Hall in Orange and Black?

Grant at McCovey Chronicles has an interesting post suggesting that using Noah Lowry to get some offense is a sensible approach. He targets the Brewers' Bill Hall as a decent option --

The Giants can't pay retail; they have to go to the outlet store. They don't have the chips or the scratch to get a young superstar coming off a fantastic season -- a Miguel Cabrera. They should be focusing on young players who are locked up for the future, but whose 2007 performance might have made them expendable. Hall can play a league-average shortstop -- think Rich Aurilia during his first run with the Giants -- and he probably isn't as bad as he was in 2007. He probably isn't as good as he was in 2006. Something in the middle would still fill a huge gap for the Giants.

Seems like a good idea but I'm dubious that it will happen because Sabean is too incompetent.

The A-Rod Hate Train starts

The Merc-News' (registration required) idiotic Ann Killion -- part of the media cabal that blames Barry Bonds for the Giants being a crappy team -- has now declared that the Giants should not sign A-Rod.

Ann doesn't want to admit that getting a three-time MVP to play for you makes you a better team. She'd rather have a team full of good-quote guys like Pedro Feliz playing third base -- even though Feliz probably would not start for any other MLB team unless they were desperate. She's convinced herself that Bonds (not Blownitez, Aurilia, Sweeney, Hillenbrand, Alzonzo, Finley, Klesko, Niekro, Feliz, Durham and Zito) was the reason why the Giants were lousy for the past 3 years.

She can give Bill Plaschke and Ray Ratto a run for title of dumbest sportswriter on the planet.

Joe Torre in Dodger blue?

Sounds like Grady Little's about to get canned. My only question is what took them so long. It also sounds like they wanted Joe Girardi but may have to settle for Joe Torre.

One New Jersey paper is saying it's true, that Torre will be announced tomorrow.

The LA Times does its usual crappy job and writes a story saying it doesn't know what's going on.

Giants fans have to be disappointed that Little won't be around to mis-manage the Dodgers. Fortunately, "Clubhouse Cancer" Kent is still around for another year to disrupt any semblance of team chemistry.

Steinbrenner -- more incompetent than Sabean

Let's see. Since George Steinbrenner threatened to fire Joe Torre, five things have happened:

1. The Yankees went out and lost to the Indians
2. The Bosox swept the World Series for the second time in four years.
3. Torre told George to go hell
4. The guy George wanted, Don Mattingly, turned down the job
5. A-Rod, the best player in MLB, opted out

So, here's a guy with every advantage on the planet. But his personality is so toxic and his strategies have become so deranged that it's unlikely that the Yanks will see another World Series any time soon. In poker terms, he's a guy who can't even cash in after drawing a royal flush.

Red Sox humiliating the Rox

I almost never bet on anything but I was proclaiming at work earlier in the week that the Bosox would probably sweep, so a Dodger fan said, "I'll bet you $5." So I said OK. Looks like I may win this one. It's still surprising that the Rox got into the Series but they got hot at exactly the right time and then benefitted from the Dbacks playing like idiots. Now, they're back to playing like the Rox that we've disdained for all these years. Those unis still look awful and they've been reduced to starting Aaron Cook, who hasn't pitched in 2 months, tonight.

If the Rox win tonight, they will then face Josh Beckett -- who looks unhittable -- on Monday.

Jimmy Kimmel recently ran this pretty funny PSA about Red Sox Nation.

The disgrace at first base

Chris at Bay City Ball has done an excellent recap of just how pathetically Brian Sabean's handled getting decent first-basemen on the roster. Truly amazing to read the litany of non-performers -- Damon Minor, Lance Niekro, Pedro Feliz, Ryan Klesko, Mark Sweeney, Shea Hillenbrand and Jose Vizcaino (27 ABs).

It turns out that the only decent years in terms of offensive production since 2001 were in 2003 when Galarraga got a fair amount of time and Snow's one great year in 2004.

Chris also suggests Adam Dunn, Richie Sexson, Erubiel Durazo or career minor leaguer Craig Brazel would be better than Dan Ortmeier in 2008.

Ray Ratto = dingbat weasel

The SF Chronicle's worthless Ray Ratto is one of the many non-talents cluttering up the pages with time-wasting prose. Two days after Barry Bonds appeared at the Commonwealth Club to say that he wouldn't rule out a return to the Giants, Ratto gets back on the Bonds Hate Train to say .... well, it's kind of hard to tell, exactly, given that the piece is so poorly written ..... but the bottom line is this -- 'I, the amazing Ray Ratto, believe Bonds is pathetic for saying that."

It seems that this is a pretty obvious story -- Bonds says in response to a question that he'd be OK with coming back even though that's a longshot. But you can always count on the Chronicle writers to muddy the water by reminding you how much they hate Bonds because he's EVIL.

SF Chronicle already missing Barry

As a number of commentators predicted, the San Francisco media's suffering from Bonds' withdrawal -- to the point that Gwen Knapp of the Chronicle actively speculates that a return to the Giants isn't out of the question.

Marichal says Bonds may retire

John Shea of the SF Chron reports that Juan Marichal believes Bonds isn't coming back.

I'm still expecting him to DH in some place like Minneapolis or Arlington.

Back to 1977

I haven't thought a lot about the World Series -- my guess is the Bosox in five. I tend to think more about the Giants at times like this and I've already come to the painful conclusion that this team will post another losing season next year -- its fourth in a row.

In a way, I imagine that the 2008 version of this team will strongly resemble the 1977 Giants, who also went on to post a fourth straight losing season. That team had 3 pretty good starting pitchers -- Barr, Montefusco and Halicki -- but was fairly lacking on offense past Gary Matthews and Stretch (both with 28 HRs each) and Darrell Evans. The team's final record was 75-86.

The season started off with Gary Thomasson hitting the very first pitch of the season at Dodger Stadium for a homer. The Giants went on to lose 5-1, sort of symbolizing what was coming.
The team only got to .500 twice that year at 7-7 and 8-8 -- and that game was played before 2,240 fans at the Stick.

Two guys -- Jack Clark and Vida Blue -- arrived in 1978 to give us fans a decent team for a change.

Memo to Brian "The Brain" Sabean: No on Gagne

It really is "Game Over" when Eric Gagne comes in to relieve, as the Bosox fans learned to their dismay in Game 2 of the ALCS. Lorne Chan of the San Antonio Express-News has a nice column saying that if the Sox win the Series, Gagne will be one of the least deserving wearers of a Series ring.

And it turns out that "Game Over" is a free agent this off-season. I'm sure that -- given his obsession with signing over-the-hill vets -- that Sabean is thinking about Gagne in the Orange and Black.

Perhaps you're wondering if "Game Over" pitched again in the ALCS?. Yes, he did. He closed out Game 6 with a 1-2-3 ninth inning while the score was 12-2.

A pox on Fox

I thought I was the only one but Dan emailed me to make the same observation about how poorly Fox is handling the games:

Every time they have shown a replay tonight during the 7th game of the ALCS, they have flashed the logo for "The Transformers" DVD release. I can't believe we have to suffer through their over-produced games and the annoying Joe Buck and the overbearing Tim McCarver until at least 2013.

"The Giants win the pennant"

For those of you who missed Grant posting the link at McCovey Chronicles, here's a nice story out of the Las Vegas Sun about the legendary Russ Hodges' call of Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard Round the World."

As Grant correctly observes, you can never get too many of these.

A modest proposal

I think the Yanks and Mets should trade managers -- Torre played a lot with the Metsies and Randolph was almost entirely with the Yanks. (OK, I know that Torre's not with the Yankees any more. So sue me.)

It actually happened in the middle of 1960, the Tigers and the Indians traded managers -- Jimmy Dykes for Joe Gordon. Frank Lane, who loved to make trades, was the Tribe's GM.

Bogus headline -- "Giants should sacrifice an arm"

Glenn Dickey writes a pretty good piece for the Examiner saying that Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum are the only guys who will bring any value in trade. BUT HE DOESN'T ADVOCATE THAT THEY BE TRADED -- even though that's what the headline writer implies.

He simply says that the Giants will be crappy in 2008 with lots of low-scoring losses. And he asserts that Brian "The Brain" Sabean's not willing to trade Matt and Tim, which is the only part of the column that's not depressing.

As for his prediction that the team will be lousy, I'm hard-pressed to disagree, especially with Sabean's recent track record of an idiotic attraction to veteran players who are on the decline -- Durham, Roberts, Aurilia, Zito, Klesko.

The piece also shows that copy editors are some of the biggest lunkheads in the journalism biz.

Joe Torre's record

This is not a post about Torre leaving the Yanks; it's an easy way to win a bar bet. Who holds the record for grounding into double plays in a game?

Joe Torre. Four times as a Met. Feliz Millan hit four singles; Joe then grounded into four DPs.

A bit more reflection on 1989

Thinking back again on 1989 .... I've always disliked the Oakland A's for their pathetic performance against the Dodgers in the 1988 World Series. Rather than get down to business, they acted arrogantly -- as if they were so good that they were flat out entitled to win. Then they took it out on the Giants in 1989.

The Thrill couldn't quite get on track and went 4-for-16 in the Series that year after going 13-for-20 with 8 RBI against the Cubbies in the NLCS.

Arizona Fall League

The Giants Web site has a story about how Ortmeier and Schierhholz are batting well in the fall league.

But it doesn't mention that the team is currently 0-8. I found that out by clicking through "Winter coverage." That's what is known in the news biz as "burying the lead."

18 years ago today

The one and only Stick. photo taken in June by jjandames.

I was tired beyond belief when the earthquake hit. I had driven up from LA and was on one of the ramps to the upper deck; the shaking knocked me over and the noise overwhelmed me. I told my sister that it must have been a Blue Angels fly-over. "No, it was an earthquake," she said. (My sisters are very nice about not calling me an idiot even when I act like one).

We got to our seats and I had a slim vague hope that they still might play despite the general air of freak-out. But we were right next to the auxiliary press box and as soon as the monitors began working again, they were telecasting the collapsed portion of the Bay Bridge. We all knew at that point that there wasn't going to be a game that night.

As we spent the next 8 hours trying to get back to my sister's house in the East Bay, we mostly worried about her hubby having been on the road at 5:04 p.m. It turned out that he had already made it home, given how extra-light the traffic was when it hit. It's always struck me how fortunate it was that it was the A's and Giants that were about to play -- a circumstance that may have limited the number of cars that were damaged when the freeways fell down in the East Bay.

And I found myself reflecting more than a few times about how the Stick -- the much-derided Stick, the laughingstock of MLB parks -- had managed to survive this massive earthquake. For all its faults, it was at least built strong enough to withstand a 7.4 quake.

So looking back, I feel mostly lucky, even at this remove.

The countdown starts

Assuming Spring Training starts about Feb. 16, 2008, there are 123 days to go.

So there are now 166 days until March 31, 2008, which is opening day for most major league teams, and the Dodgers.

Many thanks to Dan!

Best line of the NLCS....

...goes to Dave Campbell on ESPN's Radio's Game 3 broadcast last night. When Yorvit doubled deep to center in the 3rd, the Rox crew mistakenly set off fireworks. That prompted "Soup" to recall a time when Phils' manager Terry Francona came out to the mound to have a word with Curt Schilling after he'd given up back-to-back homers in a visitors' park.

Schilling said, "You're not going to take me out, are you?" Francona said, "No. I just want to give the fireworks guy time to re-load."

Already waiting for next spring

Argyleist shot this last June

Dbacks: too dumb to win

Would Chip Caray please shut up? He was insufferable on tonight's telecast, going on and on and on about how wonderful the Dbacks are in spite of choking away a gold-plated opportunity to go to the World Series. The worst was his talking about what a "great" series Stephen Drew had -- when it was obvious that Drew's colossal base-running stupidity in the 9th inning of Game 2 had been the key play of the series.

Stupidity honors also go to Bob Melvin for pinch-hitting with Micah Owings in Game 2, for keeping Valverde in during the 11th inning of Game 2 so he could walk 3 straight batters and for starting Owings in Game 4 when Brandon Webb could have started; to Justin Upton for his ridiculous slide/football block on Matsui in Game 1 that resulted the ump awarding the Rox a DP; to Miguel Montero for getting thrown out at 2nd at the end of Game 1 with his team down 4 runs; to Chris Young for consistent bonehead base-running. And let's not even talk about Eric "Over-rated" Byrnes and his series-long gagging.

The DBacks are just too stupid to go to the World Series.

Yorvit!

Yet another ex-Giant success story as Yorvit hits a huge 3-run HR that destroys the Dbacks season, pretty much.

Would it have been smart to keep this guy (he and Foppert got traded to Seattle in 2005 for Randy Winn), instead of eventually spending $18 million for three years of Benjie Molina and his .295 OBP? Probably so. He's younger (29), gets on base a bit more (.323) and probably wouldn't be costing anywhere near $6 million a year. At this age, he might even have an upside surge of power.

Still, he did hit into 19 DPs this year. As far as intangibles & leadership go, he's been the catcher during the Rox exceptional run of excellent pitching.

Let's make a deal with the Reds

Now that Dusty Baker's employed again, how about unloading some of the Orange and Black's useless vets on the Reds? How about a package of Pedro Feliz, Ray Durham, Dave Roberts and Ryan Klesko for Aaron Harang?

Gagne gags

photo by brentmid


The foul stench of being a one-time Dodger icon will surround Eric Gagne for years. One of the better moves the Giants made this past season was not signing Gagne, the very annoying ex-Dodger. He's dropped a bunch of weight but was utterly ineffective tonight as the Tribe scored 7 runs in the 11th to even the ALCS at 1-1.

It was delightful to see how Gagne looks worthless now -- and if the stupid Dodger fans had any conscience, they'd be admitting to themselves that Gagne was probably juicing when he was on the Dodgers. How was it that all of the sudden a career back-of-the-rotation starter was getting the ball up there at 100 mph? Doesn't it seem vaguely suspicious that once testing began taking hold, he became an injury-prone shadow of himself? Of course, that's not a question that the dingbat Dodger fans would ever bother asking, anyhow. They'd rather spend the game knocking beach balls on to the field.

Dbacks deserved to lose

I attended tonight's game at Chase tonight in Phoenix and -- as much as I hate to see the Rox win anything -- they definitely were the less stupid team tonight.

-- How about Stephen Drew walking into an out in the bottom of the 9th? Just left the bag, never bothered to check. What a dingbat. Dbacks season is probably over due to this mental giant.

-- What was Melvin doing sending up Micah Owings to bat in the 11th with the season on the line? Wouldn't Cirillo be a better choice?

There you have it. The Dbacks performed like the Giants - no hitting at all - although these fans are certainly older than the Giants fans. No wonder the cheering seemed restrained.

Why the Cubs Lost

The Onion has the scoop --

CHICAGO—Following the Cubs' first-round elimination from the playoffs, a stunned and confused Lou Piniella asked umpires and reporters to clarify the rules of division-series play, claiming he "could have sworn" that advancing to the NLCS involved losing three games as quickly as possible. "I thought we had the Diamondbacks right where we wanted them—we looked terrible out there, we had all the momentum on their side, and it seemed like the other team was practically trying to win," said Piniella, who claims he began getting suspicious before Game 3 due to the ease with which he lost the first two games. "Though, I guess when you think about it, this way makes lots more sense." Piniella promised that he would attempt to win the games in the NLDS next year should the Cubs amass the 90 losses needed to make it to the postseason.

1976 Chisox -- what else is there to say?

(Yes, that is Oscar Gamble in the middle of the back row)

We all make mistakes, but the 1970s seems to have been a particularly mistake-prone period for people of my generation. At one point, I owned a flesh-toned 1962 Rambler and red-velvet platform shoes.

Josh Wilker at the always-entertaining Cardboard Gods has a fine post about this baseball card shot of the 1976 Chicago White Sox and their short pants uniforms. Honest to God, I laughed out loud over this sentence --

Though embarrassment was everywhere in the 1970s, it may have crested on August 8, 1976, when the White Sox plied their trade in front of their competitors, the media, and 15,997 paying customers while dressed in what must have felt for all the world exactly like it feels in a dream when you realize you’ve left the house after forgetting to put on your pants.

The mark of Cain

Chris at Bay City Ball has a great post, pointing out that Matt Cain had exceptionally bad luck in 2007. He cites stats from the subscription site Baseball Prospectus that show Cain had the fourth-worst luck score -- in terms of expected pitcher performance compared with actual won-lost record -- of all time. Here's a fascinating part of the article --

According to the estimated wins and losses metric, Matt Cain should have netted 13.6 wins and 9.4 losses. Instead, Cain went 7 and 16 in ‘07. The #1 all time pitcher with the lowest Luck score is Houston’s Turk Farrell (-18.18 Luck sore). In 1963, he went 4 and 22, when his expected W/L total should have been 10.9 and 8.8. Nolan Ryan’s (-14.96 Luck score) 1987 season is #2 and Bruce Berenyi’s (-13.52 Luck score) 1982 season is #3.

Another reason to hate George Steinbrenner

It seems that he loves the worthless Rudy Giuliani -- enough to give him front-row seats every time he deigns to go to Yankee Stadium. Yankee fans, who were already in a lousy mood due to the team playing like garbage, booed him not once but twice during Monday night's game. (Many thanks to Dan for the link!)

Giants fire a guy who deserves to be fired

Unfortunately, it's not Brian Sabean. But they did get rid of "hitting" coach Joe Lefebrve and Willie Upshaw, who was apparently the second hitting coach.

How bad was it? The Giants had the second-lowest number of runs scored at 683; only the Nats scored fewer runs. They had the third-lowest OBP -- even with the MLB's LEADER in OBP on the roster.

Bruce Jenkins is a gold-plated idiot

If you want to vomit, I suggest you read this completely stupid column by the SF Chronicle's hack weasel loser Bruce Jenkins. Here are his points --

1. the Giants are in big trouble and will probably finish in last place
2. he still supports Brian Sabean

There's no explanation as to why Sabean deserves any support after having taken the team from the World Series to the cellar in five long years. The implication is clear -- it's all Barry Bonds fault and Jenkins supports Sabean because Sabean's kicked Barry Bonds to the curb.

Jenkins is an idiot whose only role in reporting on the Giants is as an apologist for Sabean.

It could be a lot worse

With three straight losing seasons and several more likely plus a future without Barry Bonds, Giants fans have been reduced to being thankful that things could be a lot worse.

What would prompt me to say such a thing? Easy answer -- it's George Steinbrenner's threat to fire Joe Torre for the Yanks not winning the ALDS over Cleveland.

Steinbrenner should be ashamed of himself but that will never happen. And it reminded me of one of my most vivid memories of a baseball game on the radio. It was April 27, 1982, and the George had spurned Reggie -- despite getting the 1977 and 1978 World Series crowns. Reggie had signed with the Angels and was back in the Bronx for the first time. In the 7th, Reggie hit a long home run off Ron Guidry and the crowd responded with massive cheers and followed that with an unmistakeable chant that went on and on and on for at least two or three minutes ---

Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!
Steinbrenner sucks!

It's never too late...

...to post an outstanding column, this one by ESPN's Jim Caple, written on the eve of Barry Bonds' last game in the Orange and Black. Here are some highlights --

--No active player means as much to a team as Bonds has to the Giants. As difficult as it is to recall now, the Giants nearly moved to St. Petersburg, Fla., the summer before Barry arrived. They had reached the postseason three times in the previous 30 seasons. They had averaged fewer fans than the league average the previous 15 years, drawing under a million as recently as 1985. Then Barry arrived in 1993 and everything changed. The Giants drew 2.6 million his first season and won 103 games. They reached the postseason four times in one seven-year span, and came within two innings of winning the city's first World Series (why, oh why couldn't Spiezio have hit that ball three feet lower?). And they now play in one of the finest ballparks in the game, where they average two fans for every single fan who showed up pre-Barry.

-- San Francisco fans love Bonds, which is only natural, and yet fans elsewhere always look down on them as if they're the biggest group of delusional, blindly loyal losers this side of Clark and Addison. As if Giants fans need to apologize for rooting for the best player on their team over the past 15 years, as well as one of the very best players in the game's history. That makes no sense. Somehow it's all right for fans in other cities to root for Gary Sheffield, Jason Giambi, Pudge Rodriguez, Sammy Sosa, Roger Clemens or any of the other players who have been linked to or suspected of steroids. But San Francisco fans rooting for Bonds? Oh, no. That's shameful.

-- San Francisco fans don't need to defend rooting for Bonds. And if you were too busy rooting for the steroid users on your own team to understand, that's just too damn bad. Because you will miss Barry.

-- As soon as Barry takes off the Giants uniform, he loses stature and becomes a marginalized figure. He'll be Hank Aaron finishing out his career with the Milwaukee Brewers, Babe Ruth unhappily playing out the string with the Boston Braves, Crash Davis breaking the minor league home run record with the Asheville Tourists. No matter how legendary the player, once they become identified with one team, they always lose luster when they change uniforms at the end of their careers. Barry simply won't be the national lightning rod for emotions and heated opinions while wearing a Rangers jersey. Columnists and late-night comics will have to come up with jokes that don't use the size of Barry's skull as a punch line.

-- From here on out, Barry will just become an aging player trying to keep his career going. First you'll forget that he isn't on the Giants anymore. Then you'll forget he's on the roster when his new team comes to town. Then you'll forget that he's still playing at all.

-- With his departure from San Francisco and McCovey Cove, Barry also abandons his exhausting role as baseball's unofficial villain. Unless, of course, he signs with the Yankees.

Temporarily for the Yanks

I always feel like the Yanks have had more success than they deserve but I found myself rooting for them just a tiny bit today for the silliest of reasons -- I couldn't bear to think of three empty days before the playoffs start again with the Rox/Dbacks game on Thursday. Here's hoping the Yanks win on Monday to take the series to five and then lose on Wednesday in Cleveland.

It's also a preview of the coming of the off-season -- those three and half long months from November through mid-February before pitchers and catchers report.

Non-baseball note to USC fans -- How did that taste, you arrogant bastards?

Thanks again, Barry

Photo by artolog

Dbacks vs. Rox

As I said earlier, I don't really care who wins once the Giants' season is over -- just so long as it's not the Dodgers.

That said, it's more than a little disturbing that the Orange and Black's NL West rivals mowed down the Cubs and Phils with relative ease. Maybe both teams have gotten a bit lucky but it's hard to deny that there's some real solid young talent (Chris Young, Matt Holliday, Jeff Francis, Troy Tulowitzki, Brandon Webb, Jose Valverde and Garrett Atkins come to mind); that, along with the Padres and Dodgers, these are the teams that the Giants have to play more than any others' and they may be whomping the Giants for years to come.

Calling for the Waaambulance

I really didn't care who won the Cubs-Dbacks series until listening to Ron Santo made my teeth hurt. What a whiner. I realize he has health issues, but his endless moaning and groaning, plus the endless use of "we" to describe everything about the Cubs is not only unprofessional but just plain boring to anyone who's not a Cubs diehard.

Gone but not forgotten

Even with Barry Bonds no longer a Giant, the SF Chronicle still has plenty of uses for him such as this online limerick contest --


Bonds limerick contest winner
UPDATE: Weldon B. of Berkeley (aka lawtalker) is the winner of our Barry Bonds limerick contest! The judges chose Weldon's entry partly because it touched on both sides of Barry, veering toward the positive, which is how we think most Giants fans will remember him in the decades to come.

With the press he was always defiant.
With managers he's never compliant.
But with talent and style,
he hit baseballs a mile.
In the end, he's one hell of a Giant.

The runner-up is this one from kodiak, which gave us the biggest laugh:

Some say Bonds by the Giants was coddled
As for BALCO he took what they bottled
But amongst all of his sins
I'll recall with a grin
The time when Jeff Kent he throttled

Jon Carroll wrote an interesting column about a lawsuit filed by a woman against the Giants and Coca-Cola over breaking her ankle from sliding down the slide during the 2002 World Series. Here's my fave part --

Now, having had five years to mull her options, she's suing the Giants, Coca-Cola, the designers of the slide and sundry other humans (she might have included Barry Bonds, because everything is his fault) for $2 million in general damages plus an unspecified amount for punitive damages.

This kind of thing drives me nuts. I do not mean to minimize Roush's injuries; she apparently has had several surgeries and carries a fair amount of metal in her ankle now. But she's an adult - she was 47 when the accident happened. She knew she was climbing the stairs to a slide. She's an American; she certainly has absorbed the gestalt of a slide. Climb up, slide down. So it seems likely that, having climbed up, she understood that she would have to slide down. If she didn't understand that, then she was not paying attention to the rules of the world.

You're the lunatic, Brian Sabean

If you want to be repulsed by the Stupidity of Sabean, go ahead and read his live chat. Rather than admit that Bonds was the best player on the team, he insists it was Benjie. The worst part is saying that the team did not look like a last-place team and that it's all part of the "parity" in MLB right now.

You know, Brian, it was no accident that they went 71-91. We're just going to have to agree to disagree.

Fox can go to hell

What a relief it is for playoff baseball to be presented on TBS instead of Fox. I just watched the Dbacks beat the Cubs 3-1 in a game that Dick Stockton and Ron Darling handled without any sort of the same idiotic overkill that we've come to expect from Joe Buck and Tim McCarver. No talking baseball named Scooter, no constant sound effects -- just simple, straight-forward presentation of what was a very interesting game.

Andruw in the Orange and Black?

The Braves cut ties with Andruw Jones after 12 years. I'm sure Scott Boras will be calling Brian Sabean since not one of the Giants outfielders -- Winn, Roberts, Davis, Schierholtz, Ortmeier, Lewis -- is anywhere near this guy's class in terms of power and fielding. But the power drop in the 2007 stats seems a bit alarming and the OBP was a terrible .311. Still, he's only 30 and two years removed from finishing second in the MVP race after hitting 51 HRs.

My first guess would be that it's all academic since someone like the Dodgers, Cubs, Bosox or the Rangers will make a better offer anyhow.

Minnesota, here I come

John Shea of the SF Chronicle reports that the Twins appear to be an early front-runner for signing Barry Bonds.

He also says the Rangers may be very interested. But I think the Twins are a good bet at this point -- given their need for a DH and the fact that the AL Central has become so competitive in recent years with Detroit, the Chisox and the Tribe all contending and the Royals finally starting to emerge.

It also strikes me that Minnesotans are generally such level-headed people that they may not be particularly susceptible to the media's drumbeat of "You MUST hate Barry Bonds because he's EVIL."

Sabean live chat today

The Giants just put this out --

CHAT LIVE WITH GENERAL MANAGER SABEAN TODAY - Monday, October 1, 2007 12 Noon PT

The Giants will be moving in a new direction for the 2008 season, with an emphasis on building a team around pitching, speed and defense. Join Giants GM Brian Sabean for a look forward and his thoughts on constructing the 2008 Giants team.

Chat live with Brian Monday, today at 12 Noon PT.