter).

I love watching worry-warts freak out about Spring Training results. These are clueless fans who don’t understand the game. The veterans could give less than 2 figs about scoring or statistical results right now. All they care about is crafting their routine and not getting injured. Spring training phenom’s are fun to talk about but they almost NEVER keep it going into the regular season. Luckily, we don’t have to worry about Bochy and Sabean getting “bowkered” into believing that a +.400 batting average youngster should make the roster. Even if Belt tears it up, I fully expect him to start the season in AAA, despite what management is saying. And that’s fine, let him sharpen his tools in AAA for a few months, we don’t need him AND if we can tease out another year of control over him, all the better…….

My apologies in advance to those who will likely be outraged at today’s BB–just tryin’ to toss a few bones to the outskirts of the blog……

I hope the Giants keep to their word and the rotation goes Tim, Dirrrty, Cain, Zito, Bumgarner. The theory is that the bullpen gets some regular relief by separating the reliability of Timmy and Cain. But tactically, I think this is an outstanding approach. Timmy is a no-brainer as the 1. Dirrrrty at the 2 is intriguing. At his best, he can beat a 1 or a 2 with ease. At his worst, and it’s usually either or with him, he has trouble hanging with a 5. By putting him as a 2 he either pitches his ass off and beats his opponent or he throws a game that would probably get him a loss regardless of who he pitches against. If I had to wager, I’d say that Dirrrrty steps up this year and pitches like a #2 much more often than a #5. And Cain at the 3 vs the other team’s 3? Say hello to 20 wins for Matt Cain in 2011. Zito at the 4 is simply a way to protect the inning total of Bumgarner. Theoretically,  pitching as the 5 and getting his start skipped now and again, Bum might come in around  200 innings this year, which would be good for his arm. I say *theoretically* because I have less confidence in Barry Zito than I’ve ever had at any point in his career here in SF. And that is an astounding lack of confidence considering the last 4 years. Bum will bump to the 4 probably by mid-May when Zito comes down with some phantom injury. At this point they will shuttle Suppan or Mr Somebody into the #5 and just hope for the best……..

The Warriors gave me some hope that Rowand might actually get released. After that absurd trade they pulled off yesterday for Troy Murphy’s expiring contract, I was surprised to read that on January 7th the Nets informed Murphy to stay home and wait to get traded or released. I don’t know the circumstances, as far I as I know he’s not injured. And Murphy has never been a clubhouse problem. And he’s making 12 million dollars this year. Why wouldn’t the Giants just do the same thing? Or a better question would be, would they even consider doing it? I’ll be disappointed if they trade Schierholtz, a player with redeemable value, and keep Rowand.

The Giants are making a TON of money off their World Series win, as they should for such a stellar accomplishment. They can afford to eat the rest of Rowand’s contract and just send him home to his batting cage……

They’re saying he’s healthy and that he’s going to be “Super Utility Man!” I just don’t think it’s going to shake out that way. I think he’s going to get significant playing time at one of the infield spots. Tejada is really more of a third baseman at this point.  If Pablo is raking I could see them moving him back to first base, slide Tejada over to third and flip Huff to the OF…..

And he could easily end up at 2nd base since Franchez is always a mere mole’s whisker away from another knee injury….

And if Pablo still can’t hit………

There’s always an outfield spot to consider……..

I had Wendy video tape me watching the final out of the World Series but I wasn’t really paying attention to what she did after that. Apparently, she decided to snap a few photos. I never saw any of them until last night. I don’t think the picture of this really does it justice but it really is an incredible shirt that captured the exact feeling I was having in the moments after we won the World Series. She even pulled a quote off the blog from the morning of that game. If you can’t make it out it says, “I have no idea how I’m going to react or what I’ll do when the final out is secured….”

Well, you nailed it cold, Wendy-baby. Thanks, I don’t think I’ll ever wear it for fear of staining it by accident and I don’t even know where to put it. But it was probably the best birthday present I can ever remember getting.

Chris Haft wrote an mlb.com article essentially saying that, according to Bochy,  it’s a four-way competition for the left field spot. It really should be 5, there’s no reason in the world for Bochy to limit Rowand to CF, in fact as he’s aged, a corner spot is likely better for him anyway. But Boch says Rowand is CF-or-bench so……

The four official contenders for LF are…..drum roll please…….Huff, DeRosa, Burrell and Schierholtz. I’m taking Huff off the list since I think there’s a 93.693% chance that Belt starts the season in AAA. I’m also taking DeRosa off the list because he’s simply going to be too valuable as a super-utility guy. He’s going to spend plenty of time filling in at 3rd/SS/and 2nd base. Book it……

So now we are down to two candidates and that really should be the end of the competition. The BEST option for us in LF is for Burrell to start and get 3 or 4 at bats with Schierholtz coming in as a defensive replacement in the 8th inning. I have 100% confidence in Pat Burrell. The World Series debacle was nothing more than a random 15 at bat rut that anyone could fall into. Who knows, maybe he just can’t hit American League pitching—the stats support that, too.

And, it’s my birthday today, so let the b-day wishes flow as freely as a twig on the shoulders of a mighty stream……

We could see he had gained a lot of weight as last season rolled on but I was shocked to read just how out of shape Sandoval actually was.  According to the Mercury story, he couldn’t take a half dozen ground balls without panting, hands on knees. What were the coaches saying to him after this type of sad display?  He could only squat 135 lbs. I know 125 lb women who can squat that 10 times. And this one blew me away: He could only do 2 inverted row reps. I don’t understand how someone could be that out of shape and still be a professional athlete. You would think that he would at least be getting at least SOME benefits from running out a double or even just from the stretching and light running that all the ballplayers do before each game. Apparently not.

While it was good to see Sabean “scare him straight” at the end of the season I don’t understand how Sandoval was allowed to take 6 ground balls in practice, during the season, and fall apart into the panting-hands-on-knees position. What did the infield coach say to him?  Sorry, but that’s just poor, shoddy coaching. My LITTLE LEAGUE coach would have been up my ass if I lagged that hard in a drill…….

Obviously, we are all happy to see him accomplish what he accomplished this Winter. I just have trouble comprehending how a professional baseball player could be THAT out of shape at any point in his career…….

I just loved the articles about Eli Whiteside’s injured arm. And the bloggers that are wringing their hands with worry! I guess it took a minor injury for this guy to finally get some press. Look, replacing the worst back up catcher in the league is a piece of cake: just plug ANYONE ELSE in there. The only worse back up catchers in the world are all currently holding down jobs with  the Giants minor league teams. How’d you like to be one of those guys? “Dude, we can’t even get ahead of Eli Whiteside.” Talk about time for a career change…..

I know it’s not being considered, but now that Pablo is back in shape why couldn’t he take some practice time behind the dish and be our emergency catcher? If his catching skills haven’t eroded completely he could be a fine back up to Posey and a great contingency plan if Posey ever missed a significant amount of time. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s see how Pablo handles a bat at the whispy 240 he checked in with yesterday. I hope he uses an Andres Torres bat, otherwise he might just get swept away by a strong breeze……

Quite the buzz created when Pujols shut down negotiations with the Cardinals. In a Yahoo article, the Giants were listed as a possible destination. I don’t see it (and wouldn’t want to see it), Sabean doesn’t do deals like that anymore. And who really wants Pujols on the back end of that deal? 30 million a year and he can’t play defense the last couple of years that we have him? No thanks….

I’ve got a theory on why Pujols didn’t sign with the Cards and it’s not because he wanted an “A-Rod deal” (275 million or so). After the Cardinals signed Holliday to that 120 million dollar deal I immediately thought, well how are they going to afford Pujols, too? This is a team that is pretty consistently around 90 million dollars a year with their payroll. Now it’s coming out that they did come in with a 200 million dollar offer, though the number of years is unknown. I think Pujols looked at the numbers and just decided “We can’t win a world series with that much money tied up into two players.” He’s 31, he’s only won one, at this point in his career that goal (WS) has to be the prevailing motivation for him. Of course, he’ll get a deal offered to him north of 200 million no matter what numbers he puts up this year. But I bet he ends up going to a team that can either handle the salary pressure of 2 guys making over 100 million or a team that doesn’t have all their chips committed to two players……….

Nice to read that Rowand spent the Winter in a batting cage (insert huge sarcastic smiley face). I have no idea why this dude thinks that more practice is the answer. He’s got the swing down, he’s perfected that. Problem is, it doesn’t work. Now he’s saying he’s perfected a *new* swing, one in which he’s more upright. This is all bullshit, he was more upright starting last year (when compared to 2009) and look where that got him. And God help us if he hammers the crappy-ass pitching he’s going to see in Spring Training. Bochy’s head will explode with excitement and he’ll give him the LF job. Then, presto, the season starts and he’ll be rolling ground balls to 3rd base/SS with impeccable regularity…….



At the beginning of the day I didn’t think I was going to make it down there till 5ish. But I hauled ass and cut corners to get down to Lytton Plaza by 4pm. When I got there, I was in a pretty shitty mood but as soon as I turned the corner and saw a sea of orange and black balloons flapping in the strong wind, it all just sort of melted away. There were maybe 300 or so Giants fans lined up and fired up for their moment with the trophy. It was a winding line so at least twice I was led directly by the trophy, maybe 10 feet away or so, but really still 30 minutes away from taking the picture. While in line I decided that I’d seen enough and didn’t really need a picture with it. But, I ran into a few people that I knew so I stuck around to talk to them. Even when I was next up I wasn’t that jazzed, I felt like I’d seen it, done it, the picture was kind of a gay idea anyway. The usher directed me to the trophy and  I handed my phone to a police officer and asked him to take a picture of me (since the pic they were taking of me wasn’t going to be available till it was uploaded online). I got to it and stood behind it, the photographer told me to lean in. At this point I was about 8 inches away from it and I looked down. Then I looked up at the long line of people, every one of them so happy to be there. I swear to God, I couldn’t have been happier in that moment. I had kicked around different ideas of what my pose was going to be. One buddy wanted me to take my two foam fingers and do a Brian Wilson impersonation but that idea got nixed for obvious reasons. I had planned to do a “bask” pose but that didn’t really feel like the right thing either. All I could muster was a dumb-ass grin and a #1 sign with my index finger almost touching one of the flags. The photographer said “Ok, that’s it, hey that one was perfect”. I just nodded and walked away, dumb-grin in check, knowing that I’m never going to have that feeling again, no matter how many times we win it……

Actually, I find that prediction quite pedestrian. EVERYONE is picking the Phillies. But honestly, who gives one whit about a pre-season baseball prediction? 162 games can sometimes feel like a lifetime, or more. So much changes,  surprising players (or did all of you take the “over” on Bautista hitting 50+ home runs last year?), so many injuries, mid season trades, mid season call ups….

I think it’s fairly obvious that the Phillies are the favorites to win their division. I’d be bummed if my team played in the NL East, they are definitely built for the long haul. But I am 100% totally confident of playing them in 7 in the playoffs. Again, for obvious reasons. We just finished beating everyone on their staff except, I think, Blanton. The Phillies don’t scare me in the playoffs. I bet Ryan Howard’s bat is still sitting on his shoulder…….

Trophy tour blazes through Palo Alto today. I’m bummed, the EARLIEST I can get down there is about 5 o’clock and supposedly they’re only showing it from 4-6pm. I’m worried about the lines but the weather is sucking so that might work to my favor. If there’s no chance of me getting my picture taken with it I’ll just have to settle for taking pictures of it; and basking in its radiant glow……..