Hope the Giants suck forever so you’ll have a way to spend your time.

50 million for Titantic deck chairs. Which is what those 4 guys amount to. And the fact that you didn’t realize it was those guys specifically tells me you you’re probably exactly the individual I am referring to.

Anybody who suggests Fred Lewis is currently MVP material is uhm…probably trying to peddle tickets or contributions to the Brian Sabean deferred compensation plan

And the marketing the ballpark experience has produced how many winners in San Diego, Baltimore, and Pittsburgh?

1) A baseball team interested in making money? And the money comes from fans? Who would’ve ever guessed! This must be a new development… can’t date back to more than 1876.

2) $50 million/4 players = $12.5 million a year. Can’t possibly be right – ballplayers don’t make that kind of money.

3) yeah, life is rough… only three Cy Young award winners and a prospective fourth in the rotation. Plus Sanchez. And maybe Lowry. The horrors.

4) I dunno – Randy Winn’s worked out pretty well, Bengie’s been better than anyone would have expected, Lewis is surrounded by “future MVP” talk, just retired HOF shortstop and left fielder, middle infielder with incredible speed that there isn’t really even a roster spot for….

So, I guess if we can’t rely on stats, 4 gazillion blogs, and being fans… guess we should all just be Yankee rooters (different than trollops, if we must be euphemistic). They buy the world series every year! Just like the Mets! Oh… wait….

In 2006 his first full year around the league Cain went 13-12. In 2007, Cain was credited with 7 wins and 16 losses after the rest of MLB had a book on him. Ten of those losses were by 2 runs or less. Last year Cain won something like 8 games and got dinged with 14 losses. In 11 of the 14 lossess the margin was 2 runs or less. In the last two years, he has lost 30 games, 21 of them by two runs or less. That is what I mean when I say “giving up one more run than his teammates score.

Now nobody I know of, including me is advocating that w-l record be the primary measurement tool of judging an individual pitcher’s ability or predicting future results. What I am saying however, is that at some point, a starter has to “own” his losses as well as his wins. He has to be able to make certain pitches at certain times in certain situations to certain batters, if his team is to win. It is that simple. That is what shows up in a won loss record. It is not going to show up elsewhere, unless you actually witness these games. And of Cains 104 career starts, I have probably seen 90 of them. And what I am saying is that since the league knows his tendencies in certain situations, they sit on certain pitches in those situations.

For example, good hitters know he’ll try to force his fastball on certain days, even though he doesn’t have much command of it, and take it for a ball. Or the same thing with his curve and/or change. The experienced hitters around the league know he gets stubborn with certain pitches or tries too hard for a strikeout. They use that to wait him out, force him to get behind in the count or groove his no.2 or no. 3 pitch.

Now that doesn’t happen all the time, and Cain is not unique in this. All I am saying is that he is still in the potential category, not a sure thing, and that at some point (he has 104 career starts even though he is still only 24) he has to be held accountable for a significant portion of his won loss record.

1. Larry Baer: “THE GIANTS ARE ABOUT PROVIDING THEIR FANS WITH A BALLPARK EXPERIENCE” not “The Giants are about providing their fans with championship baseball”

2. Barry Zito, Aaron Rowand, Randy Johnson, Edgar Renteria. Just under $50 million per year.

3. Not a single impact offensive player, other than Bonds in 5 years. None. Zero.

4. The starting pitching has only 2 solids. Lincecum and Cain. Sanchez is potential while the 45 year old with back problems and Zito are wishful thinking at this point.

Thats just simply the way it is. Anything can happen for sure, but that won’t be because of a long range plan on management’s part. Teams sometimes win in spite of the stupidity of its front office. But thats no reason to delude oneself into ignoring baseball reality.

The venomous and interminable spittle is as tedious as it is predictable.