Saturday, November 14, 2015

Giants have grown the best infield in baseball

When the Giants had Barry Bonds in the middle of their lineup, they had a habit of giving up on prospects for veterans. This win now approach led to some post-season success, but the Giants never won a World Series with that approach.

Fast forward to 2015, and the Giants have three world championships because of a change in philosophy, that began with building through the farm system. This led to the team sticking with young first rounder Matt Cain, instead of trading him away like they had with so many others. And after some down years at the end of the Bonds era, the Giants used those drafts to re-stock their system for the long term. Tim Lincecum, Madison Bumgarner and Buster Posey got the most headlines, but the Giants started looking for players who were worth investing in long term.

This led to the Giants taking Brandon Crawford in the 4th round in 2008, Brandon Belt in the 5th round in 2009, Joe Panik late in the 1st round in 2011 and Matt Duffy in the 18th round in 2012.

Crawford had built a reputation with his glove in college, but his bat was inconsistent to say the least heading into the draft. So despite a much higher grade, he fell to the 4th round. His bat wasn't great in the minors either, but his glove kept him in the conversation for a call-up. However, even when he joined the team in 2011, he struggled at the plate. To put his bat in perspective, look at the similarities between Crawford and Andrelton Simmons at age 25.
However, the Giants believed in two things after winning a championship in 2010: 1. Pitching and defense is more important than offense. 2. Building through the farm system will pay off. Crawford slowly started to show improvement at the plate over the next two seasons. In 2015, he put it all together, earning a trip to the Midsummer Classic, winning his 1st Gold Glove and winning the Silver Slugger award as the best hitting shortstop in the National League.



Belt has always been an interesting case for Giants fans. For fans who believe in traditional stats more, Belt has been a disappointment. He has never hit 20 home runs, let alone 30 like fans expect, and he has never driven in more than 68 runs in a season. For fans who have embraced Sabermetrics more, Belt has been a strong two way player his entire career. He also set career marks in 2015 for home runs, runs batted in and walks with a slashline of .280/.356/.478. Also in 2015, Belt was awarded with his 1st ever Gold Glove nomination. Belt has always been criticized by fans for what he has not yet done, but his defense at 1st base, willingness to share the position with Posey without controversy, and his career .803 OPS are clearly valuable.

Panik missed 62 games in 2015, but his slashline of .312/.378/.455 led to a Silver Slugger nomination. He also showed off power he hadn't shown before with 8 home runs in his shortened season. Despite being the only Giants infielder not to be nominated for a gold glove, it may be because his best play came in a rehab start in Sacramento.
If Panik can put together a full season in 2016, he could beat out Dee Gordon for both the Gold Glove and Silver Slugger awards at 2nd base.



Duffy didn't even start at third base for the first five weeks of the season, as the team had signed Casey McGehee to start at 3rd. Duffy also had never played 3rd base in his professional career. Despite not starting until May, Duffy earned a nomination for both a Gold Glove as well as Rookie of the Year. And if it wasn't for the existence of generational talents Nolan Arenado and Kris Bryant, he'd have a chance at winning both. In his first Major League season, Duffy, had a slashline a .295/.334/.428 that included 12 home runs. While 12 is certainly a small number, it's important to note that Duffy did not hit a single home run in his entire college career and only hit 13 home runs in three minor league seasons.

 His development, along with Panik, Belt and Crawford show a patient approach Giants fans weren't used to. The team's patience with their homegrown talent has been paramount to their success in both 2012 and 2014. In the 2014 World Series, the Giants ended game 7 with an entirely homegrown infield and battery. Bumgarner was on the mound, with Posey catching, Belt at 1st, Panik at 2nd, Crawford at short, and Pablo Sandoval at third.

 Despite the Giants missing the post-season in 2015, the infield was historically good. Posey, Belt, Panik, Crawford and Duffy became just the 7th full infield in baseball history where each player had a Wins Above Replacement of at least 3.3.
The only other teams to accomplish this were the 2002 New York Yankees, 1983 Milwaukee Brewers, 1977 Texas Rangers, 1950 New York Giants, 1914 Philadelphia A's and 1906 Chicago Cubs. While the '02 Yankees infield consisted of homegrown talents as well like Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Alfonso Soriano, they also included a huge free agent signing in Jason Giambi and a trade for Robin Ventura. The Brewers team in '83 happened to include two members of the Baseball Hall of Fame with Paul Molitor and Robin Yount.

 If you include Madison Bumgarner with the five infielders, they had a collective WAR of 29.7 in 2015. By comparison, the 2002 Yankees infield, along with Hall of Fame candidate Mike Mussina, had a combined WAR of 27.8. There are two things Giants fans can conclude from these numbers: 1. The Giants homegrown infield was great in 2015. 2. The Giants homegrown infield could be even better in 2016.
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Thursday, November 5, 2015

The San Francisco Giants will sign...


Ah, the off-season. That time of year where we play musical chairs with free agents and put all of our favorite free agents in our favorite team's uniforms. Just imagine your team with Zach Greinke, or David Price or Jason Heyward or Yoenis Cespedes. Instant World Series contender. It's what we do as fans in November when our favorite sport ends in October. We have five months to speculate on how good our favorite team will be and it won't be until April before we get to see if any of our thoughts are actually accurate. The Giants have two significant needs: Starting pitcher and Left field. The off-season has two loaded positions: Starting pitching and the outfield. It's almost like next year is an even year or something. Yes, despite Vegas having the Giants as 20-1 favorites for the 2016 World Series, Giants fans know it's more like 2-1. Giants fans have become a little delusional in recent years. Winning the World Series is immensely difficult and the proof is not only in the Giants missing the playoffs entirely in three of the last six years, but also in 100 win teams like the Cardinals not even making the NLCS this season. The Dodgers won the National League West three straight years, something that franchise has never done, and came up short every time. The Pirates have made the playoffs three straight years as well, but haven't got past the 1 game playoff in two of them. Baseball is hard. So how will the Giants get back to the parade route that they have grown so accustomed to in recent seasons? Buying expensive free agents of course. But who do you sign? Who will they sign? And will those players want to sign with them?
1. Zach Greinke
The prize of the 2015 free agency class is coming off a Cy Young season. Even if Jake Arrieta or Clayton Kershaw win the award, Greinke's 2015 numbers were otherworldly. He put in one of the great seasons of all-time. He will be paid a mint to sign with whoever offers him the most mints. The Giants just declined options on Nori Aoki and Marlon Byrd. Play-by-play announcer Duane Kuiper suggested that the main reason for the options being declined was to put all their chips into the middle of the table for Greinke. Bobby Evans, the Giants general manager, said he wanted the most flexibility the team could have heading into free agency. Is Greinke worth the risk? Signing him would mean two things immediately. The top pitcher available is added to a rotation that features Madison Bumgarner and creates a similar 1-2 punch that the Dodgers had in Kershaw & Greinke. It also takes Greinke away from the rival Dodgers, which makes them instantly worse. That doesn't mean another top tier free agent couldn't sign with the Dodgers, but just that it could be a strong rationale to go after the top prize.

2. David Price

Price has been an outstanding pitcher his entire professional career. He has been nearly as good when it comes to Wins Above Replacement as Max Scherzer since his rookie year of 2008. His 29.2 WAR is only slightly less than Scherzer's 31 WAR in the same seasons. Considering what Scherzer was paid by the Nationals, expect Price to seek out similar money. Again, the question "is he worth it?" is thrown out there, and based on his sub par post-season starts with Tampa Bay, Detroit and Toronto, there are red flags when it comes to what Price will do when the light shines brightest. Of course, those were all American League teams, so obviously signing with the Giants will be just the change of scenery Price need come October. Right? In the absolutely loaded National League...maybe not.

3. Jordan Zimmermann

 October 4, 2014. Jordan Zimmermann pitched 8 and 2/3 innings of 1 run ball, allowing 3 hits vs the Giants and when Matt Williams came to get him and pull him from the game, the Giants road to the World Series became possible. The Nationals are loaded. Dusty Baker has been brought in to lead the troops and that is scary because Giants fans know first hand how much better the Nationals will be now with Dusty running the team. But the team will more than likely not re-sign Zimmermann with so many other pitchers on their staff making big money. Every Giants fan remembers how dominant Zimmermann looked that night in October, and every fan should be hoping that the free agent market thinks as little of Zimmermann as Williams did that night. Hopefully he falls into the laps of the Giants and he becomes the one who gets paired with Bumgarner. So by the power vested in me by the state of the internet, I proudly pronounce Jordan Zimmermann signed by the San Francisco Giants.

4. Jason Heyward

So now that we've solved starting pitching, let's find the Giants their outfielder. Heyward is an interesting case because to some, he is one of the best two way players the game has ever seen to start a career. On the other hand, he doesn't hit for enough power or have enough of the traditional numbers to warrant a middle-of-the-order payday. Heyward would be a perfect Giant, and there were reports that the Giants were trying to trade for Heyward last off-season before the Cardinals swooped in. So, we can expect the Giants to be interested. However, is his price tag going to scare away most teams? Will he be worth every penny, or will he be a guy who looks more like Jayson Werth than Manny Ramirez.

5. Yoenis Cespedes

Cespedes has played for the Oakland A's, Boston Red Sox, Detroit Tigers and New York Mets in the last calendar year. How can a player still be looked at as a prize in the free agent market when so many teams let him go elsewhere? Because baseball is weird and so is Cespedes' career so far. He has all the tools that scouts drool over. His arm is as legendary as his bat flips. However, he also takes terrible routes to the ball sometimes and even his greatest throw vs the Angels came after the ball was kicked. He became a non factor in the World Series this year, and yet the Mets wouldn't have made the playoffs in the first place without him. Will someone offer him an obscene amount of money and will that team play their home games at AT&T Park?

6. Alex Gordon

Gordon is a gold glove left fielder who may have hit the biggest home run in Royals history this October. He declined his player option this week, so he is now a free agent, and his age may be the only red flag heading into the winter. Will he remain productive in years four and five of a long term deal? Will he be worth the money he gets offered to still be an elite left fielder and to still be productive at the plate? As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, Free Agents aren't worth it. Does that mean that teams will stop overpaying for free agents? No. Will it mean that teams will be more careful about who they offer big money to? Probably not. But when it comes to this free agent class, Gordon seems like a more reasonable answer in left field at a much more reasonable price than Heyward or Cespedes. So that answers that one. The Giants will be signing Jordan Zimmermann and Alex Gordon and winning the World Series in 2016. I know we will all still watch the games next season, even though we know the results already because we love baseball, but it's nice to have some piece of mind. So the only real question now is: Who wins in 2017? It's an odd year. I'm no good with odd year predictions.
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