Monday, March 22, 2010

Know Thy Enemy

Robert Timm, the webmaster at Dodger Dugout, e-mailed me this weekend and asked if I'd supply a post about the Giants for his NL West preview series. I'll be representin' RMC in enemy territory! Look for it this week, probably Thursday. Today the D-Backs are covered by Doug Franz of Sports 620 KTAR radio in "Know Thy Enemy." This should be fun. Be sure to check it out.

What do you think of the Joe Mauer deal? Is it possible to consider such a thing for a pitcher (er, Tim)? The Giants have four more years and $76 M committed to BZ (not including the 2014 option), so I doubt we'll ever see a deal of that scope again. Then again, I never imagined the Twins would spend this kind of scratch. Carl Pohlad is turning over in his grave!

Todd Wellemeyer or Kevin Pucetas? Ol' Boch likes 'em grizzled--as does his boss--so the odds swing to T.W., I think. Having K.P. ready in AAA for a quick call-up if/when T.W. implodes would be smart. We all hope to see MadBum get that job in the end, anyway, so I'm not sure it's much to fret over. Marc Hulet thinks teams ought to re-think the whole notion of a "no. 5 guy" in his two pieces for FanGraphs (A New Approach to the Fifth Starter and Fifth Starters Don't Exist). In 2009 the Giants got 17 starts from Randy Johnson, 6 from Ryan Sadowski, 6 from Brad Penny, 5 from Joe Martinez, and 1 from Madison Bumgarner. If the three we have now split up the duties for the season (MadBum a late call-up), I can live with it.

The dream dies--Cal gets thumped by the No. 1 seed. No shame in losing to Duke, I suppose, that's a great basketball team. It was a fine season for the Golden Bears, with their first-ever outright Pac-10 title. The old enemy coach worked his magic on the other side of the Bay. Maybe the guy does know what he's doing. The good thing about the loss is now the NCAAs won't distract me any more.

GO GIANTS!

--M.C.

1 comment:

Zo said...

MadBum has not shown an ability to pitch in the major leagues this spring - Pucetas and Wellmayer have. If spring is about competition for spots, it is a pretty clear loss for young Madison. One hopes he can be ready in time. Also - you have to get a few rebounds to be able to win basketball games.