Monday, March 30, 2009

The keystone corner

Chris Haft (q.v. his blog Haft-Baked Ideas) seems to think young Emmanuel Burriss is the front-runner at second base:

. . . the Giants' apparent interest in seeing what Frandsen can do at other positions creates the appearance that Burriss will secure the second base job.

I have been assuming all along that Frandsen was the second baseman, that is, it was his job to lose. Burriss has speed, and I know the Giants like that, but his lifetime minor-league slugging percentage is .337. (Frandsen's is .458, though you wouldn't call him a slugger.) Frandsen might be expected to handle backup at third base, thus freeing Aurilia from that task. In my ideal universe, Guzman is our backup first baseman, but we will break camp with Richie and hope Jesus learns to use the mitt at AAA.

2 comments:

Brother Bob said...

We've been waiting a long time for Frandsen. It's now or never for him. Burriss may not be any big deal but he seems to have more long-term potential.

Theo said...

It's Burriss' job to lose, but Frandsen will get a lot of time elsewhere; outfield, at 2B when Rental is out (and Burriss is at short), and like you mentioned at third.

Really, this boils down to the fact that Ray Durham is still hurting this team. If the Briantrust didn't re-sign Durham after '06 we would know by now what K-Fran is capable of. Too bad for him, just another in the long list of mishandled prospects.