When the Giants Come to Town, It's Bye-Bye Baby

07.09.2008
Giant Trade Impact

We’re not yet at the All-Star break, and two top starting pitchers have already been dealt. The Indians sent C.C. (or is it CC?) Sabathia to the Brewers for top prospect Matt LaPorta and others, and yesterday the A’s traded Rich Harden to the Cubs for four players.

Pulling the trigger weeks before the deadline on trades for starting pitchers makes sense, as they only can only contribute once every five games. Their impact is limited — get a hold of them as early as possible.

The early deals also free up resources for other trades, but the Giants won’t be much affected. They don’t have impact players, they have guys who are likely to patch small holes just before the deadline: Aurilia, Durham, Taschner, maybe Correia (he’s so essential the Giants just skipped his turn in the rotation), possibly Vizquel if someone needs D and doesn’t care about O. In other words, teams who lost out on the Sabathia and Harden trades aren’t repackaging their prospects for the big Durham-Correia blockbuster.

The exception could be Randy Winn. Sabes said a few days ago he wouldn’t trade Winn, but other teams’ desperation could change that. With Moises Alou and Ryan Church disabled, the Mets have an acute need for outfielders. Winn is valuable, and I could imagine a team with deep pockets taking on his salary even as a fourth outfielder. The more salary the Giants eat, the better the prospect(s?) they’ll receive in return.

The ultimate wild card, however, is a trade of Matt Cain. His name has surfaced in a couple rumor reports, which doesn’t mean jack, but if the Giants wanted a haul of potential high-impact bats, a Cain trade is the shortest route to a legitimate offense in 2009.

I’m not rooting for such a trade, but it’s worth laying out the possibilities.  What if, for example, the Giants could get two blue-chip position players who would contribute in 2009 at the latest, especially at positions where the Giants lack viable high-minor prospects (ie, the entire infield)? Names like Boston SS Jed Lowrie or Angels 2B Howie Kendrick immediately come to mind. 

Then again, BP’s Will Carroll reports today that the Giants have “waved off inquiries” about anyone not named Durham or Aurilia. It might be a quiet July and August after all.

Can Sabean return to his glory days of trade domination? Can he bamboozle anyone besides Dave Littlefield? For a look back at his trade history, go here and download the spreadsheet. Then discuss.
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[July 10, 2008 1:49 PM]  |  link  |  reply
MrLomez said

It'd be hard to let Cain go. It seems like every Giant fan likes him, despite some of his recent struggles. That being said, GET A FREAKING BAT!

For Cain, it would have to be someone like Elvis Andrus. A guy with true "stud" potential.

[July 10, 2008 7:35 PM]  |  link  |  reply
Zo said

I have thought about this question, and will suffer the abuse certainly coming from the following position. Overall, Sabean has done well in trades. Not consistently, but overall, better than even. The first trade on the spread sheet is the Matt Williams for Jeff Kent + trade. There are still people who are bitching about how much they liked Matt Williams, but this, and the subsequent signing of Barry Bonds, set up the Giants to be one of the best teams of the late 90's - early 00's. We were in last place before that trade. Most of the trades and signings since then have been in an attempt to retain that edge with the goal of getting to the world series (which they did, once). Unfortunately, the playoffs as they exist today are too much of a crap shoot to reward the best seasons (see: Giants, 2000). Also, I note the trade for Jason Schmidt. Schmidt was a dominant pitcher during his time with the Giants, I believe that will be apparent when his career is over. There is, of course, the stinker that was Joe Nathan for shithead. That was a terrible trade, and I believe cost the Giants many games for several years because of our lack of a bona fide closer, not even considering Liriano and Bonser. Another good one: Grilli and Bump for Livan. Grilli and Bump may yet shine, but they were unknowns and we got 745 innings (although, not all of them good ones). Most of these other guys you can drag stats out for, and maybe we "won" some and "lost" others, but given the potential variability in players year to year, they are the type of trades made to fine tune, trading equal strength for a little different strength. We are now in a different era. We need a trade (or free agent signing, or blossoming of some of our youth, or a combo) to be good again. Comparison with the last 10 years is really pretty pointless because the aims have been different. From Sabean's recent comments, he seems to understand that. It remains to be seen if he can build a winner again.

[July 11, 2008 6:05 PM]  |  link  |  reply
horace w green said

This is a mediocre track record by a mediocre GM. He's done an OK job of drafting, if you don't think about all of the other MLB position players drafted during the same time frame who could've helped (AL - Mauer, Pedroia, Young, Morneau, Longoria, Quentin, Sizemore; NL - Berkman, Utley, Ramirez, Holliday, Martin, Pujols, Uggla, Wright, Hart, McLouth). The only "winner" Sabean ever built was with Steinbrenner's bottomless purse. Lewis and Bowker are nice adds, but Sabean has been here since 96 and has not developed a single All Star caliber position player. He's got to go. Give Billy Beane a budget of $90 mil and watch him put this team back in the NLCS within 2 years.