chulk one up to my dad

"Should we order playoff tickets now?"

- My father, on the Giants coming to terms with relief pitcher Vinnie Chulk.

adios, happy peter

Pedro Feliz signed with the Phillies today, ending a disappointing era in San Francisco. There's an inverse correlation between the size of Pedro Feliz's role on the team, and the team's success on the field.

2002: Feliz backs up David Bell and occasionally pinch-hits. Giants win the National League pennant. They lose in Game Seven of the World Series, not coincidentally, after inserting Feliz into the starting lineup at DH.

2003: The Giants win 103 games, while a newly-aged Feliz continued to back up third. In addition, he spent 25 games at first base and in the outfield. An increase in Feliz led to a decrease in post-season success, as the Giants bowed out in the divisional round of the playoffs.

2004: Feliz doubled his plate appearances, and the Giants won 12 fewer games. They missed the playoffs.

2005: An injury to Barry Bonds opened up a hole in left field. Feliz filled that hole with a .295 on-base average. Feliz appeared in 156 games; the Giants won only 75 games.

2006: Feliz played in a career-high 160 games, taking over as the team's regular third baseman. The team responded by finishing 11.5 games out of first place.

2007: In slightly reduced playing time, Feliz still finished second on the team in home runs. Giants finished last.

For all intents and purposes, he was Pedro Triste for the Giants. I will miss his defense and versatility, but I won't miss his wild swings at curveballs in the dirt. Adios y buen suerte, Happy Peter.

Sabean, Boras plan slumber party

In an official announcement today, the San Francisco Giants announced that on December 3rd they will host their 2nd annual "Get Out Your Checkbook Slumber Party." The sleepover, sometimes referred to as "The Winter Meetings," will take place in Nashville, Tennessee. The list of invitees is impressive: Brian Sabean, Peter Magowan, Larry Baer, super-agent Scott Boras, and of course his clients Alex Rodriguez, Andruw Jones, Eric Gagne, and Kyle Lohse. Several slumber party regulars were left off the invite list this year, most notably not-so-super-agent Jeff Boris and one of his lesser known clients, Barry Bonds.

You may remember last year's sleepover. Barry Bonds himself was there for the first night, he forgot his toothbrush though, and had to leave a little early. His agent Jeff Boris was there for the entirety, and after he and Peter Magowan made a fort out of couch cushions, Jeff talked Pete into one more go-around for #25.

But the real dish on last year's Slumber Party was the pair who snuck off and did the checkbook-mambo. Brian Sabean had spent the first few days of last year's winter meetings watching Scott Boras from a far, jealous of how popular he was with other general managers like Theo Epstein and Omar Minaya. Whenever Scott would look in the direction of the Giants' general manger, Brian would look away, pretending like he had no interest. But later in the week, the pair were seen in a local Blockbuster Video, selecting DVD's about eclectic left handed pitchers with a track record of durability. Away from prying eyes, under a big Superman themed comforter, Sabean and Boras hammered out a deal for Barry Zito.

Brian got together with Pete and Larry back in San Francisco and they popped some popcorn. They put on their pajamas and watched the 2007 season unfold. Barry Zito... was not so good. Via cell phone, fax, and email, Brian tried to get back in touch with Scott. But every time he would call, super-agent Boras was out of the office, presumably playing "truth or dare" with the Yankees, "spin the bottle" with the Braves, or "30 seconds in the closet" with the Angels.

So what will this year's slumber party/winter meetings hold? Brian and Scott are BFF (best friends forever), right? Will they get together at the sleepover and work out deals for all eleven of Boras' free agents? Management declined to answer, however, a source close to the Giants front office informed this blogger of several itinerary items planned for this year's sleepover:

- A Ouija session on a custom made Ouija board. The board they will be using in Nashville only has portions of the alphabet. In no particular order, the letters and numbers used will be as follows: 3-5-0-m-i-l-l-i-o-n-o-v-e-r-1-2-y-e-a-r-s. The custom Ouija also featues a picture of Alex Rodriguez's genitals.

- A planned excursion to George Steinbrenner's house. Four cases of toilet paper have been purchased as well as a full gross (144, I think) of eggs. Tee-pee-ing and egg-ing will continue through the evening as pajama clad revellers hit Hank and Hal's places as well.

- Andruw Jones will lead a session of dress up. No word on who will be dressing as who. However, it is believed that the Boras client, Jones will dress up as "2006 Andruw Jones," becuase no one wants 2007 Andruw.

Don't forget your sleeping bag... and your checkbook.

matt cain gets no support

It's been a disappointing season for the San Francisco Giants, but perhaps most disappointing for pitcher Matt Cain. On Tuesday night, Cain again pitched well, giving up only two runs in seven innings of work, but the Giants still lost, 6-4, as the bullpen gave up four runs in the ninth inning. Cain has an ERA of 3.65, tenth in the National League, and yet his record is 7-16. It's all due to a lack of run support from his offense. However, as shown below, Matt Cain is no stranger to a lack of support.

The New Bike

Matt Cain: Hey mom, where's my bike?

Mom: I'm so sorry, honey, it got repossessed.

Matt: But I mowed lawns all summer to buy that bike! Dad said if I earned half the money for it, he's pay the other half.

Mom: Your father never sent a check this month, honey. And without child support...

Matt: But they had to take my bike?

Mom: Your father also owed Barry Zito a lot of money.


Making Out

Matt's high school girlfriend: Yes, Matt, yes. Kiss me!

Matt: Hey, why does your bra feel so stiff? What gives?

Matt's high school girlfriend: Do you mean the underwire?

Matt: Yeah! Is that like a medical brace or something?

Matt's high school girlfriend: No, it's just a support garment.

Matt: A su-what garment?

Matt's high school girlfriend: A support bra. You know, it supports my breasts?

Matt: Look, if you've got scoliosis, just tell me.


The Accident

Doctor: Mrs. Cain, Matt was in a bad crash yesterday. He stopped breathing briefly after the accident, and, well, we're not sure if he'll ever regain consciousness again.

Mrs. Cain: Oh God! He's so young!

Doctor: I'm very sorry, ma'am.

Mrs. Cain: Are you saying, you're considering taking him off life support?

Doctor: Life support! I knew we forgot something!


The New House

Architect: I don't know what happened, Matt. The ceiling just collapsed.

Matt: What was holding it up?

Architect: I dunno, some kind of beam, I forget the specific kind.

Matt: (picks up piece of rotten lumber) Is this the wood you were using? This is old and brittle, and it looks like it could fall apart at any moment. And why does this 2x4 have "Rich Aurilia" written on the side? This one says "Ryan Klesko".

Architect: To be fair, those were all part of very successful buildings in the mid-to-late 90s.


The Internet Connection

Matt: Hello, Tech Support? My internet connection is down.

Tech Support: Well, what do you expect? Your whole infrastructure is old and slow.

Matt: I don't have any control over that. Can you just fix this problem?

Tech Support: Tell you what. I'll send Brian Wilson down to deal with it.

Matt: Is that a good idea?

Brian Wilson: Sorry, Matt, I accidentally set the router on fire.

mathematically eliminated

Wednesday night, the Giants were mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. This wasn't a shock to anyone. Informally, the Giants were eliminated from playoff contention on December 6th, 2006, after they signed Dave Roberts, Rich Aurilia, and Pedro Feliz over the course of two days.

The phrase "mathematically eliminated" is very commonly used, but not all that useful, because, what other kind of elimination would anyone be talking about?

"The Giants just got eliminated from the playoffs."
"What happened? Did the team plane crash? Did they receive a post-season ban for recruiting violations?"
"No, neither of those. They've simply lost too many games to be able to overtake the current division leader."
"Oh, mathematically eliminated. Whew."

For you calculus whizzes out there, to understand the complex mathematical elimination process requires...subtraction. Me, I'm going to refer to the Giants' loss as mercifully eliminating them from the playoffs.

Baltimore Orioles Haiku

rookie no hits us
we surrender thirty runs
we are lousy bums

My Dad, on Bonds: "He's Over The Hill, Right?"

My dad refutes the theory that Barry Bonds is washed up.

"Well, uh, not exactly.

"Here are stats I just downloaded.

"Despite not being in the Top 30 in batting average (which is what most
pundits look at), if you look at the "Moneyball" stats (i.e., the ones
Billy Beane focuses on) Bonds isn't performing too badly:

"Walks: Bonds' 124 leads the majors by a whopping 33% margin over Helton
at 93.

"On Base Percentage: Here, too, Bonds is in first place at .493, substantially above second place Ortiz at .434.

"Slugging: Bonds is only in fifth place at .588 (A-Rod is first at .637). Aww.

"But in OPS (a combination of the previous two stats): Bonds is first again, beating out A-Rod.

"OK, he doesn't play every day, but when he does he's still probably the biggest offensive force in the game. And, now that baseball is testing, don't you have to say that he's doing it naturally? (Not really, since they don't test for HGH--but still, it's a good argument to counter those who, incredibly, want to keep him out of the Hall of Fame.)"



Good points from Dad. Bonds is easily the Giants most effective offensive player, worth five wins over what a replacement-level left fielder would provide (AKA, ), or six wins over what Jason Ellison or Todd Linden have given their teams this year. Bonds is only 15th in VORP, but has the fewest plate appearances of all but Ryan Braun in the top 40. Clearly, he's still an effective player. Imagine if he could DH somewhere. He'd score 100 runs in 120 games if he played on the Angels.

Other notes: By VORP, Noah Lowry has been a more valuable offensive contributor than Omar Vizquel, Ray Durham, and Kevin Frandsen. Randy Winn is #109, worth almost two wins above replacement. Matt Cain is the second-most-valuable Giant by VORP, worth about 2/3 of Bonds's value. Lowry, Lincecum, and Zito all outrank Winn, and Kevin Correia checks in right behind him. Conclusion? The Giants are really sucky, but the pitchers are much less sucky than the hitters, particularly the super-sucky middle infield.