I generally love reading Ann Killion, but sometimes, she is way off. I once responded in my blog when she questioned the future plans of the Giants under Sabean. Here she goes again, this time in the Chronicle, questioning Zaidi.
ogc thoughts
Ann Killion wrote in her first paragraph, "They have to figure out who they want to be."
There is an art to drafts, as well as a need to adjust yearly to the rhythm of pitcher development. College hitters tend to provide more likely value, and sooner, and that was the focus of Zaidi's first draft. Which, unfortunately, didn't work out, none of them are really much of a prospect today. Ironically, the one with the most potential is their high school pick, Grant McCray, who strikes out way too much, and the best and most likely to produce some value is Tyler Fitzgerald, but the odds are still long for him because he has little draft pedigree (4th round draftee) and was still striking out too much in AAA.
Zaidi's second draft was a mix of pitching and hitting, but is the one where he hit the jackpot. He targeted and arranged his picks to enable him to cobble together enough bonus money to offer Kyle Harrison first round money, while picking him in the third round. Harrison is the key prospect around which the NextGen Giants will be built.
The NextGen Giants Will be Led by Kyle Harrison, Hopefully
This is similar in timing to 2007, where Webb is Cain, a good to great pitcher who pitches more to contact, but can strike out hitters too, and Harrison is Lincecum, an electric pitcher who strikes out a ton of hitters while also walking a bit too much. Harrison's MLB debut was obviously mixed, but the future looks bright for him because he has pitches that MLB hitters already swing and miss a lot, and if he can limit the mistake pitches that becomes homers, he's already a good pitcher in his other peripherals.
The Giants must have realized what they got with Harrison and Webb, so in their third and fourth drafts, Zaidi drafted almost entirely pitchers with their picks down to Round 10, with the only position players being seniors whose bonuses are almost zero, allowing the Giants to spend more on pitchers in the earlier rounds. And instead of throw away seniors, the Giants have drafted seniors who exhibit skills that they desire, in Vaun Brown and Wade Meckler, getting value there as well.
As I've written about the draft before, it is a mix of luck and talent. Humans can only go so far and so often in identifying good players, it is like being a hitter where .300 (or 30%) is a good percentage for success. Except the level of success is closer to .050-.100. So I view the volume draft method as a key ingredient of Sabean's tenure: even though pitchers made up less than 50% of the 25-man roster back then, he always drafted more pitchers than hitters, and almost always used his first round draft pick on a pitcher, spending a huge amount of his draft bullets (which can be measured crudely by summing up bonus money). And Zaidi went with the volume method even more so than Sabean, drafting, from what I recall, 17 pitchers out of the 20 picks they had from round 1 to 10 in 2021 and 2022.
Focusing Drafts on Pitching
It just makes sense, especially with a pitching emphasis. If you are going to get lucky, be lucky with pitchers because the more you have of good pitching, the better your team will be. It also builds a backlog to cover for the fact that pitchers tend to be injured and flame out quicker than good position players.
Moreover, if you find three good pitchers, you have a great rotation. Even talented pitchers who flame out as starters can create value as a good reliever, as the stress of starting is what breaks down their body. But if you find three good position players, if any are playing the same position (think McCovey and Cepeda both being firstbasemen), you either lose value by pushing him to another position (if possible; which invites injury, see McCovey playing the OF) or by having to trade him to fill a gap elsewhere (and studies have shown that, in general, trades involved getting the prospects and players the other team finds lacking in some way, and if you have to trade a good player, you end up taking a shave in value received).
Player Development Takes Time
And while Giants fans moan about giving Zaidi five years to find prospects (actually, only four drafts, can't rebuild otherwise), prospects take time to develop into major leaguers. Let's look at Kyle Harrison.
He was drafted out of High School in 2020 draft, and because of the pandemic year, he couldn't even start his pro career in any way. Still, he progressed quickly, and reached the majors only 3 years after he was drafted. Which only very good prospects do! Especially high school prospects. Now he needs time to mature and develop into a good player.
So, Zaidi has already found a very good prospect, who reached the majors in a very short span, especially since he missed his first pro season, and yet the vast majority of fans on social media is crying about how he hasn't find a prospect. Zaidi did his job, which is find a good prospect (heck, very good prospect, top ranked LHP in most Top 100 rankings), and the prospect reached the majors in 3 years in spite of missing his first pro season, which most prospects do not do.
And that's from only his second draft, which also includes Patrick Bailey, who had a good start to his MLB career this season, and Casey Schmitt, who clearly needs to improve his hitting, but shows some potential to be a valuable complementary player. That's three players who reached the majors in three seasons, which, if compared with other teams, is better than what other teams got.
Most good players take 4-6 seasons from when they are signed as prospects to become good players. They might take 2-3 seasons to reach the majors, but generally, expect 4-6 years between signing a prospect and seeing him produce a good season (and that's IF he ever becomes good, as my draft studies show, the vast majority of draft picks, including first rounders, don't even make the majors, let alone become useful like Joe Panik, let alone become a good player like Cain, Lincecum, and Bumgarner, or a HOF-level player like Posey.
Thus, five years is way to early to judge his improvement of the farm system solely by who is contributing at the major league level. You have to be more nuanced in your estimation and projection. You have to consider what was successful in the past, too.
For example, Bobby Cox the GM tanked the Braves for an excruciating six years of 90+ losses (first season was by his predecessor), to find his NextGen player, Chipper Jones, in his fifth draft. After which, he named himself manager and waited for Jones to mature and reach the majors. Based on Giants fans outcry over Zaidi, Cox would have been fired by the fans after four drafts/five seasons, before he drafted Chipper Jones and became the manager and model for many fans of how to manage a baseball team.
And as I noted in a recent post, Sabean was in similar straits as Cox, he took over the 1997 team, and it wasn't until his 6th draft that he selected his first good player in the first round, Matt Cain in 2002. Giants fans then and today (hey, I was one of them) wanted to fire Sabean for not developing any players, back in that day.
It took my first research of the draft to discover how extremely hard it is to find a good player upon which to build a competitive team, and drove me to support Sabean for both of his two year extensions, in the face of almost universal disdain for Sabean from 2005-2010. Understanding how hard it is to draft made me focus more on his ability to identify and obtain good talent, as demonstrated in trades for Reuter, Kent, Burk, Nen, Schmidt, and others, while rarely giving up much of anything in trade (one great reliever, one great closer, one up and down ace starter). My draft, pitching, and playoff success research and readings drove me to the conclusion of how teams win regularly in the playoffs: great pitching (which boiled down to the ability to strike out a lot of batters) is the key ingredient.
The Giants Know Where Their Competitive Advantage Lies
The Giants have figured out what their competitive advantage is: build a team around pitching. Their park favors pitchers, and really hurt left-handed power hitters not named Barry Lamar Bonds (hence why the only reason Ohtani would come here is because he wants to pitch again). There are also all the benefits that derive from a focus on being great at pitching, as I've detailed in my baseball business plan.
Thus I expect the Giants to solve the lame duck issue with Zaidi by giving him at least another year, if not two, as an extension, around the same time they name their new manager. That was how the Giants operated back in the dark Sabean era where the fans wanted Beane instead, at the end of the season, they announced two year extensions for him. Since Zaidi has a team option for next season, I expect the team to announce a two year (or even three, considering how key it is for the team to sign elite free agents this season) extension for him, based on the improvements in the farm system and baseball operations. That will be a show of support, as well as eliminate the lame duck aspect for him as he tries to convince the premier free agents to join the Giants from 2024 on.
The caveat is that this is similar to the 2007 season, where the Giants brass decided that signing Barry Zito to a record contract was the way to go. It is encouraging to me that instead, Zaidi has said that he is eyeing Ohtani (of course, but not likely), Yamamoto (more possible, given pitcher's park, Giants history, Giants Japanese coach, and gobs of money available, plus West Coast location), and hopefully players like Snell and Bellinger. The main problem is that LA and NY teams also have gobs of money, and might go all in as well. But the thing is, the Giants need to sign at least one of them, and I hope they focus on the ace pitchers. Snell hasn't been mentioned in rumors, however, so, for me, the only hope I see is signing Yamamoto. But given Bellinger's checkered past, they might be able to sign him as well. We'll see.
No comments:
Post a Comment