- 1960's: I didn't follow the Giants yet, but this had to be the Willies: Willie Mays and Willie McCovey. Juan Marichial was great too, but those two symbolized that decade for me, plus I did get to see them during the 70's though obviously as a shadow of their former greatness.
- 1970's: Split between Bobby Bonds and John "the Count" Montefusco, though Jack "the Ripper" Clark was also prominent, and I suppose Vida Blue. Both Bonds and Montefusco put their stamp on the fans hearts during that time for this decade.
- 1980's: Fallow years and short stints make this decade the hardest. Jack Clark led off the decade and Will "The Thrill" Clark ended it, so I suppose they would make good bookends. There was also Jeffrey "Penitary Face" Leonard with his "One Flap Down" to note as well, but he just didn't match either.
- 1990's: I was torn on this one, and while I could have done it like the 80's with bookends, I have to say it's Barry Bonds alone, Will was a shadow of his early years by the time he left us, experiencing continual injury problems. Matt Williams was very good but always in the shadow of these two players.
- 2000's: This is pretty clearly Barry Bonds, but with Tim "The Kid" Lincecum winning the Cy Young, I would bookend it with the two of them.
- 2010's: I would say early betting line has to be Lincecum for now, with the possibility of others making a name for themselves, like Madison Bumgarner, Angel Villalona, Buster Posey, and Rafael Rodriguez.
These are just my opinions. I cannot promise that I will be perfect, but I can promise that I will seek to understand and illuminate whatever moves that the Giants make (my obsession and compulsion). I will share my love of baseball and my passion for the Giants. And I will try to teach, best that I can. Often, I tackle the prevailing mood among Giants fans and see if that is a correct stance, good or bad.
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Sunday, February 01, 2009
Giants Decades
With Will Clark joining up, and thoughts of Jack Clark dancing in my head, it got me thinking of the Giants player who symbolized a decade. The decade is a very arbitrary unit and each will have their own player or rather players in this day of shifting allegiencies, but here is my Giants Decades:
Could we do a 'Worst Giant' by decade? That could be kinda fun. Maybe a LeMaster decade. A Neifi decade. Ahhh, memories.
ReplyDeleteSure we could, but it has to be a notable worse, not some saber stat like lowest RAA/RAR/ROAR/MEOW, something bad that hurt you as a fan:
ReplyDelete70's: Tie between Sudden Sam McDowell and Bobby Mercer, both sucked for the Giants after we got them, though Sam was probably worse, but I took off points (i.e. made him worse) for Mercer because we lost Bobby Bonds for his surly performance.
80's: Tie between David Green and Rennie Stennett. Stennett stunk for 7 years at $7M, a large amount in those days, but we traded Clark for Green and he did squat, the trade only became notable because we got Jose Uribe, the original player to be named later (he was originally Jose Gonzalez but didn't want to be one of many).
90's: Salomon Torres. It was actually hard to pick someone, and I feel a little bad for selecting him, he was young and probably scared out of his gourd, plus he had the nads to come back and become a decent reliever in his 30's. Still, pretty bad performance no matter how you slice it.
00's: Tie Edgardo Alfonzo and Armando Benitez. Nuff said.
LeMaster was LeMaster, he wore "Boo" on his uni and I fell in "like" with him as a fan. People forget but he started out his career with a 4.000 SLG and 5.000 OPS: he "slugged" an inside the park HR in his first AB.
Yeah, I like LeMaster, too. Anyone that wears a 'boo' jersey is OK in my book.
ReplyDeleteI'll stick the 90's and 00's. Torres is a good pick, even if you feel for the guy. For the 00's, I think I've got to go for Zito right now. His contract just scares me.