Meet the Giants new largest stakeholder

Larry Baer may be the face of the ownership group but he is far from the largest shareholder in the team and that means that he must answer to the people that ultimately control the team.

Well today Mark Purdy of the Mercury News has a story introducing us to the man that is now the main guy in charge. Giants fans meet Charles Johnson.

There isn't a lot to give us an idea of what it means for the Giants in the future expect for that he was one of the people that helped push out Bill Nuekom. Here is some of the background from Purdy's story:

Johnson, according to Forbes magazine, is among the world's 250 richest people. The co-chairman and co-founder of the Franklin Resources financial mega-firm is worth an estimated $4.4 billion...

He is 78 years old. He is chairman and co-founder of Franklin Resources, the investment and mutual fund giant. Johnson and his wife, Ann, have been longtime Bay Area philanthropists. They live on the peninsula.

That's about it in terms of biographical information.

It is still too early how things under the new regime will turn out but I can't say that I am thrilled with how things are starting (can you say rainy day fund). With this information we will at least now have an idea of how is behind the spin machine that is Baer.

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Is a long extension for Tim Lincecum a good idea?

One of the big off-season goals of the Giants is lock up their top two pitchers to long term deals. Earlier I took a look at what kind of a deal makes sense for Matt Cain and I did something similar with Tim Lincecum over at Bay Area Sports Guy's site.

The latest rumor about the negotiations is that they are still pretty far apart. Here is what MLB Trade Rumors has on the deal:

A sizable gap still exists between the Giants and arbitration eligible right-hander Tim Lincecum as the sides explore a possible extension, Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com reports. Negotiations have taken place this winter, but the sides appear to remain a couple of years and tens of millions of dollars apart.

The more I think about this it might not be a bad idea if the Giants avoid a long term deal with Lincecum. Now before you jump all over me for this blasphemy give me a chance to explain.

Crazy Crabbers’ Most Popular Posts from 2011

The end of the year is hear and I thought it would be fun to take a look at what the most popular posts were of the last year. Here is the top 10:

1. Giants to Revive Classic 80's Uniforms What can I say people are excited to have these classics coming back.

2. Baseball America's Giants 2012 Top 10 Prospects Without really knowing it I was ahead of everyone with this one, I got my digital magazine subscription that had all the information before Baseball America published the list online.

3. Aubrey Huff Isn't Coming Back A post explaining that wishing for a Huff resurgence was foolish, I think that might be the case going into next season too unless the problem really was conditioning and he has taken it seriously this off-season. I am a skeptic but I am sure he will be given every opportunity to prove me wrong.

4. Checking in on Brandon Belt Looking at Belt in the minors after his demotion from the big leagues.

5. Larry Baer Confirms Giants Fans Worst Fears Title pretty much sums it up, we are living in a rainy day fund world.

6. Jeff Keppinger Trade Analysis I wish I knew about his lack of range when I wrote this. I overrated his offense because for some reason I thought he had something more than singles in his bat. I still don't think it was a bad gamble but not the win I imagined when I wrote the post.

7. Cost Benefit Analysis of a Jose Reyes Trade I was a fan of trading for Reyes, instead the Giants traded for Beltran which wasn't as big of an improvement.

8. Welcome to the Big Leagues Hector Sanchez Title sums this one up.

9. The Giants Misguided Way to Build a Baseball Club Talking about my dislike of the relief pitcher signings this offs-eason which I am still not a fan of.

10. Concussions are a Joking Matter to @MLB MLB twitter account made a bad joke and I called them out on it.

Overall it was a fun 2011 and I can't wait to keep writing into 2012, I hope you all keep reading.

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Replacing Runs for the Giants

The major off-season discussion for the Giants has been about how they will get better offensively next season. Over the weekend it looks like a couple people took a shot at trying to answer that.

David Fung at Beyond the Boxscore as a part of his series took a look at the players the Giants lost to free agency and used the Bill James projections to get an idea of what their replacements would do in their place.

3 ways the Giants could have signed Carlos Beltran

The big bat on just about every Giants fan Christmas list just signed with the Cardinals for a very reasonable 2 year $26 million deal. When the news of the years and money involved broke over twitter, a justified freak out session broke out among Giants fans, why couldn't the Giants swing this deal?

It would have been understandable if the Giants didn't want to go three or even four years with the aging slugger but two years was right in the Giants sweet spot. The Giants have window to compete with their pitching and getting Beltran on a two year deal would have opened that up a little bit further without hurting the long term out look.

The Giants need patience with Brandon Belt's strikeout problem

Once upon a time the Giants had an awesome hitting prospect, he had all the tools one could ask for, he had good power, made contact well and by all accounts was a very good fielder.

At each minor league level against inferior pitching he looked like the second coming of Babe Ruth, a real can't miss prospect that was the envy of every scouting director and general manager in baseball.

When he was finally called up to the majors something funny happened. He couldn’t hit a major league curveball and his strike out rate soared. When he did put the ball in play, he had poor luck with those balls falling in for hits leading to a poor batting average.

Highlights from the Baseball America Giants Prospect Chat

Over at Baseball America today, the Giants Top Prospect list was officially announced (but you already knew that if you read here regularly) and the second part of their wall to wall coverage was a chat with Andy Baggarly.

There was lots of great information in the chat that I thought I would share. So here are some of the highlights, you can check out the full chat here (Subscription required):

The Soft Carlos Beltran Market... Could the Giants Get Back In?

So the market for Carlos Beltran isn't shaping up the way that many thought at the beginning of the free agent period.

According to MLB Trade Rumors there is interest in the slugger from multiple teams but it seems that no team has been willing to give him the long term deal that he would like.

This is a bit surprising, I thought that he would be able to get a third year from an AL team pretty easy and that some team might even give him a fourth or filth year with the luxury of a DH to move him to should his knees get achy.

The Great Keppinger vs. Fontenot Debate Ends Tonight

The deadline to tender a contract to players eligible for arbitration is at midnight eastern time tonight and the Giants have a few decisions left to make.

The main event for tonight revolves around the Giants choosing between infielders Jeff Keppinger and Mike Fontenot as their backup second baseman/utility infielder. To me the choice really isn't that hard, I am a fan of Fontenot who offers better defense, more power and is better suited for the utility role. Keppinger has his skills but it is hard to get past the poor speed and empty batting average for me.

How much should Matt Cain get in an extension?

With the news earlier today that the Angels had signed C.J. Wilson to a 5 year $77.5 million deal it got me thinking about Matt Cain and his coming free agency next season.

What Wilson was able to get as an older and less consistent starting pitcher means that the market, should Cain become a free agent, could get pretty crazy. With that in mind I think that the Giants should really take advantage of the window that they have right now to work on getting him extended before he leaves town like Albert Pujols.

The Giants Budget is Maxed Out

With the trades for Melky Cabrera and Angel Pagan the Giants final roster situation has solidified a little more. In addition the team has confirmed what I suspected already, that they will go into 2012 with a payroll target of $130 million.

There are still quite a few things left to resolve that could change things but as things stand now there is about $5 million left for two smallish players. The Giants have ten guys that are eligible for arbitration that they are likely to offer a contract, the numbers for these guys are a best guess and could end up being quite different if the team makes longer term deals.

Angel Pagan Trade Analysis

The winter meetings sure haven't been dull, there have been streams of rumors flying around and last night some big news regarding the Giants came out. The Giants and the Mets have for the second time in the last few months come to terms on a trade. The Mets send the Giants Angel Pagan in exchange for Andres Torres and Ramon Ramirez.

This one isn't quite the blockbuster that sent Carlos Beltran to the Giants in exchange for top prospect Zack Wheeler but it is still a pretty big move so lets take a look.

Giants End of Season Review: Starting Pitchers

Up today, as we continue to take a look back at 2011, is the starting pitchers. This was the strength of the team and if the Giants are going to contend next season it will need to be again.

It is time for teams to have more engagement with their blogs

So I saw something on twitter today that made me insanely jealous, the Mets are having a blogger conference call with GM Sandy Alderson. 

Yes, lowly bloggers get to ask questions to the guy who is in charge of making the biggest decisions for a Major League Baseball team. 

Let me repeat that, the Mets are having a blogger conference call with GM Sandy Alderson. 

Is There a Market for Jeremy Affeldt?

Ken Rosenthal is reporting that the Giants are shopping Ramon Ramirez and Jeremy Affeldt to try to make some room in the payroll.

It is a little peculiar that the Giants are looking at trading Affeldt right after picking up his option, especially considering his relatively high salary at $5 million for this season but I guess the front office has had a change of heart or think the market for relievers has changed enough that flipping him might make sense.

Baseball America's Giants 2012 Top 10 Prospects

The Baseball America digital edition landed in my inbox this afternoon and I was quite happy that this issue was the NL West Prospect preview.

The Giants top 10 list is a bit different than the one that I was putting together but the Baseball America scouts did have some nice things to say about the Giants prospects.

Here is the top 10 list and a bit of the future blurb for each:

Giants to Revive Classic 80's Uniforms

Some pretty cool news for those that enjoy the sport of uniform watching, according to SportsLogos.net the Giants will be bringing back an updated version of the interlocking "SF" jersey that they wore from 1983 to 1993.

Giants Extend Brian Sabean, Bruce Bochy

Well I can't say that this news was unexpected, this was pretty much going to happen no matter what baring some sort of major scandal.

While I have a certain times not been thrilled with both of these guys (Brian Sabean more than Bruce Bochy) they both have some good points that are nice to have around.

Get ready for more bad middle tier free agent signings because the rainy day fund means top tier talent off limits. Get ready for more crazy lineup shuffles based on small sample fluxuations and prospect mishandling. It should be another maddening couple of seasons but hey maybe lightening in a bottle can be caught again.

I could have more outrage but it is hard to get mad about something that you know is coming. This announcement is like when Monday rolls around after a fun weekend, you knew it was coming, it sucks but you're aren't really mad about it.

There we go Brian Sabean and Bruce Bochy, they are like a case of the Monday's. If only this announcement came yesterday.

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Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving. I have lots to be thankful for this year.

2011 in Review: Relief Pitcher Vertical Vector Charts

Click to enlarge

Continuing with the vector charts series that I started earlier today (based on this from Athletics Nation) here are the relief pitchers stats visualized awesomely.

If you need a refresher here is how to look at the graph:

Each line corresponds to a Giants relief pitcher. The angle of each vector corresponds to the pitcher's GB percent with 100 percent ground balls as a horizontal line and 100 percent fly balls the opposite (duh) and represented as a vertical line, and the middle between the two extremes (50 percent ground ball rate) represented as a 45° angle.

The length of the line corresponds to the pitchers FIP-, where 100 is equal to league average and each point below is equal to a percent better than league average. So an FIP- of 75 means that the pitcher FIP was 25 percent better than league average. So in this chart a shorter line means that the pitcher pitched better which is kind of counter intuitive for how we would normally look at things.

Sergio Romo is the tiny, tiny line which is pretty amazing. The rest of the Giants relievers come in around 80 which is still really good and finally there are the two outliers Steve Edlefsen and Barry Zito but neither pitcher pitched many innings in relief so it didn't kill the Giants bullpen much.

Unlike the starting pitchers the relievers are not as fly ball heavy with 7 guys who were at the 50 percent mark or higher for ground balls with just Romo being the only guy who would be considered an extreme fly ball pitcher.

Up next will be the Giants hitters.

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2011 in Review: Starting Pitcher Vertical Vector Charts

Click to enlarge

I got this idea from the guys over at Athletics Nation and thought it was pretty cool way to visualize data. Here is how it works:

Each line corresponds to a Giants starting pitcher. The angle of each vector corresponds to the pitcher's GB percent with 100 percent ground balls as a horizontal line and 100 percent fly balls the opposite (duh) and represented as a vertical line, and the middle between the two extremes (50 percent ground ball rate) represented as a 45° angle.

The length of the line corresponds to the pitchers FIP-, where 100 is equal to league average and each point below is equal to a percent better than league average. So an FIP- of 75 means that the pitcher FIP was 25 percent better than league average. So in this chart a shorter line means that the pitcher pitched better which is kind of counter intuitive for how we would normally look at things.

The stats here are just for games that the pitcher started a game so Dan Runzler has just one game in this sample and Ryan Vogelsong's 4.2 relief innings are also not included here.

What we do see is that the Giants main four starting pitchers this season were all very good, the other guys that started games for the team were not. We can also see that Giants pitchers do there best to maximize their spacious home ball park with only Runzer (and his one game sample) going above the 50 percent mark for ground balls.

Later I will make one for the relief pitchers and hitters.

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Giants End of Season Review: Out Fielders

Up next in the end of season reviews are the guys that played the outfield for the Giants. Overall there was a bunch of injuries and a disappointing lack of production in total.

Just about everyone played below what I projected them in the beginning of the season and those weren't the rosiest of projections to start off with.

Cody Ross

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	0.267	0.320	0.439	68	30	2	17	71	7
Actual	0.240	0.325	0.405	54	25	0	14	52	5

Ross actually managed to put together a half way decent season, the only problem was that it would be half way decent for a 4th out fielder and not a guy that a team is expecting to be a starter. Part of the problem is that his crazy post season I think raised the expectations for fans to an unreasonable level.

With free agency approaching I am not sure the he will be back and that is a bit of a disappointment because he seems be a good 4th out fielder to have around with his ability to play averageish defense at all 3 spots and hit lefties well.

I can understand not bringing him back though because the Giants seem to have an abundance of guys who are almost good enough to be full time out fielders and would make nice 4th out fielders on most team.s

Nate Schierholtz

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	0.259	0.315	0.406	40	18	4	5	29	5
Actual	0.278	0.326	0.430	42	22	1	9	41	7

After years and years of rosy projections it seems that maybe Shierholtz finally was able to put together a pretty nice season.

It was a huge disappointment when he went down at the end of August and was one of the many Giants that got hurt during their melt down but his injury lingered and he was unable to return.

I still see Schierholtz as a fringe starter who just might not have enough bat to play a corner out field spot but he was starting to convince me that he might be able to handle a starting role. I would still prefer the Giants get a quality hitter that they can install into one of the corner spots but the tea leaves seem to point to that not happening. So I guess Shierholtz is a decent fall back guy because hey at least it isn't Aaron Rowand.

Andres Torres

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	0.264	0.334	0.442	77	32	8	13	53	22
Actual	0.221	0.312	0.330	50	24	1	4	19	19

I wanted so badly to believe that Torres was not just a one year wonder and that he would be able to continue his improbable out of no where career. Well it appears that I was wrong and from the reports coming out the Giants front office Torres is on the bubble for being even tendered a contract this coming season.

After a leg injury sidelined him for nearly a month in March it was steadily down hill from there where he just never got going with the bat. Over the course of the season it came out that he was struggling with his ADD medication and also having trouble sleeping which probably didn't help things.

He is still an elite fielder and a good base runner but his power outage is a reason for concern. I would like to have him back because if he can have a bit of a bounce back he could be quite valuable and at worst he could be a great 4th out fielder (see lots of guys who can fill the role). With this being just his second year of arbitration he is going to be significantly cheaper than Ross if the Giants bring him back which I think they should.

Aaron Rowand

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	0.250	0.309	0.398	49	20	1	12	45	5
Actual	0.233	0.274	0.347	34	22	2	4	21	2

Much to the delight of Giants fans everywhere the Rowand era came to an end last year. It was a little bit late but hey at least we don't have to have a Parental Advisory warning before each of his at bats any more.

Last season Rowand was worse than my already low expectations. Rowand put up a career low in walks and a career high in strikeouts and seemed to have lost about all ability to recognize a breaking ball. It baffles me that pitchers threw him anything but a slider all season.

The on going legacy of Aaron Rowand is that the Giants will continue to pay him this season and that is probably one of the many excuses that they will use as to why they are unable to improve some of their glaring holes in the out field and short stop.

Thanks for the memories Aaron.

Pat Burrell

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
2011 Projections	0.243	0.344	0.451	57	23	1	21	71	0
Actual	0.230	0.352	0.404	17	9	1	7	20	0

This was likely Burrell's last season and it was kind of sad to see him go out with a foot injury that sidelined him since the beginning of July.

I have a serious crush on Burrell after last season and even this year with his incredibly team friendly deal he was a steal with his awesome three true outcome ability.

It was a great story to have the local kid comeback and be redeemed while being a big part of a championship. I really hopes that he is able to find a job in baseball, can you imagine if he could teach his plate discipline to some of these Giants hitters?

Brandon Belt

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA
Actual	0.225	0.306	0.412	21	6	1	9	18	3

Belt was put on the yo-yo development plan and surprise surprise it didn't work out too well for him.

With the uneven playing time due to front office yo-yoing and a broken wrist Belt struggled to make contact with major league pitching. He continued to excel against guys in AAA but still had some issues with MLB breaking balls. I think that will just take time and him keeping his mechanics consistent (from his crouch if he raises up he will swing and miss over the top of breaking balls which seemed to be the case too much this season).

There were lots of good signs from his season, his power is legit. He hit 9 homers in 209 plate appearances and if given a full season he looks like a guy who can hit 25-30 homers on a regular basis. That combined with his plus defense at first base, excellent eye and I think his ability to hit major league pitching makes me even more excited for him.

I just hope that he is given a shot next year that isn't dependent on him hitting like crazy right out of the gate because I think he really started to feel the pressure that the Giants were putting on him to perform in those small samples.

Carlos Beltran

	BA	OBP	SLG	R	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB
Projection	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA
Actual	0.323	0.369	0.551	17	9	4	7	18	1

I think that Beltran's success willl be lost in the Giants meltdown where Beltran was too hurt to play during the Giants collapse where they fell from first place.

He was a very good player, he played up to the price tag (even if it wasn't the trade was a bad idea) and was the middle of the order bat that Giants wanted. The problem was that the team still didn't have enough to put around him to make a bad offense good enough to make the playoffs.

I would love to have Beltran back in 2012 but I think the odds of that are nearly zero with the rainy day fund needing filling and the Giants wanting to pinch their pennies. That doesn't take anything away when you imagine a Beltran, Posey, Sandoval, Belt middle of the order. Man that sounds nice. I might just stay in dreamland a little while longer just so I don't have to loose a guy with a .360+ OBP.

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