Here’s an article about Lincecum that addresses most of the issues fairly well:
…. In arbitration, the player and club each submit a salary figure to a three-person panel on Jan. 19, and hearings to decide which salary to award are Feb. 1-21 – unless an agreement is reached first. Hearings can get ugly, with the team bringing up negatives on the player (who’s sometimes in attendance) to make its case. Naturally, the Giants prefer to avoid a hearing.
Either way, Lincecum will cost a bundle.
Theoretically, because of a “special accomplishment” provision, the arbitration process allows Thurman to negotiate without regard to service time, meaning Lincecum could be compared with any pitchers, meaning teammate Barry Zito (averaging $18 million annually) and CC Sabathia ($23 million average) could enter the conversation, meaning open the vault.
Article VI Rule F (12) in the basic agreement states the arbitration panel must consider comparisons with others who have similar service time.
But it adds, “This shall not limit the ability of a player or his representative, because of special accomplishment, to argue the equal relevance of salaries of Players without regard to service, and the arbitration panel shall give whatever weight to such argument as is deemed appropriate.”
…. Sabean hinted no serious talks would begin until the sides exchange figures in January, because that’s when he’ll learn of Lincecum’s asking price. Thurman said he plans to meet with the Giants during the Dec. 7-10 winter meetings in Indianapolis.
As Robert pointed out in his backtalk, the Giants are hamstrung by the many expensive mediocrities currently occupying roster spots; and, unless Neukom authorizes a significant bump in salary expenditures, after Lincecum breaks the bank, we’ll be lucky if they sign anybody, let alone a good to great player.
UPDATE: I’d also like to mention that the above sentence makes me sick to my stomach. The very idea that the Giants cannot go after players because of money issues is the heart of my distaste for Sabean.
THE GIANTS WILL CRY POVERTY, THE GIANTS CAN CRY POVERTY, BECAUSE SABEAN SPENDS MONEY LIKE A DRUNKEN SAILOR!
The contracts of Edgardo Alfonzo, Edgar Renteria, Dave Roberts, and the endless stream of “gamers” and “character guys” and “veterans” has drained the pockets of the team. How about the $18 million dollars we gave to Reuter, who wasn’t up for renewal, was about to have his arm fall off, and didn’t deserve it? Hpw about the $10 million we gave Jason Schmidt so he could pitch three games?
The Giants have flushed, absolutely burned well over $100 million dollars in the last five or six years, on some of the worst players, signed to some of the absolute worst contracts any team has ever given any player, and Sabean’s been responsible for all of them!!
And now, even though, once again we desperately need offense, defense, youth and speed, we’re not in the running, once again, for the best player on the market, the player that fits our needs just about perfectly. Sound familiar? Here’s what I wrote in 2004:
…. Sabean loves veterans. I just think his love for the proven commodity has distorted to the point where he overpays for it, competing against nobody. It’s been written time and again how Tom Hicks overpayed for A-Rod, basically competing against himself. Well, I think Sabean is guilty of the same thing, in many of these instances. Who was going to give Reuter the kind of money we did? Who was going to give Alfonzo $25 million? Who was going to give Nen $30 million? Who was going to give Benard $10 million? Who was going to “steal” Snow from under Sabean’s nose and give him that $24 million dollars?
Here’s what we heard from Sabean way back when Vladimir Guererro was available:
…. the SF Giants’ GM, Brian Sabean, was featured in an MLB.com chat. During the chat, he was asked whether the Giants had made an offer to Vladimir Guerrero. His response?
“In a word: No. If we had signed Guerrero or [Gary] Sheffield, we would have been without [Jim] Brower, [Scott] Eyre, [Matt] Herges, [Dustin] Hermanson, [Brett] Tomko, [A.J.] Pierzynski, [Pedro] Feliz, [J.T.] Snow, [Jeffrey] Hammonds, [Dustan] Mohr and [Michael] Tucker–obviously not being able to field a competitive team, especially from an experience standpoint, given our level of spending.”
It’s the same fucking story, year after year after year. Disgraceful.
25 Backtalkers
The Giants are not serious. Please note the timeline
Court Jester and Assamander In Chief
But of course. Why would you want to give the appearance of brushing off Lincecum’s agent? I mean, he only represents the only fucking reason in the world for people to come out and watch this steaming pile of overpriced-under-performing collection of pigshit that you’ve put together the last several years.
Why the fuck would you want to negotiate in good faith before the arbitration numbers are due and, you know, cement a relationship with the best thing to happen to your career since you signed Bonds to several extensions? Why would you not want to end the speculation and war of nerves and get on with the process of team-building as soon as possible?
Because you can? Because you are a corpulent, arrogant, stained-shirted, mullet-coiffed, floppy-flapping sack of skid row stench trapped in the body of a middle-aged hippopotamoid and you can get away with it? Because Lincecum may turn out to be not–gritty, not-savvy, not cop-haircut-acting like Aaron Rowand, Barry Zito, Randy Winn, Fred Sanchez, and Edgar Renteria? Because he may turn out to be a negative public relations situation down the road with his stoner ‘tude? Like Bonds “surly Black Man tude”? Like Kent’s “redneck ‘tude”?
Because you can thumb your nose at everybody because the shitbag greedy fuck partnership that throws fan money at your fat ass as a reward to cover up their fleece job allows you to tell this kid and his representative to take a hike? Like the hike you told Bonds’ agent to take? And Kent’s agent? And Guerrero’s? And all the rest of the “top tier” players who might actually, you know, enable the Giants to actually play meaningful games in October instead of just August maybe?
You know, like the Dodgers and Rockies. Actual teams the Giants compete against for players and playoff spots?
You know, like the Red Sox, Angels, Yankees, Cardinals, who aren’t afraid to admit mistakes and rectify them rather than try to cover them up with platitudes and far fetched advertising campaigns?
Sure go ahead and fly your ass out to dumfuck owners meeting in the dead of winter. But you’re wasting your time. But we’re not going to be “serious” for another month and a half, when we may or not be serious.
We know thats what it has to be. Because well, you know. The Giants would never be party to collusion. Even the subtle de-facto kind when you send the message that you’re not even willing to be serious with a guy until you are forced to by the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Nah. Not on Selig’s watch.
more poor roster management by Sabes…. Starting the arbitration clock too early for Lincecum in 2007, and Posey and MadBum this year.
Poor roster management is not Sabean’s problem. Worrying about when a player’s contract clock is started is irrelevant if he has superstar potential. Pointing at Sabean’s roster management fuckups on star players is akin to criticizing Genghis Khan for a bad haircut.
Sabean is not a problem and a disaster and an abomination because he doesn’t evaluate talent properly. Sabean is all of those things because he can’t value talent properly.
He is stuck in 1988.
He is stuck on batting average.
He is stuck on bbwaa opinions.
He is stuck on RBIs
He is stuck on All-Star appearances.
He is stuck on guys who talk like college players used to talk in the 1980s.
He is stuck on guys who look and act like Aaron Rowand and Barry Zito.
He is stuck on hacks who look and act like dorks being paid $534.00 per hour to deliver garlic bread and pepperoni pizzas.
He is stuck on stupid.
Read what kotex brain said in 2004 in John’s “update” …thats six fucking years ago. This is not a recent development.
Sabean said this shit exactly 4 months after the Giants were eliminated by the Florida Marlins; The last play off games the Giants have ever played. No team in a major market has gone longer than the Giants without a playoff appearance.
NOT ONE SINGLE SOLITARY FUCKING TEAM. Not the Mets, Yankees, Phillies, Cubs, White Sox, Dodgers, Angels, or Red Sox.
Fuck Sabean’s roster management! There isn’t any. Worrying about Sabean’s roster management is like Granny Klampet contemplating botox injections. Sabean’s problem is that he is lazy, arrogant, ignorant, stubborn, unlikable, and unkempt and unchanged.
This is nothing new.
Read what Perricone wrote in 2004. FOUR MONTHS AFTER THE LAST GIANTS PLAYOFF GAME…EVER
Sabean’s egregious and insurmountable shortcomings are not little more than “whoops, excuse me’s” They have been franchise killers insofar as winning baseball is concerned.
forgot to add.
Fucking Perricone could have done a better job than Sabean, even swinging a framing hammer full-time.
I really mean that.
Will Rick Thurman and the team at the Beverly Hills Sports Council take the Giants to the cleaners?
When Brian Sabean said “This is one I have not been through, nor one many in baseball have been through,” it was a rare moment of honesty.
Tim Lincecum’s unique achievements make his a precedent setting case. I imagine that the MLBPA is in contact with Thurman, and one of the most experienced negotiators in the sport, Michael Weiner, is going to be involved in shaping strategy. The concept that Brian Sabean may be over-matched in the negotiations is not new or surprising. And I frankly don’t give a damn.
Lincecum deserves to get paid. And he is going to get paid no matter who is on the other side of the table. The only thing I regret is that this will give the Giants an excuse not to sign other players.
In my admittedly biased opinion the Giants should be running a payroll of between $110 and $135 million. They are certainly good for that much. The highest they have ever gone was $90.2 in 2007 and that’s not going to get the job done. The Dodgers’ payroll has exceeded $100 million five times in the last 10 years and during that same stretch it has never been as low as $90.2 million. Even after realignment the Giants have to compete with their division rivals, weak and cheap though they may be.
When the rest of the economy is falling apart MLB has managed to string together two consecutive record years of $6.5 billion. You can’t do that on the one hand while claiming financial hardship on the other. So I’m not going to lose any sleep about the Giants financial problems: they are a self serving fiction.
Sabean: “In Lincecum’s case, it’s Howard-like in terms of where this could go as a first-time eligible player,”
Lincecum is going to ask >$20 million. Why not? Worst case, Sabean is going to come in at least at $10m perhaps a lot higher. There is certainly justification on his own team.
Howard has submitted $18 million, and settled for $54 million for three years to avoid the arbitration battle. I was thinking Lincecum would settle for $35m for three years, but that may be too low a number, based on Howard.
Cain must be pretty pissed about now. Does anyone see him staying around after his contract expires?
You have some good points but Jason Schmidt is not one of them. There was not a single year of Jason’s 6 with the Giants in which he did not more the earn every dollar we paid him. The one year in which you imagine he just started just three games and we paid him $10M did not exist. He brock down for the Dodgers not for us.
I was exaggerating to make a point.
Schmidt went 11-9 in ‘06, after we exercised his option instead of trading him the year before, and then, after he had a great May, we didn’t again trade him for a boatload of prospects, and then we declined arbitration so we didn’t get a draft pick. He may not have broken down completely in his last two seasons, but he was in the process of breaking down. There were endless stories about how he was hurt, how he might miss a start, how his arm hurt, his elbow, his shoulder…. He had one good month, and strings of awful games in which he was obviously a shadow of his former self, (18 runs allowed in April, 6 in May, 11 in June, 17 in July, 15 in August, 16 in September).
Sabean failed to see what was going on with Schmidt, and failed to trade him to a contender for a boatload of prospects when he absolutely could have.
Neither, subtlety, gross exaggeration, nor other linguistic insinuations are the strong suit of the literalistic interpreters of the New Testament. Nor those with serious chronic personality disorders.
the vlad comments still get me
he was clueless then….he is clueless now
yet still, he has a job
and all we can do is bitch and moan on blogs
timmy will get his millions….and when he is an fa…he is gone
The Giants have spent free agent money horribly, yes. But…
“Hpw about the $10 million we gave Jason Schmidt so he could pitch three games?”
What?
[...] This post was Twitted by greebs [...]
Even With A Clue Rake
Our boy, the ever-intrepid Skipper Jonas Grumby. Brilliant!
You can read the whole fucking mess here
Lowlights.
Token offers to Penny and Uribe were not taken seriously by either one, so wave bye bye.
He wants Howry back even though he was declined arbitration. (Who the fuck else is going to give up all those walk-offs in late innings anyway)
Posey will start in AAA because he doesn’t have enough catching experience.
Molina wasn’t offered arbitration, not because they thought he would accept, but because he didn’t want to go through the process.
He doesn’t want any Type A free agent, because well, just because there are some really cool options in the “second tier” like 138 year old Jermaine Dye.
A word about Penny. At the end of the year, he was the Giants best pitcher next to Lincecum. He shoved it during the month of Septemeber and except for a blowout in 3 innings in LA, he gave the Giants 5 quality starts and DOMINATED opponents for the entire month giving up 2 or fewer runs in all but that one start in LA. The guy was an absolute horse:
Here’s a brief recap
Beat PHI 4-0 8 inn
Beat SD 9-4 7 inn 2 earned runs
Beat LA 7-2 7 inn 2 earned runs
Lost LA 12-1 2.2 inn 7 earned runs
Lost Chc 3-2 8 inn 1 earned run
Beat Az 4-1 9 inn 0 earned run
He and Lincecum kept the Giants in the race almost single handedly when everybody else was out of gas.
So as it stands now. Molina is gone. Penny is gone. Uribe is gone. They have been replaced by …. NOBODY.
Skipper Grumby. Intrepid and Fearless leader of Mulletheads everywhere.
Anybody that thinks this outfit is serious about winning a championship, should just shoot themselves in the face multiple times with a paint gun.
As it stands, this is a roster that projects out to even fewer runs than last years. This is a team that scored 2 runs or less in about 1/3 of their games. Not that Uribe or Molina was worth that much, but they haven’t been replaced, let alone been improved upon.
This team was 100 runs short of contention coming into the post season. Thats if they can match a sub 650 runs allowed again. Without a number 3 starter thanks to the throwing of Penny over the side, I don’t see it as likely, though possible.
Look for this piece of shit to drop back under .500 again. They’re not even trying to hide the fact that that they’re not even trying.
Spiral Bound
Trying to parse Brian Sabean’s cloud of sleazy sales-pitch-double-speak is no way to spend a Saturday morning; it leaves you feeling angry and unclean. Nevertheless it has yielded the following impressions:
Brian Sabean is afraid of what is going to happen in the Lincecum arbitration. He has said that he has never faced something like this before, and that few people in baseball have. Additionally, in response to questions about the Giants decision regarding Molina, Sabean let slip this testy response:
“We don’t need another arbitration case. I think that’s obvious.”
With Lincecum, Wilson, Sanchez, Medders and – god help us – Garko, lined up for arbitration the Giants GM is displaying an uncharacteristic degree of weariness. It sounds like he is expecting trouble.
It also sounds like Sabean is being given very little money with which to make deals. Letting Penny, Uribe and Molina go to test the market supports this theory, as does Neukom’s stated intention to grow the team from the farm system.
At the winter meetings Sabean said,”There are more and more clubs deciding that their backup catcher, their middle-inning reliever, their utility infielder or their No. 5 starting pitcher is going to be a young guy. Whether that’s done to balance the books or to keep a nest-egg of young players is up to the individual club.” And to just what club could he be referring?
The writing is on the wall, the Giants are again going to go cheap this year. Forget about a big bat, forget about a small bat; they will be lucky to sign a catcher to replace Molina. They will be lucky to sign the players going to arbitration.
They are going to run out their young pitchers, including Madison Bumgarner, with the support of what will once again be one of the worst offenses in the National League. Barring a miracle they will sink below .500 and come in third or fourth in their division. They might even finish in the cellar.
I look forward (and I am sure you do to) to watching as Dwayne Kuiper sinks into a depressed alcoholic stupor, Krukow yammers at an ever increasing pace, and the cameramen search desperately for closeups of children in the stands while avoiding showing the abysmal on field play. It should be an exciting season, with lots of low scoring games. Certainly the Giants will do their part by putting up low scores.
The soul truth hidden inside of this rant is that Lincecum winning another Cy Young really fucked the Giants and was about the worst thing that could of possibly happened. Yet most Giants Fans foolishly hoped for it to happen and cheered when it did.
I learned about homonyms in the fourth grade. I bet u didnt graduate from middle school? You’re like so not clever. My younger brother has a paint gun for sale. I thought about you when I read this.
Somebody told me you were a 14 year old girl. R U?
How Unsurprising. A sick dirty old man pretending to be a 14 year old girl.
For a guy who dines on boogers and school paste, thats a pretty big leap of illogic.
By the way. Its been several days since I told Sabean’s idiot twin to go fuck himself
So.
Go Fuck Yourself
Ugh
I think this is the 2010 theme. No more “Grit”. No more “Warrior Spirit”. No more “Giants Way”
Just this:
From Jim Callis’s chat on the ESPN Baseball web site on Wednesday (Callis writes for Baseball America, and specializes in evaluating minor league players):
Chuck (MPLS)
your opinion: top 5 org talent (no particular order)
Jim Callis (2:54 PM)
Was kicking this around with John Manuel the other day. In no order: Rangers, Phillies, Rays, Giants, Indians.
So, does this exchange, combined with the Giants’ surprise 88-win season, create any optimism among OBM readers? No? OK, I was just checking…
Look at the Books
In addition to the few teams that are ‘gaming’ the system and pocketing huge profits the owners as a group are using the bad economy as an excuse to keep payroll down or to actually cut payroll, when MLB is taking in record high revenues. They are obviously not fooling Scott Boras and they are not fooling the MLBPA. I can’t remember the owners ever doing anything but complain about how they were losing money; but at least in the past they had a modicum of plausibility. Now they are exposed as blatant liars. It would be difficult to prove illegal collusion is taking place, but something smells rotten.
The failure to offer Bonds work had more than a whiff of unified action about it, and the cutting of payrolls in this time of plenty is an eye watering blast. If the owners aren’t abusing their anti-trust exemption they are cutting it mighty close. With “ex-owner” used car salesman Bud “For the Good of Baseball” Selig running the show, who is watching the watchers? A little congressional oversight is in order.
With their other investments tanking the owners look like they’re taking profits out of baseball at a rate that would make a loan shark blush. At the very least there ought to be come sort of claw back clause in the revenue sharing system to rein back the worst offenders. A congressional investigation wielding the threat of contraction would be good for baseball and good for the fans. And MLB should pay the costs of the investigation. For the good of the sport of Baseball.
Just Wrong
And a very good example of why I feel the way about the Hall of Fame the way I do.
But at least the indomitable Tom Seaver, my favorite pitcher of all-time, stood up and called a spade a plantation owner.
When Tom Seaver stands up in a meeting that is stacked with owners and tells those weasels that Marvin Miller is on a par with Babe Ruth and Jackie Robinson, and 5 of those cretins still refuse to vote for Marvin Miller, than you can understand why folks like me have so little use for the owners and their mouthpieces.
+mia
I’m just hoping Sabean can get some decent deals done. I’m sure we can’t really afford Bay or Holliday with Lincecum due for a huge raise and Rowand, Renteria and Zito’s contracts. It would be nice for the Giants to just bump the payroll up for a big bat. Im just hoping Sabean can get someone or some decent people. His free pass is gone from last year.
~King of Cali
All The Latest SF Giants Rumors
http://www.sfgiantsbaseball.net
What in the world would cause you to have any kind of reasonable hope that will happen?
The Sanchez signing? Which came on the heels of multiyear contracts to:
Edgar Renteria, Barry Zito, Aaron Rowand, Dave Roberts, Randy Winn?.
The failure to keep Penny?
His stated desire to re-sign Walk-off retread Bobby Howry?
His public trashing of Posey’s baseball skills and maturityl?
His antagonism when questioned why he did not offer Molina arbitration in order to get a sandwich pick because he didn’t “want to face another arbitration case?”
Are you serious when you say you “hope” Sabean makes some good signings? What the fuck? Do you hope the Mullahs, Taliban, Hezbollahs, Ayatollahs, and all the world’s snake charmers come to their senses and decide to have a fan appreciation night at Payphone Park too? You’re kidding right?
Well, actually, yes they can. They had operating revenues of $196 million in 2008 according to Forbes. With a payroll of $82 Million in 2009 with about the same projected revenue thats a hell of a lot of money. Thats a done of fucking difference to explain away as a reason to go all cheapskate on the folks buying tickets.
The Comcast cable money alone is a little over $30 million in 2007 (ranked sixth in Regional Sports Networks behind the Yankees, Mets, Angels , Tigers, and Dodgers. About a million less than the Dodgers and 2 million less than the Angels). That $30 Million by the way, comes on the back of 1.5 million Bay Area Cable TV subscribers, so even those of us who don’t want to give those greedy fucks a nickel still end up getting pick-pocketed by the shylocks who run the Giants.
And putting all of that aside, who the fuck was responsible for the reprehensible contracts of Zito, Renteria, and Rowand in the first place? The same idiot that as John cited above, threw multi-year millions at the feet of Snow, Benard, Reuter, and Alfonzo. What in the fuck makes anybody think that this 15 year pattern of signing players based on Fleer baseball cards is going to change, given that Mr. Toad was just given a 3 year deal by Mr. ABA and Microsoft centerfold Orville Redenbacher?
And the reason Lincecum is reluctant to sign a multi-year contract and is leaning towards the biggest arbitration award in history is because maybe, just fucking possibly, he might not want to waste the BEST FUCKING PITCHING AND EARNING YEARS OF HIS LIFE surrounded by “second tier” position players who couldn’t score runs if they hit a ball off a tee…on a little league diamond…against a Challenger League team…in a zero-gravity environment…with 100 foot fences…with 3 defenders in the field.
That it may even be possible that Lincecum might not want to spend his twenties being bossed around by a management team that is more interested in real estate, souvenir sales, and cable tv revenue with a lukewarm commitment to being competitive. Or do you think, he might instead want to pitch for a team surrounded by “first tier” players who are not committed to being competitive, but are committed to winning a World Series?
Guys like you need to stop swallowing the swill from guys from the Merc, Chronicle, ESPN, Comcast, KNBR and all the rest of the cheerleaders, who are nothing more than pimps for the Giants front office. Guys who continually spew Management’s spin on everything.
The sad case is that the ownership groups in San Francisco are not held to high standards of competitiveness by mainstream media. Your post is simply a reflection of that
Passed out in Hotel Room
Trade your Number 2 prospect for a rent-a-DL second baseman, who managed to give you all of 105 at bats with a sub-700 OPS. Then cover it up with a 2 year contract for $12 Million. The second part of that deadline horseshit consisted of sending another of your better pitching prospects in order for him to ride pine. Now you’re debating whether to non-tender him or not.
Top it all off by failing to sign the only starting pitcher to carry this team on his back during the month of September and let him get away to? A small market team, that manages to go to the playoffs just about every fucking year.
According to Skipper Grumby, he offered Penny “a fair contract” but was rebuffed by Penny’s agent. The skipper is blaming his failure to sign Penny on the agent, since in old broken capillary nose’s opinion, the Giants made a comparable offer to the Cardinals.
Well. No he didn’t. Not even close. Even if the money was similar. And it had nothing to do with the park. It had to do with playing for a bunch of merchandise marketers and real-estate developers who are running a waterfront amusement park. Given that the money was similar, Penny’s agent recommended correctly that Mr. Penny take the opportunity to pitch for a contender and use the incentive laden contract to command an even better contract the following year…and give himself a genuine shot at the World Series. Not “competing” with “second tier” players for third place in the NL West.
Almost daily, Sabean exposes by his words, actions and sloppy explanations, the fraud that is the San Francisco Baseball Company.