Randy Winn's Giant Debut

I was flipping through my copy of "San Francisco Giants: 50 Years" and was reliving some great Giants memories. Of all the great performances chronicled in the book, the one that I had lost to time was the amazing run that Randy Winn had in his amazing two month stretch with the Giants in 2005.

I feel bad that I had let his last few seasons cloud my judgement of him. I remembered him being a glove first right fielder who could give you a decent at-bat, but wasn't exactly an offensive threat.

If any of you are like me, that impression will forever be changed. In his first 58 games with the Giants, Winn put on an offensive show.

Before we get to0 deep, lets give a little back story. The 2005 season was a down year in the NL West, with a bunch of mediocre teams battling it out to the end. The Bruce Bochy-led Padres would win the division that year with 82 wins. At the trade deadline, the Giants were a pathetic 45-59, but only 5.5 games out of first place.

With Barry Bonds on the shelf with a knee injury, the Giants were hurting for offense. Brian Sabean pulled the trigger on a trade with the Seattle Mariners that sent Winn to the Giants for Yorvit Torrealba and Jesse Foppert.

To put it simply, Winn did not disappoint.

Year	Tm	G	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	OPS+
2005	SFG	58	231	39	83	22	5	14	26	7	11	38	.359	.391	.680	1.071	173

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 3/8/2011.

In 58 games, Winn carried the Giants. They were a bad team and he single-handedly kept them in the race for the playoffs. With Winn in tow, the Giants improved from a .432 winning percentage to a .517 winning percentage. If we extrapolate his stint with the Giants to 162 games played, it would be one of the best in the franchise's storied history. He would have hit 62 doubles, 14 triples and 40 home runs.

In his third of a season with the Giants, he accumulated 3.9 wins above replacement. To put that in perspective, if he had done that over a full season, it would be worth nearly 11 wins.

Randy Winn; a tip of the hat is in order for that amazing stretch of baseball.

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