Bear
04-21-2009, 02:06 PM
By: Glenn Dickey
Special to The Examiner
04/20/09
San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy, Giants Vice President and General Manager Brian Sabean, New San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Barry Zito and Giants owner Peter Magowan formally announce Zito's seven year, $126 million contract with the team January 3, 2007 at AT&T Park in San Francisco.
The Giants are doomed to another sub-.500 season because of Brian Sabean’s bad financial and baseball decisions. If there’s any justice, this will be his last season as the club’s general manager.
Consider these 2009 salaries: Barry Zito, $18.5 million; Aaron Rowand, $9.6 million; Randy Winn, $9.1 million; Randy Johnson,
$8 million; Edgar Renteria, $8 million. That’s roughly 65 percent of the Giants’ team payroll of $82.6 million, and I’m quite certain that, by season’s end, we’ll see that Winn is the only one of the five who has earned his salary.
Then, consider this: If you took just the first two salaries off the book, that would give you $28.1 million. If the Giants had had that much breathing room in the offseason, they could have pursued Manny Ramirez.
Fred Lewis could play center for that team, with Manny in left — a little weaker defensively but with a hitter in the middle of the lineup who changes the game, as Barry Bonds did for the Giants for so many seasons. Obviously, the Giants have no such hitter now.
The starting rotation? Jonathan Sanchez could have been moved up to replace Zito, and the Giants could have picked up a pitcher off the waiver wire who could do what Zito is doing. Or, quite possibly, better.
No team other than the Yankees can afford the kind of mistakes Sabean has made, and this list doesn’t even include Dave Roberts, whom the Giants released but are still paying.
The Giants are doing well with an attendance that surpassed three million in each of the first eight seasons at their new park. It fell off last year but was still just short of 2.9 million, and attendance has been respectable so far this season. But in a bad economy — and with a yearly debt service of $20 million — the Giants can no longer afford the profligate Sabean.
Sabean was a very effective general manager for his first six seasons with the Giants. He was especially good in his first season, when he transformed a 94-loss team into a division winner. It started with his trade of Matt Williams, which turned out much better than he anticipated. He wanted to dump Williams’s contract and bring in solid major-league players, but he got a real bonus when Jeff Kent turned into a Hall of Fame player. Sabean also acquired first baseman J.T. Snow in the offseason, and he made midsummer trades to solidify the pitching.
Later, he also made a very good trade to pick up Jason Schmidt, the anchor of the starting staff for years.
That’s the Good Sabean. The Bad Sabean emerged after the 2002 World Series. Kent left (he has since said he’d have stayed with a good offer from the Giants) and Sabean grew ever more frantic with his efforts to surround Bonds with a decent hitter. Remember Edgardo Alfonzo? Good-hit, no-field Ray Durham got two contracts! Sabean traded for A.J. Pierzynski, giving up Joe Nathan and Francisco Liriano. Double ouch!
It’s time to pull the plug. New Giants managing general partner William Neukom seems to be the type who makes certain he has all the relevant information before he makes his decisions. He certainly will have it by the end of the season, and I think he’ll realize he has to make this change.
I would say that this is it in a nut shell except that Bruce will be gone before Sabean.:p
POST 2400
Special to The Examiner
04/20/09
San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy, Giants Vice President and General Manager Brian Sabean, New San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Barry Zito and Giants owner Peter Magowan formally announce Zito's seven year, $126 million contract with the team January 3, 2007 at AT&T Park in San Francisco.
The Giants are doomed to another sub-.500 season because of Brian Sabean’s bad financial and baseball decisions. If there’s any justice, this will be his last season as the club’s general manager.
Consider these 2009 salaries: Barry Zito, $18.5 million; Aaron Rowand, $9.6 million; Randy Winn, $9.1 million; Randy Johnson,
$8 million; Edgar Renteria, $8 million. That’s roughly 65 percent of the Giants’ team payroll of $82.6 million, and I’m quite certain that, by season’s end, we’ll see that Winn is the only one of the five who has earned his salary.
Then, consider this: If you took just the first two salaries off the book, that would give you $28.1 million. If the Giants had had that much breathing room in the offseason, they could have pursued Manny Ramirez.
Fred Lewis could play center for that team, with Manny in left — a little weaker defensively but with a hitter in the middle of the lineup who changes the game, as Barry Bonds did for the Giants for so many seasons. Obviously, the Giants have no such hitter now.
The starting rotation? Jonathan Sanchez could have been moved up to replace Zito, and the Giants could have picked up a pitcher off the waiver wire who could do what Zito is doing. Or, quite possibly, better.
No team other than the Yankees can afford the kind of mistakes Sabean has made, and this list doesn’t even include Dave Roberts, whom the Giants released but are still paying.
The Giants are doing well with an attendance that surpassed three million in each of the first eight seasons at their new park. It fell off last year but was still just short of 2.9 million, and attendance has been respectable so far this season. But in a bad economy — and with a yearly debt service of $20 million — the Giants can no longer afford the profligate Sabean.
Sabean was a very effective general manager for his first six seasons with the Giants. He was especially good in his first season, when he transformed a 94-loss team into a division winner. It started with his trade of Matt Williams, which turned out much better than he anticipated. He wanted to dump Williams’s contract and bring in solid major-league players, but he got a real bonus when Jeff Kent turned into a Hall of Fame player. Sabean also acquired first baseman J.T. Snow in the offseason, and he made midsummer trades to solidify the pitching.
Later, he also made a very good trade to pick up Jason Schmidt, the anchor of the starting staff for years.
That’s the Good Sabean. The Bad Sabean emerged after the 2002 World Series. Kent left (he has since said he’d have stayed with a good offer from the Giants) and Sabean grew ever more frantic with his efforts to surround Bonds with a decent hitter. Remember Edgardo Alfonzo? Good-hit, no-field Ray Durham got two contracts! Sabean traded for A.J. Pierzynski, giving up Joe Nathan and Francisco Liriano. Double ouch!
It’s time to pull the plug. New Giants managing general partner William Neukom seems to be the type who makes certain he has all the relevant information before he makes his decisions. He certainly will have it by the end of the season, and I think he’ll realize he has to make this change.
I would say that this is it in a nut shell except that Bruce will be gone before Sabean.:p
POST 2400