I have no idea how to respond to John’s post. Instead I offer this threadjack.

Ho Ho Ho

In the spirit of the Holidays I am compiling a wish list/fantasy for dealing with the Giants problems.
Please add any changes/improvements you think would improve the list.

The fish stinks from the head down. The first order of business is the owners, their finances and their desire to win. There is nothing of greater importance to the success of a team than the owner’s desire and ability. The two “Major League” movies were based on the idea that a team could win despite opposition from the owners. That is funny because it is untrue.
#1 on the list: Billionaire Mark Cuban, come on down. Let Mark Cuban buy the Burns’ interest in the team and let him work his magic.

Further down the fish we find the GM and we know he has to go. He’s been too long on the job and his performance record doesn’t justify retaining him any longer. His replacement can be hired out of the ranks of assistant general managers working for successful major league teams, such as the Angel’s Ken Forsch. Other possibilities abound, but you get the general idea.
#2 on the list: Replace GM Brian Sabean with a successful team’s assistant GM.

Naturally a successful team requires a successful manager, one with a winning record and preferably one with a pulse. Bruce Bochy has a history of making the most of underfunded teams and running out gritty veterans to the detriment of younger player development/opportunity. He is not the right guy in this fantasy scenario. He’s been too long on the job, is too far removed from the player experience, and he has to go. Let’s get a younger man who is hungry for success and who would take the job because he is being blocked in his advancement. Let’s hire the Red Sox’s Tim Bogar and make his day.
#3 on the list: Replace Manager Bruce Bochy with a hungry, younger, more successful manager.

The beautiful and quirky dimensions of AT&T Park have earned it the reputation of being a bad hitter’s park. Whether or not this is a real or perceived fault it is a problem with a solution and in this fantasy the park’s fences get moved. Making AT&T into a bandbox is not the goal, but making it more attractive to players who have to hit in it and patrol the foggy, windy outfield is. Certainly the immense triples ally has to go, and enclosing it would have the additional benefit of allowing the club to build an actual bullpen. Bringing in the left and center field walls would allow the addition of more bleacher seats which will increase revenue and will be filled to capacity by happy fans who will gladly pay to see real hitters and real baseball.
#4 on the list: Change the dimensions of the outfield to match, at a minimum, those of New Yankee Stadium.

The Giants’ payroll is out of balance and can only be causing jealousy and malcontent among the team members themselves as well as making the team unattractive to free agents and prospects everywhere. As an example and as a standard they should just dump their undeserving and overpaid players. This would be expensive and would mean admitting to having made mistakes. This is a fantasy list so it includes that unimaginable scenario. Dave Roberts was a good start, but the team didn’t go nearly far enough. Barry Zito, while he is improving his performance, is just paid too damn much to make him fit in so he has to go. If another team wants to sign him, the Giants might pay part of his salary to get rid of him, but not much, and not within their division. If nobody wants him then pay him to sit in Napa, or wherever his heart desires, as long as it isn’t on the the Giants roster. Other players deserve similar treatment. You get the picture. The Giants can’t keep running a retirement home, and since the idea is to build a perennial championship caliber team, long term security is off the table.
#5 on the list: Sign short term contracts for higher dollar amounts, laden with performance bonuses.

Making this short list was a lot of fun. I hope you like it and will add to it or amend it. It has acted as a kind of antidote for the off season blues I always experience around this time of year and to some extent was cathartic. I don’t want to be pissed off at the Giants all the time. Merry Christmas to you all, and I hope we all have a Happy and Joyous New Year.

#1 Dead from the Neck Up
I was really stoked about Bill Neukom. I had great hopes. I wrote about it here at OBM and I made a strong case for Neukom. I believed he would turn the team around.
Then he extended the Sabean and Bochy contracts. One could argue that he was inexperienced and didn’t want to make big changes before he better understood his role. That doesn’t cut it.

At the highest level of professional sports there are no time outs for taking stock. Neukom has no business heading a Major League Baseball team if he needs two and possibly three years to get his sea legs. He doesn’t understand that the life span of talent in professional sports is short, and he doesn’t understand that his employees have dedicated their entire lives to get to this point.
I offer the only billionaire sports nut who desperately wants to buy an MLB team. Look at the other winners in the MLB. Steinbeck, Turner, crazed egomaniacs. I want one.

#2 Obviously horrible performance by the GM
First reaction to the Giants GM is hoping he will do no harm. Makes not having any money to spend a positive. How fucked up is that?

#3 Manager. Anybody else. Anybody. Anybody at all.

#4 If there is an amazing amount of opposition to changing the park then move home plate up. Do I have to spell this out?

#5 This is where I went off the chart. The Giants are totally fucked. They made terrible deals.

To take this back to the real world: the Giants Ownership sucks.
‘Merry Christmas’

another decade about to come to a close….and still the giants are no closer to a championship then they were at the start

i am going on 30 plus years of being a fan, and it really is disconcerting

even my 11 year old nephew knows that sabean is one of the worst gm’s in the biz (and he is a sox fan who loves pablo)

i was really hoping that the giants would win before i got to a point where i could care less….its not gonna happen

There’s a movement to radically change California government, by getting rid of career politicians and chopping their salaries in half. A group known as Citizens for California Reform wants to make the California legislature a part time time job, just like it was until 1966.

latest trend

Retarded

Sabean just threw 12 million at a 35 year old utility guy coming off a down year and a wrist injury; Mark DeRosa

So far, this year, Sabean has spent $24 million of fan money on Freddy Sanchez of the sub 600 OPS and Mark DeRosa, a scrubini, over-age utility pine grabber with a declining OBP with warning track power.

I’m sure Lincecum and his agent have taken note.

Words I do not expect to hear:

Lincecum: “Fuck dude, thats some awesome run-support I’m gonna get this year” Sign me up for 6 yeas of this shit! Fuck Yeah.

Cain: “Wow, I can’t wait till I ring up my 100th career loss before 50 wins, and still get picked for the All Star Game….I should get into the HOF right about the same time Joe Jackson does”

Just fucking wow. Shows what happens when inherited wealth and status brings its arrogance to the ballpark by buying its way into a scurrilous stewardship.

Sabean Does It Again

In a conference call with Andrew Baggerly today Brian Sabean said,

“It’s a chess game at this point. We’re engaged in a lot of possibilities. We’ve still got some offers on the table. We haven’t beefed up efforts on a fifth starter or the catching front. Between now till the new year, we’ll flush out the offensive possibilities.”

Not sure what he’s talking about – Sabean flushed the Giant’s offensive possibilities years ago when he signed fat contracts for the hideously under-performing trio of Zito, Rowand and What’s His Name.

Said the newest ambulatory case to join the Giant’s retirement home,

“I was just tired of being a lot of team’s plan B.”

It should make Giants fans happy to hear that a lot of other team’s plan B is Sabean’s Plan A.

Nothing about this deal makes sense from a baseball point of view. Six million a year to another over the hill sub-par hitter with no upside increases payroll, blocks younger players from development, and sends out the message to fans and free agents that nothing good is going to happen with the San Francisco Giants. In other words, a Classic Sabean signing.

Brian Sabean is single handedly killing the Giant’s chances of ever getting out of their prolonged slide into mediocrity through making these idiotic deals when doing nothing would at least do no harm.

Perhaps it’s time for Sabean to quit playing chess and take up another game, say baseball, or by preference, Russian Roulette with a semi automatic.

Mark DeRosa?????????????

so sabean gets a 3 year extension to do the same old same old

No kidding! I’ve been refreshing since the DeRossa signing because I just know that OBM is going to to be full of authentic hair pulling fury!

Don’t give up, John. Win, loose or draw you’ve got the best stick out there. Hop over to USS Mariner if you need confirmation that things get better. The elation that they’re able to bring right now wouldn’t be the same without the years upon years of intelligent and entertaining “**&$%##*#&!!!”. You’ve got a masterpiece in the making here!