Another sweep at the hands of the best record in the NL Padres. Another one-run loss, another offensive display of offense. Another bunch of bullshit excuses and explanations telling us how this shit just happens, it’s not our fault, everybody is trying real hard:
…. As for DeRosa’s signing, team sources said the Giants did an extraordinary amount of research. They consulted the doctor who performed DeRosa’s surgery and the medical staffs of his two 2009 teams, the Indians and Cardinals. When DeRosa and the Giants came to terms, he flew to San Francisco for a physical that included an examination by team hand specialist Dr. Gordon Brody, and X-rays and an MRI on the wrist.
At the time, the Giants believed the surgery worked.
“Anyone can get hurt in any game,” Groeschner said. “All the guys have a history of things. We’re aware of it. It’s something we research thoroughly. This is something than can happen when a guy plays baseball.”
The team’s position is that all signings carry risks that are weighed against a player’s potential benefit. The Giants understood the risk when they signed DeRosa. Right now, they are losing their bet. But in their view, the game is still on.
Yeah, right. Edgar Renteria, Freddie Sanchez, Edgardo Alfonzo, Moises Alou, Rich Aurilia (version 2.0), Randy Johnson, Ryan Klesko, Ray Durham (version 2.0) Mark DeRosa, I mean, come on. How about Dave Roberts or Mark Sweeney? Two guys that had never been everyday players signed to be everyday players for the Giants. How about Steve Finley? We only signed him about five years after he was washed up. Michael Tucker, anyone? How about signing Jeffrey Hammonds at 33 years old?
Here’s the line that Neifi Perez posted in 2002, .236/.260/.303 .563 OPS. Since Triple-A stats don’t mean anything, I’m guessing that major league stats must not make too much of an impression on Captain Queeg either, because the hitter that posted that line got a two-year deal for $14 million dollars, and a declaration from our estimable GM that Neifi was already penciled in as our starting shortstop and top of the lineup table setter.
The simple fact is that the Giants, that Brian Sabean decided that these guys, these washed up, has beens and never was’s had to be Giants, and he ignored, in fact, he flaunted his ignorance and his stubborn unwillingness to acknowledge what was known in baseball at the time; that old players tend to decline, that old, injured players tend to get injured, and that signing old and injured free agents to fill your entire roster has to be the worst possible way to do so. This is all on him. Brian Sabean built this team, has been building this team for going on fifteen years.
The number of acquisitions, trades and free agent signings that have worked out for the Giants can be counted on your fingers. The number that have been failures, not just so-so, but flat out colossal busts, is staggering. We’re talking millions, millions of dollars thrown on the ground as if there was no way to know what to expect with these players, as if we were still in the 1920′s, when all you had to go on was a game or two when your scout saw a player hit two home runs.
“…. team sources said the Giants did an extraordinary amount of research”
Yeah, well, that’s only part of your job. And, by the way, who’s getting fired for all the terrific “research” the baseball team has done with the last five or ten free agents we’ve signed?
Nobody. In the world of the Giants, it’s always bad luck. It’s always somebody else’s fault. There’s always a team that is chasing the superstar Brian Sabean wants, so he has to overbid, overpay to get them. There’s always a reason. And in the words of a fairly famous mentor of mine, “You either have reasons, or you have success. You can’t have both.”
Every time you read a Sabean quote, or hear him talk on the TV, he’s explaining how these things happen all the time, or he’s telling you how he doesn’t need statistics, or some other bullshit how he just has to be patient, that the hitters will come around. Here’s an idea: Go get some real baseball players, players who are young and good, and we won’t have to wait for them to finally get the rust out of their ancient bones, and we can stop hearing how unfortunate it is that another 35-year old is hurt again.
UPDATE: Just to be clear, I’m not blasting these players. These players are who they are. They are probably good guys. They work hard. They have integrity. It’s not their fault they are being asked to be the second, third and fourth best hitters on a team, instead of the sixth, seventh and eighth best. It’s Brian Sabean’s fault.
Buster Posey has now played essentially one full season in the minors. Here’s what he’s done so far:
158 Games 585 AB 120 Runs 194 H 46 2B 2 3B 24 HR 110 RBI 89 BB 92 SO .332/.425/.544 .968 OPS
Let’s say, for the sake of argument, those numbers are inflated, or better, will be depressed some 15%, maybe even 20%. That guy’s not ready? Really?
Bengie Molina, last season:
132 Games 491 AB 52 Runs 130 AB 25 2B 1 3B 20 HR 80 RBI 13 BB 68 SO .265/.285/.442 .727 OPS
Are you kidding somebody? How can anyone who knows anything about the game of baseball think that Posey couldn’t match that production? That Posey couldn’t have saved the team the $5 million we gave to the out-maker, and used it to land a real hitter?
Here’s the BP boys talking about Posey and Sabean:
…. Giants general manager Brian Sabean insists that Posey has work to do in the minors, but at least he doesn’t pretend any of that work involves his hitting. With last night’s outburst, he’s batting .355/.448/.579 for the Grizzlies. Instead, Sabean insists that Posey’s receiving skills still need work, despite the fact he’s played errorless ball so far, been charged with just one passed ball and nailed half of all stolen base attempts. Just admit you are managing his service time clock, Mr. Sabean, we’ll understand–kind of.
Well, first off, he is pretending that his offense is an issue, absolutely and constantly. And, even if he is only managing his service time clock, that is still pretty much inexcusable, given how poorly Sabean’s efforts to improve the offense went this off-season, highlighted –lowlighted?– by the fact that he brought back Molina to bat cleanup again.
This is a joke, that’s what that is. A joke.
Excellent weblog, many thanks a lot for your awesome posts!
thank you for sharing the info..
That is definately one of the best blogs I’ve sen in ages online. Maintain up the excellent posts.
Intimately, the submit is definitely the very best on this precious topic. I concur with your conclusions and will eagerly look forward in your coming updates!
Hello there, I should say it is a clever posting. I’ll certainly be seeking in on this web site yet again soon.
It’s a good stage!
[...] Onlу Baseball Matters » Blog Archive » …. Broom Hilda [...]
link to herr sabean’s recent appearance on knbr
http://mediaplayer.yahoo.com/contplay/index.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.knbr.com%2FPodcasts%2Ftabid%2F1065%2FDefault.aspx
this is a list of knbr podcasts
the one with sabean is labeled 0513sabean
use the pull down bar
and be prepared for true insanity
If somebody that worked for me sounded like that I would send him to be drug tested and to have a psychological evaluation. He really sounds like he is on “medication” and by that I mean he sounds like he hasn’t slept in a week and is taking speed or coke to keep going. Having frequently heard him talk before I have to say he sounds very bad. Maybe he’s having a breakdown.
The Emperor’s New Clothes
During the three game sweep by the Padres I began to look up the names and occupations of the principal owners of the San Francisco Baseball Associates, L.P.
There’s Neukom, and Baer, and Sue Burns’s daughters, Tori and Trina. There are CEO’s of investment groups and well heeled local business types, Dan Gellar’s Trust still owns a chunk. There’s even a guy who owns an interest in a pro soccer team in Washington, D.C..
I learned more about these people’s interests, wealth and businesses than I can honestly say I wanted to learn. I looked at their campaign contributions, at resume’s of their former employees, their signatures on the 10-K reports that they file with the SEC. I looked at their Facebook and MySpace pages, their high school photos and reunion messages. I looked at their charitable foundations and cultural contributions and looked for links and relationships and it all appears quite benign. There are some partners that I couldn’t find out anything about, but I couldn’t find anything fishy.
Some are vested for large money and some were recruited for as little as half a million. I believe that for the most part they are either investing as a hedge against inflation and/or the meltdown of the economy, or they are just enjoying having their names on the list of owners and getting seats in the owner’s box or whatever other perks and prestige being a partner entails.
Both KNBR and KTVU are principal partners, so you know that those two media outlets will never utter a negative word about the team. Never in a million years. Anything coming from either of those sources might as well be marked “From the Desk of Laurence M. Baer”.
As far as Comcast Sports Bay Area is concerned, I imagine they won’t be badmouthing the quality of the team as long as they are heavily invested in broadcasting rights.
The Chronicle and the Mercury won’t criticize the team for fear of losing access and enraging their dwindling number of readers who, if you ever read the comments in, for instance, Baggerly’s blog, are packed with snarling defenders of everything Giants.
No, the local media has nothing to gain, and much to lose, by criticizing the Giants. Don’t hold your breath waiting for that to happen.
The national media takes a swing at the Giants from time to time but even when that happens the fans are used to everybody hating San Francisco, that bastion of liberal communism, dirty hippies, and the hated Barry Bonds, and the local media responds to such national attacks with real or feigned indignation. H. Schulman recently blew two gaskets when ESPN showed a slow motion clip of Fatty Arbuckle being thrown out by a mile at home.
The Wall Street Journal recently reported a Neilson survey’s results that showed the Giants enjoy the most satisfied and happy fans of any team in Major League Baseball (they were trying to determine whether the Yankees were the most hated, but that honor fell to the Indians). AT&T Park, where the price of a beer is the highest of any in baseball, continues to draw huge crowds of paying customers.
San Francisco is not a baseball town. The number of hard core baseball fans, knowledgeable baseball fans, is a tiny minority. Think back to the early 1980′s, to the crowds that attended games at the ‘Stick, and you will see what I am driving at. Those big crowds at AT&T are happy and ignorant, and the local media is not going to educate them. The people of San Francisco are hopelessly provincial. They will root for anything that has the words “San Francisco” on it, so long as it isn’t too much trouble. They will buy panda hats and orange rubber chickens and their frustration at the Giant’s losing year after year will be offset by their enjoying playing the role of being a ‘loyal fan’. Like the Giant’s owners who enjoy having their name on the list, the fans’ attraction to the sport is more about being Giants fans and wearing the hat. If you were to take a survey at the park during a game and asked the fans if they knew who Brian Sabean was, or the name of the Giants center fielder, odds are less than half would know the answer to either question.
So the money keeps rolling in, the fans are happy, who the hell is going to tell Bill Neukom that the Emperor has no clothes? He has to figure it out for himself. Let’s hope he’s paying attention.
[...] Baseball Matters rips the Giants management: Yeah, well, that’s only part of your job. And, by the way, who’s getting fired for all the [...]
Never have so many, been fleeced by so few, for so much, paid to so many, for so long
And if he were alive today Winston Fucking Churchill wouldn’t give the sweat off his ball-bearings to Captain Fucking Queeg if he were dying of thirst in the Serengeti looking for the next president of the fucking United States.
It is a pathology. The Giants have the highest payroll in the NL West. They are spending more money now than at anytime in their entire history. It is almost $100,000,000. And the Stooge-In-Chief has 6 fucking free-agent fucks over the age of 107 that he signed within the past 18 months penciled in to start every fucking game…floppy tendon or not. That’s the plan at least when they’re not mercifully in a skilled nursing facility and out of the line-up recuperating from rickets, shingles, goiter, gout, gastro-intestinal disorders, floppy fucking tendons, hammer-toes, terminal acne, vaginal warts and whatever else the fuck old cunts get when they start wearing fucking Depends Diapers.
This fine fucking collection of noodle-swinging pantie-wadders has managed to put dead aim on last place in MLB in most hitting categories again…for the 4th fucking year in a row. And for the 4the year in a row they are probably not going to score anywhere near 750 fucking runs which is just about the minimum requirement for post-season. Fuck post-season; this splendid collection of booger-eating dip-shits can’t even win a fucking regular season game against the fucking San Diego Nobodygivesashits when a kid who defied Crazy Fucking Alou’s every attempt to ruin him, allows only 1 hit and still gets beat.
Fucking postseason? Fuck postseason. There’s not going to be any fucking postseason and there never will be while Captain Stooge Queeg runs around looking for his mythical pus-infested strawberries in Scott Boras’s deep freeze. Were talking corpse mutilation and necrophilia committed upon what was once a living breathing major league team. It took Stooge Queeg almost 10 years but he finally succeeded in killing it off in 2005. A couple of stellar pitching performances over 2 years is not a fucking team. Its a travesty considering the amount of money spent and the opportunities wasted.
And why isn’t there more fucking outrage at this fucking atrocity? Because the skull-fucked cocksuckers that cover this team and are supposed to report instead of propagandize get free fucking parking in the players parking lot, thats why. A bunch of fucking limp-wristed cocksucking sell-outs.
You won’t hear this shit on KNBR or read it on any fascist run commie giants blog. And I don’t even want free fucking parking from those child-molesting unicorns and pig-fucking condom-eaters
Fuck those clowns and fuck the clown-fuckers who cover them in msm. They should move their fucking horror show to the Alviso Salt Flats.
As for tonight? If Welldiggersass can’t put up a lousy fucking so-called “quality-start” against the worst team in MLB, then he should probably just show up tomorrow in a cheese-vendors uniform pouring wine for the posers in the luxury suite and call it a season
Sadly that despite all of Sabean’s blunders of bad acquisitions, trades, signings, and all the years of waiting for a title, the club continues to make money with the park and the various promotions, so I guess they don’t mind keeping a loser like him around, until it starts to seriously effect the bottom line. That can be the only explanation as to why this incompetent fool still has his job. As long as the team can stay competitive in the lousy division, and fans come through the turnstiles, Sabean is safe.
No. The problem is the stupid fucking partnership believes the shit that the front office fuckers tell them. Because it gets repeated by the media, and picked up by the fools at the Olympic Club, the Downtown Association, the C of C, the Bohemian Club, The Family, etc who buy into the bullshit and pat the owners on the back. The owners are like the stupid fucks on the Titanic who, despite seeing an iceberg as big as fucking Krakatoa, refused to believe the ship was sinking because “all the experts said it was unsinkable”.
I agree 100%. What is amazing is not just the instant injuries to Renteria, DeRosa, and F. Sanchez, but that the Giants’ FO blew it on Sanchez TWICE — once when they traded for him for the stretch drive in 2009 and he missed half the remaining games with injuries, and again when they re-signed him for $12 million this off-season, and he proceded to miss the first two months of 2010.
As the saying goes: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me every time…I’m Brian Sabean.