First, a disclaimer: I hate rants about a team's former players who are doing well.
If we'd only kept So-and-So! Now he's tearing up the league! The early success of Shairon Martis and his game yesterday is like red meat for purveyors of this particular angst.
Let's keep some perspective. All teams lose or trade players who sooner or later turn a corner. Many of those players then turn another corner, or go back around the first corner. Some pop into a Walgreen's and buy ibuprofen and a Snickers bar, some duck into the alley and buy "Vitamin B-12." Some wait respectfully for the light to change before crossing the street, some dash wildly across and get run over by a bus. Lesson: Major-league life has many corners.
I'm not going to rant and rave, but it's certainly worth looking at a handful of former Giants, how they left, and whether the Giants were foolish to part ways with them.
Matt Palmer, Angels. Somehow, the 30-year-old Palmer has had a great run. Four fill-in starts for Anaheim and four wins. After he walked 13 in 12 innings in his brief Giant appearance last year, the team let him go. He'll likely get dropped from the rotation when the Angels' injured starters return.
Foolish? No.
Russ Ortiz, Astros. Ortiz latched on with the woeful 'Stros this spring and began the year as fifth starter. He didn't last long. This might be Russ's last go-around. His legacy still lives in S.F.: the team traded him after 2002 for Damian Moss and Merkin Valdez.
Foolish? The year or two of solid work Ortiz provided the Braves would have been nice, but if Valdez becomes a force in the bullpen for two or three years, I'll call this Advantage: Giants.
Rajai Davis, A's. Sabean miraculously dumped Matt Morris and the $10 million-plus left on his contract on the Pirates, and even got back Davis, who was useful in the second half of 2007, playing great D, drawing a .363 OBP, and stealing 17 of 21 bases.
Wow, we thought,
here's the Giants' fourth OF/platoon righty for the next couple years! He got DFA'ed early in '08 after a slow start, and apparently the Giants saw something we didn't (or vice-versa). He's never come close to those numbers again, though he did steal 25 of 31 bases for Oakland last year.
Foolish? Maybe a little. He'd be a better 5th OF/pinch-runner option than Eugenio Velez
Jeremy Accardo, Blue Jays. Next to The Trade, the 2006 deal that sent Accardo to Toronto for Shea Hillenbrand and Vinnie Chulk was probably Sabean's most reviled. It got worse when Accardo saved 30 and had a .206 BAA in '07. He got hurt in early '08 and hasn't pitched in the majors since. He's currently in AAA -- not sure if it's a rehab stint or if he's there 'til he proves he's MLB capable again.
Foolish? Mmmmm....yep.
Carlos Villaneuva,
Brewers. He had all of 31 games as a pro, all in rookie ball, before the Giants traded him and another prospect in March 2004 for the legendary Wayne Franklin and some palooka named Leo Estrella. Those
31 games showed promise, with roughly a K every inning and very few walks. Villanueva has been a big leaguer since 2006, mainly a reliever with a spot start here and there, and the Brewers thought well enough of him to make him the temporary closer in April before Trevor Hoffman returned.
Foolish? Trading a guy who's put up decent numbers in rookie ball for a major-league ready arm is never a terrible proposition. But Wayne Franklin?
Jason Schmidt, Dodgers. One of the best free agent non-signings ever, and frankly, a no-brainer. Unless your brain is inside Ned Coletti's skull.
Foolish? Au contraire. Brilliant.
David Aardsma, Mariners. If Aardsma keeps up his surprising work this year with Seattle, no doubt a few Lunatic Fringers will add the Aardsma/Jerome Williams trade for LaTroy Hawkins to their list of grievances against Sabean. Just remember it's taken three years of beatings at the major-league level for Aardsma to reach "not bad" -- and he's still walking 6 batters per 9 innings.
Foolish? No. If Aardsma has half the career Hawkins has had, he'll be lucky.
Kevin Correia, Padres. Released by the Giants this winter, Correia is in the back of San Diego's rotation, doing a fine Kevin Correia impression: 5 or 6 innings per start, 3 runs, too many walks. He might put it all together one day, but hopefully not against the Giants.
Foolish? Not really. The Giants' best use for Correia this year would be long man or emergency starter stashed in Fresno, and Correia wasn't going to go for that. Better to part ways.
Luis Perdomo, Padres. The Giants looked ready to keep this Rule 5'er on the 25-man roster but dropped him just before Opening Day. The way he's been used in SD has given new meaning to "mop-up man" -- or in stathead speak, "
the ultimate low-leverage reliever."
Foolish? Is it ever foolish to give up on a Rule 5 pick?
Jack Taschner, Phils. I know you're curious. How about this: 16 IP, 8 K, 12 BB, 2 HR. Nuff said.
Foolish? The Giants actually got a promising young pitcher, Hector Correa, out of the deal. Correa hasn't pitched yet this year, though.
Pedro Feliz, Phils. Since the Giants let him walk as a free agent, he's won a World Series, played great D, and started this year with a .364 OBP (!).
Foolish? He's no Kung Fu Panda.
Travis Denker, Red Sox. Getting Denker for Mark Sweeney a couple years seemed a coup. Denker was a second baseman with a loud bat and a good eye at the plate. In a brief call-up, he had six extra-base hits in 42 PAs. What wasn't to like? A lot, apparently. After the Giants dumped him, the Padres took a flier and dumped him, too. Now the Red Sox, no doubt also intrigued by the bat skills, are giving him a shot in AAA.
Foolish? I thought so when the Giants released him, but Denker's not proving them wrong so far.
Yorvit Torrealba, Rockies. Once upon a time, Yorvit was the heir apparent to Benito Santiago. Sabean traded him with Jesse Foppert in 2005 for Randy Winn, who has been Mr. Pretty Good for most of his Giants career. (And even better on defense.)
Foolish? It's not easy to find players who give you pretty good work for years at a time; to acquire one for a backup catcher and sore-armed pitcher makes for one of the more underrated trades of the Sabean era.
Yes, I've deliberately left out Francisco Liriano and Joe Nathan. I think we know enough about that trade. Anyone else you'd like to discuss? Michael Tucker, perhaps, now a member of
the Newark Bears? Greg Bruso? Todd Linden? Take us down memory lane.
My hometown Newark Bears are stocked with former big leaguers!
I think you leave out the most important aspect of Yorvit. It was Sabean's lack of confidence in him that led the Trade That Will Not Be Named.
If Sabean gives Yorvit a chance, then no, we don't get Winn. But we also don't get AJ, so we have Nathan as a closer, so we don't waste money on Benetiz, which means we have more money to spend....
It's a can of worms, but it all starts with giving up on Yorvit.
A classic example of tugging on a lose thread then suddenly ending up without a sweater. And then the weather turns real cold.
You left out one of the greatest moments of pure joy in Giants history: Armando Benitez traded to the Marlins.
It was a baseball version of a pyrrhic victory. See also: Morris, Matt.
Most of Yorvit's plus stats have come against the Giants (doesn't it seem like he's always killing us?). But why did we ever trade George Foster For Frank Duffy?
Good: Derrel Thomas for Mike Ivie
Bad: Ivie suffers from depression and 'self medicates' and is gone.
Bad: Gaylord Perry for Sam McDowell
Bad: McDowell 'self medicates' and is gone. Perry get 2 Cy Young Awards
you left out the martis for stanton deal.
I figured putting Martis in the opening paragraph was enough, but go ahead -- what do you think of the Martis deal?
Orlando Cepeda for Ray Sadecki. Brilliant.....almost Sabean-like.
Nice run-down, very balanced and fair view.
People talk about the Yorvit situation - start, nostart -but the plain fact of the matter is that he's only been good enough to be a slightly better than replacement level in his career since, as evidenced by the fact that the Rockies, desperate for a starter, wouldn't commit to him. He is not starter material.
And his stats since shows why: he's been a low .600 OPS hitter on the road with the Rockies overall. The average catcher in the NL last year hit .265/.346/.421/.767 and been around that mark since we let him go in trade and when we made THE trade.
The problem is that Yorvit is a perfect platoon partner with a full-time catcher who is a lefty hitter. Yorvit has hit .238/.298/.367/.665 vs. RHP (and that's inflated by his time in Colorado) and .283/.350/.470/.820 vs. LHP. People refuse to see that, but if you looked at his stats with the Giants, he benefited greatly from getting to face LHP more than he would if he were a full-time starter. He stinks as a hitter if he's a full-time starter, as one can see from his L/R splits and his road numbers since joining the Rockies.
About Martis, his minor league stats suggest that he's just lucky right now, that he will regress to his horrible MLE pumpkin stats at some point when the clock strikes midnight. Even if he were still with us, he would be a middling starter prospect sitting in AAA waiting for the call.
I still like the deal, but understand it can come back to haunt the Giants in some way. We got a couple of great months out of Stanton, it's not his fault that the team faltered, he actually pitched well enough to have contributed to a pennant run if the team had performed better.
I suppose you can also include Clay Hensley, who we traded for Herges a few years back, he was a on-and-off (mostly off) starter for them for a couple of years and also relieved. SD got 300+ IP out of him with a 4.09 ERA and 1.41 WHIP, so he wasn't that bad overall, though his main value was his 2006 season.
Other recent Giants let go but not named here are:
* Jon Coutlangus (was on Reds for, like, 2 seasons)
* Brian Buscher (still manning 3B for Twins)
* Dan Ortmeier (with Rockies now)
* Brian Burres (was on Orioles for 2 seasons, now Jays)
* Brad Hennessey (Orioles)
* Jerome Williams
* Vinnie Chulk (recently released)
Also, about the Accardo deal, you are not going to win every deal, there will always be deals that bite you in the rear in retrospective 20-20 rearview mirror. But at the point of the trade, we desperately needed a 1B who could hit league average and we got Hillenbrand, who was actually above league average at that point, for a promising prospect plus a replacement reliever who actually pitched well for us in his time with us, his WHIP was not that bad (and his FIP was 4.02 in 2006; his bad ERA appears to have been due to relievers letting in his runners).
Accardo apparently was optioned to AAA because he was absolutely horrible during the spring trying to become a starter (Cito Gaston's idea). He had forearm/elbow problems that cost him 5 months of the 2008 season, and his pitching in AAA would not be inspiring Toronto to bring him up anytime soon. He's walking too many batters right now but you never know when a team is desperate enough to give it a shot (see Livan, Ponson, Jeff Weaver, Brett Tomko). Accardo had that one great season of 2007, but his other seasons have not been anything close to that.
Joe Crede is now manning 3B for the Twins, not Buscher.
Didn't Martis also pitch a no-hitter while in the SF farm system?
No, he pitched a no-hitter in the WBC against mighty Panama.
It isn't so much the guys we lost in trades as none of them are that great to begin with but what each players departure meant to the big picture. As others have mentioned, Yorvit leaving meant we lost Nathan and Liriano and had to suffer through AJ which led to Benitez etc.
I like to think of the Rajai Davis departure as another turning point or dead end for the development of this team because Davis was let go after we signed Rowand to the 5 year 60 million dollar contract. Had we kept Davis in center 2 years ago instead of signing Rowand, we would have started the rebuilding process a year earlier and we would have another 60 million to spend on a bat like Texiera or Dunn this offseason.
I look at the trades Sabean has made and apart from the Nathan Liriano trade they haven't had too much affect on the success of this team. It is more the free agent signings and poor drafts partly due to losing first round picks because of signing guys like Sanders, Durham, Roberts, Benitez, Cruz Jr., and a few others that Sabean felt he needed to surround Bonds with in order to be competitive. For the most part it worked out for a few years but it obviously was not enough to win it all and subsequently has put us in the situation the team is in today, a half ass rebuilding process with still way too many pricey veterans that aren't part of the future and add little to no real value in the present.
>>Yorvit leaving meant we lost Nathan and Liriano and had to suffer through AJ which led to Benitez etc.
Yorvit was traded in 2005. Nathan and Liriano were traded in 2003.
Yes, but wasn't he in the SF organization at the time?
Pedro Feliz is trying to break your heart.
Humm Baby FTW!
The Giants had Ortiz again in 2007 after the D-Backs released him and ate the huge contract they gave him. He was injured all of 2008.
I think that The list you gave regarding the former Giants really makes a point that Brian "the loser"Sabean
has really done a horrible job directing this team.
As for the stiffs like Rajai Davis, Kevin Correia, Dan
Ortmeier, Russ Ortiz, The Giants made a wise move. I would to add to next year's team, Fred Lewis, Travis"jesus freak" Ishikawa, Bob Howry, the Big Unit,
Edgar Renteria, Aaron Rowland. Hopefully Sabean will call up Jesus Guzman and John Bowker from Fresno(PCL)and
I think that Brandon Crawford is much better than Edgar "The Lazy" Renteria. I think that Jonathan Sanchez
reminds me of someone who has a attention disorder. I have a suggestion let's have a poll of whom the Giants Fans would like to have as General Manager? I think that
John Hart would be my 1st choice, 2nd Ex-Mets GM Steve Phillips, 3rd choice Ex-Dodger GM Dan Evans, 4th and final Ex-A's GM Dave Stewart.
why would anyone's second choice for a GM be Steve Phillips?
thanks for the history lesson but as far as I am concerned, Yorvitt was out as soon as they brought in AJ. Had they gone with Yorvitt to start that season istead of thinking they needed to bring in a veteran catcher, this team would be a hell of a lot different today and would have probably won a lot more games over the last 5 years.
I still stand in Sabean's corner on the Perzynski trade. How often do we have an All Star Catcher that hits .290-.300? So the guy turned out to be a Cancer. Like Sabean could see that coming!
Loved how Sabean gave Pit. Nearly nothing for Schmidt!!!
Was really hoping for a Sanchez for a Big Bat trade though to help with some run support!!! Of course the Sanchez hype has died now.
Could care less how Feliz is doing! Was so happy to see him gone. He seemed so undisciplined at the plate, about as bad as Marvin Benard swinging at all those chin high balls...
I like the title of this thread!
This reflection makes me sad. It just shows that on the team, or traded away, the Giants have been loaded down with crap talent for a long time now. At least the Warriors develop talent for the rest of the league!