It starts with Buster

You can spend days looking at Fangraphs Zips projections for the 2013 Giants --

Player	PA	RC/27	OPS+	Def	WAR	No.1 Comp
Buster Posey	583	6.9	139	5	6.5	Joe Torre
Pablo Sandoval	547	5.9	125	2	4.1	Jim Lefebvre
Angel Pagan	610	4.9	103	4	3.5	Mookie Wilson
Brandon Belt	544	5.7	121	1	2.7	Johnny Callison
Gary Brown	654	4.0	89	5	2.1	Lemmie Miller
Hunter Pence	665	4.8	104	-1	2.1	Gary Matthews
Andres Torres	425	4.2	94	4	2.1	Mitch Webster
Joe Panik	640	4.0	87	-6	1.9	Liu Rodriguez
Marco Scutaro	542	4.2	91	0	1.9	Mark Loretta
Conor Gillaspie	566	4.0	91	1	1.8	Ernest Riles
Brandon Crawford	475	3.3	78	6	1.7	Craig Cooper

Dan Szymborski has this to say, including a suggestion that Tim could follow in the footsteps of Flash Gordon  --  The Giants’ success is tied pretty strongly to the health and success of Buster Posey — not merely because only one player (i.e. Mike Trout) posted a higher WAR than Posey in 2012, but also because San Francisco’s catching corps lacks anything like impact talent. At 23, Hector Sanchez certainly has some promise, but even approaching Posey’s production would be a considerable challenge.....

 Allow the author to make all necessary caveats and disclaimers regarding, in particular, Matt Cain‘s ability to prevent runs above and beyond those inputs for which WAR accounts. Adjudged solely by runs allowed per nine innings, Cain was worth 6.1 wins in 2012 — and has exceeded his WAR totals by ca. 10 wins by that measure over the course of his career. He’s good. Everyone acknowledges it. Huz-zah.
Otherwise, besides the departure of Brian Wilson (who was non-tendered) and a couple pieces maybe at the very back end of the bullpen, almost the entire pitching staff returns. Tim Lincecum‘s No. 1 comparable player, Tom Gordon, is notable, perhaps: Gordon was an undersized right-hander who made 203 starts between his age-20 and -29 seasons before becoming a dominant reliever. Lincecum, who enters his own age-29 season, has made 188 starts. Despite an underwhelming season in the rotation, Lincecum was excellent out of the bullpen during the postseason.

 Here are the pitchers --

Player	IP	K/9	BB/9	HR/9	ERA+	WAR	No. 1 Comp
Matt Cain	210.7	7.65	2.35	0.73	121	4.2	Freddy Garcia
Madison Bumgarner	209.0	8.40	2.11	0.82	112	3.5	Eric Milton
Tim Lincecum	188.7	9.25	3.72	0.86	98	2.2	Tom Gordon
Ryan Vogelsong	163.7	7.15	3.13	0.82	98	1.9	Mike Torrez
Sergio Romo	52.0	11.08	1.90	0.69	161	1.4	Ugueth Urbina
Barry Zito	135.7	6.04	3.52	0.99	84	0.6	Bob Knepper
Santiago Casilla	56.3	8.15	3.84	0.80	108	0.5	Doug Bochtler
Chris Heston	136.7	5.66	3.29	0.72	82	0.4	Mike LaCoss
Jose Mijares	50.7	8.52	3.73	0.71	107	0.4	Randy Choate
Jeremy Affeldt	55.0	7.85	3.60	0.65	105	0.4	Scott Schoeneweis