ELM,

Sorry lefty I'm gonna have to disagree with you about drafting a catcher first, especially since the Giants are in need of a hitter. Catchers are almost as likely to get hurt as pitchers, hence that is why young players that mash are often switched to another position. In addition, catchers often take longer to develop into a top flight receiver.

I think the Giants have their eye on the top rated first baseman in the draft (sorry can't remember his name, think it starts with an M?)

I would not take a pitcher with the #5 pick. The Giants need an impact position player. My preference would be either Posey or Justin Smoak, who looks like he'll move quickly up the minors and help bridge the gap between the mess at first now and Villalona in the future.

I want like to see Sandoval's line at the end of the season, not just after 40 games, before I finally give him the benefit of the doubt.

I'm a best-player-available guy, but in this case, I think the hitters and pitchers likely to be available are about equal. (So we might as well take the hitter.)

Also, on the best-catcher-since-Mauer comment, I think you're thinking of Kyle Skipworth, a lefty-hitting catcher who gets compared to Joe because he's a tall high schooler who can hit. I think it's mentioned in his draft video at milb.com.

But Posey is still considered the best catcher in the draft.

I think ideally, we get someone among Pedro Alvarez, Tim Beckham, and Buster Posey (can you imagine if we had kept Boof, we could have a batter of Boof to Buster, plus Bocock and Burriss up the middle, Bowker at 1B).

Unfortunately, the more I think about it, the more I think they will all get selected before we get to pick.

I think the best hitter available to us will be Justin Smoak, and it's no shame in selecting him, but that's probably our position of least need with Bowker for now and Villalona in the future, plus no realy prospect (at least a highly rated one) at C, SS, or 3B. There has been some talk about picking the other Beckham, Gordon plus there's a rumor that the Giants have an unknown middle-infielder targeted for the pick, but I think we have to go with best available position player, who most probably will be Justin Smoak.

Forgot to ask, why say it's an empty .295? His OBP and SLG is actually slightly above league average, though minimally enough to just call him average. Still, he is tied for the team lead in doubles, that's good for a tie for 8th in NL in doubles (with double tonight, he's tied for 5th if no one there got a double, else probably 6th in the league).

Empty to me is someone like Juan Pierre, who regularly hits in the .290-.300 range but his OBP and SLG are consistently below league average, usually by a significant percentage, resulting in OPS+ around 75-85 range.

Winn, at least, has been slightly above average in OPS+ for most of his career. Players who can do that consistently is relatively rare and therefore worth more than someone with an empty .295 average.

And as much as I want to see Nate starting in RF, a caution I noted the other day on my blog was that even though Nate had a great OPS last season in Fresno, he was only 27th in the league, meaning that if you think he's going to be a good hitter in the majors, then you have to believe the 26 guys ahead of him are pretty good too, but, ay, there's the rub, those 26 guys are not all going to go to the majors and hit well (else free agents can forget about getting much money, a team would just call up one of these studs in the minors).

For example, milb.com had a somewhat critical article up after Nate had his cycle, noting his 6 homers in 40+ games, not realizing that this means that he's only averaging about 15-20 homers in AAA and that means he is equivalent to 10-15 homers in the majors. Which is not very much for a RF, pretty terrible actually (and that's about what Winn hits per year, who makes up for it with a high average and high enough OBP and SLG).

So while I would love to see Nate, don't have huge expectations for him, certainly not on par with Jay Bruce.

OGC, good points about Nate. And good point about my comment about Winn's "empty" average. You're right, he's certainly no Juan Pierre. But he started the night at .295/.347/.426, an OPS below .800, which is OK but not what you want from a right fielder or a #3 hitter.

The larger point is that he's almost certainly not going to be part of the next Giant team in contention.

Nate's not the next Jay Bruce, but why not give him a chance to exceed our modest expectations? (and yes, I too have doubted whether he'll be an impact player because of his relative lack of patience.)

I don't know why Bruce's name is even brought up with regards to Schierholtz. There's no comparison, but that doesn't mean he can't develop into a good player in his own right.

He's our youngest high level hitting prospect, and he's already done well enough at AAA. On a team going no where, there's absolutely no reason why he shouldn't be getting some playing time in RF. There's this crazy thing called development, and it doesn't happen when you're 30-something, like Winn. But it does when you're a 24 y/o getting to play in the majors everyday. I'd like to see what he can be in 1-2 years. I already know what Winn is.

I think Cyrus has the right notion: we'll never know "what we got" with Nate until he gets to play in the majors. Fred Lewis has surprised people. He's no star, but he looks like a solid leadoff hitter. There is no upside, potential or otherwise, to Roberts, Winn, Durham, etc. Winn should be traded to anyone willing to give us some prospects, even marginal ones. His "value" is negated by the fact that he blocks Schierholz. Plus we are locked up with Rowand for 4 more years, that makes Winn redundant as well.

I read somewhere that Winn has a partial no-trade clause. What exactly does that mean? Anyone know the details?

What about trading Bengie Molina? Steve Holm has performed admirably in the chances he got.