Burrell Back for 2011

As reported (Baggarly and Schulman) Pat Burrell returned to the Giants today by signing a contract with them.  The amount was not immediately known, but I would guess that it is probably in the $2-3M range, as it was made clear that he was returning in a reduced bench role.

Mychal Urban tweeted that there were significant incentives.  Basically, this allows the Giants to sign Burrell to a relatively cheap contract, but should he end up playing significant time on the field, he'll be justly rewarded for being a significant contributor.  I wonder if such a contract with Uribe would have saved the relationship and mitigate the hard feelings that Uribe apparently harbored against Giants management when he ditched the Giants.

Giants Thoughts

Glad that I could believe his words!  He said he wanted to come back late in the season as a bench player, and now it has come to pass.  His role will be like in 2010:  he'll get some regular ABs off the bench, and if any of the regulars are struggling or injured, he's our ace in the hole to start and hopefully bring up production.

Meanwhile, he and his buddy Aubrey Huff can enjoy another season together on the same team, as they dreamed about long ago when they were in college together (or perhaps it was after both made the majors), but in any case, it was a shared wish on the part of both to spend some time together on the same team before they retire.  And how better now that they won a World Series championship together on Burrell's childhood team that hadn't won in, like, forever, and Huff had a great time?

Looks like the 25-man roster is relatively complete now.  The question is whether they will keep all their arb players or not, with Chris Ray and Mike Fontenot the two possible non-tenders, as speculated by the local reporters.  Ray was put on the bubble because he was not on the playoff roster, but I think that was more because he was out on the DL for a while, and the bullpen was pretty set and functioning well in September.  I think they will keep him.

Fontenot, however, I would bet on being gone because the Giants need a MI utility guy who can play SS competently should anything happen to Tejada.  Burriss is probably up for that job and Sabean likes his vets (now maybe people can appreciate the vets more) and will probably get one to compete with Burriss.  They will probably keep an eye out on the non-tenders of the other teams as well.  They did contact his agent, so perhaps they were kicking the tires to see if he would be willing to accept a certain amount, which they would be willing to carry, knowing they might have to drop it at some point.