Rios and Lincecum: A Big Difference

ogc briefs



Rios is good, but not great.

Lincecum could be great.

Rios for Lincecum trade not great.

Rios alone won't make team competitive. There is no MUST to this deal, offense stink with or without Rios.

Trade only if team get better, can be argued team is worse off trading Lincecum for Rios.

Rios and Lincecum: A Comparison

Some people seem to think that getting Rios is better than getting no one. At least that is the impression I am getting from the people who are all for the trade. At least with Miguel Cabrera, I can understand the attraction, though not the desperation, in trading for him. Rios is so ho-hum to me, so I thought I would dig into the stats, as I am wont to do, and see what I find.

Let's dig into Rios stats first.

• He is tied for 46th in the majors in HRs hit. That's good but not great.
• He is 62nd in the majors in RBI. Again, good but not great.
• He is 39th in the majors in SLG, among hitters with over 475 AB. Good, not great.
• He is 42th in the majors in OPS, among hitters with over 475 AB. Good, not great.
• His OPS+ is 119, good not great, but getting close to it, and he'll be 27 years old next year, approaching his peak physical years.
• However, Rios in his first season was a below average hitter, pretty bad really,

Lincecum:

• The good starters in the majors have PQS DOM% of over 40%, the best have over 50% and the elite have over 70%. Lincecum, in his first season had 67%. That's great period, let alone for his first season.
• Among starters with at least 24 starts, his ERA was 46th. Good, not great.
• His K/BB was 49th. Good, not great.
• His K/9 was 6th. Great.
• His H/9 was 6th. Great.
• His HR/9 was 19th. Great.
• His WHIP was 36th. Good.
• All this in his FIRST season and he was only 23 years old.

So, overall, there are a lot of indicators that Lincecum was a great pitcher in 2007, some that he was merely good, but for Rios, everything is decidedly good but not great.

If Miguel Cabrera wouldn't make the Giants offense good by himself, how would Rios? There are no brownie points for improving your offense, the amount of help that Rios gives the offense is probably offset (possibly a negative overall) by the loss of Lincecum, and if Schierholtz is any good, Rios might not even be better than our own internal replacement in RF. So in other words, people for this trade could be for treading water and possibly taking on water.

Negotiations are not for the impatient. The Giants don't have many trading chips and, out of desperation over the offense, smart people are falling all over themselves to declare that the Giants MUST do this trade, with the unstated addendum, "because otherwise our offense will stink." Well, even with Rios, it will still stink, and trading Lincecum for Rios would just reduce by one HUGE chunk, the trade power we have.

Lincecum had great stats last year, we should not be selling him out of desperation for offense, we should be trading him because the players we add would add more to our team than what is subtracted by losing Lincecum.

We should be trading him ONLY if it makes our overall team better. I think it can be argued that Schierholtz, if given the chance, could put up numbers near what Rios did - not at his numbers, but maybe 10-15 HR, 60-70 RBI, 10 SB, which is not good but probably better than what Rios did in his first season, but given that Rios would cost the Giants Tim Lincecum whereas Schierholtz only costs the major league miniumum, that is not much of an upgrade in our offense for someone who can be as special as Lincecum appears to have the potential to become.

2007 GM Winter Meeting: Day Three Rumors and News

Just realized that some are rumors and some are news. One source is sfgiants.com/mlb.com and the other is MLB Rumors, another rumor site I go to. Tried to get this out last night, so there might be new news now, but I'm just finishing this up first.

ogc briefs

Lineup in flux: Ortmeier/Ishikawa/trade 1B; Frandsen/Durham 2B; Frandsen/trade 3B

Rios for Lincecum still alive, or is it? I think Sabean is screwing with Toronto.

I hate KNBR for pushing Lincecum trade for Rios. Logic fails me all around.

Few Positions Set

Not really news that only SS and C are set for the Giants right now, with Vizquel and Molina. The two sources above discuss some interesting twists that I wanted to capture here.

For the infield, a lot of possibilities, some unknown as yet, perhaps. At 1B, in addition to Ortmeier, Travis Ishikawa was brought up, though I'm not sure if the guy really know what he's talking about because he mentioned Ishikawa's struggles in AAA and, of course, he's never played there yet (or maybe it's Bochy who didn't know, as he's quoting a conversation with Bochy :^). Plus there's always the chance of a trade, but if true, that's exciting, I've been hoping the Giants give Ishikawa a chance, why not, it's his last option year for him, we need to find out what he's got now or lose him possibly. At 2B, Frandsen and Durham will be competing there. At 3B, either a trade or perhaps Frandsen.

In the outfield, unless there's a trade, always a possibility, it seems pretty set. It was noted that Winn, Roberts and Davis will definitely be starting, but the configuration is not set yet. I think it revolves around how well Nate Schierholtz and Fred Lewis does in spring training. If either one can excel and grab the starting spot in RF, then Roberts and Davis will probably platoon in LF while Winn mans CF. If neither do well, they will probably occupy spots on the bench while Roberts, Davis, and Winn starts, with Lewis and Schierholtz getting a lot of ABs anyhow, as Roberts will probably be platooned in some way, and since Lewis and Schierholtz are both lefties too, Winn could be splitting time between CF and RF extensively in 2008.

When asked what our 3-4-5 hitters would be, Bochy noted that right now it would be Winn, Molina, and Durham. He also said that Aurilia and perhaps Schierholtz will see time in there as well, depending on the cirucumstances.

The best case circumstances is that Schierholtz wins the RF spot and becomes our clean-up hitter. He might not show the power right now, but he probably has the highest homerun potential in the lineup, particularly if the lightbulb in his head turns on, like it did - after a slow start - at every level he climbed to in the minors. May as well let him get some time there, though with his low OBP, he is probably more suited for the #5 or #6 spot in the lineup, but it would seem odd to bat Durham 4th, assuming he returns to normal.

Rios for Lincecum Won't Die

Here is the latest on that from sfgiants.com. It is the deal that "won't die" as the article puts it. It is my fervent hope that, since Sabean is being so public about the angst of the deal and freely talking about it, that he's is just doing this for public consumption so that one segment of fans will "see" that Sabean is trying to do something for the offense, but then determine that the Giants do not want to let go of either Cain or Lincecum.

Here's why I think this. First, Sabean never talks about a deal in public. Never. He would either pooh-pooh it as media rumors, say there's no official comment, or say that they don't discuss deals in public because then the players who might get traded have to go through this issue for nothing if the deal falls through. That he's discussing it openly makes it seem like a PR move to me.

Second, if you read the comments coming from the other side, Toronto obviously wants to do the deal and is hopeful, but don't sound particularly positive about getting what they want. In this linked article, for example, they seem positively glum about it:

"I don't know. ... I just think we don't have much dialogue left. We're just waiting to see what their thoughts are on some things. We'd be willing to do some [different] things. I think they're weighing a lot of things on their end for other options."

Third, Sabean has been saying all along something along the lines of, "we have an interesting proposition, but we're probably not going to pull the trigger." So on the one hand, he keeps on saying it's alive, but on the other hand, he keeps saying that it's probably not going to happen.

All this makes me wonder if it was Toronto who leaked the deal to the press - which Sabean absolutely hates - and so he's leaving them twisting in the wind by leaving them hanging there by saying the deal's alive, but how alive he's not willing to divulge.

Then again, perhaps Sabean leaked it for once because he wants to show the fans that, yes, he knows the offense is horrible, but look, this is all we can get for Tim Lincecum, "Mr. Franchise!", so cut me some slack for 2008. Really, if that is the best that teams can offer for Tim Lincecum, I say we hold onto our great set of pitchers for now and revisit the trading off pitching idea until mid-season when teams are a bit more desperate. There is no reason to make a deal now, 2008 is pretty much not going to very competitive for the Giants, only the most idealistic think we have a great chance to win.

I Hate KNBR At the Moment

All day it has been "Trade Lincecum for Rios" day at KNBR, so much so that I thought hard about calling them up and giving them both barrels, and have a nice public debate on it. Unfortunately, my wife has been sick so I've been Mr. Mom and don't have time to do the call during the day.

Here are the reasonings they have been giving, it's like they handed out a paper on their position and they all have been repeating it like robots. First, the Giants offense suck, so you "have" to trade your pitching for Rios. Second, sure with one ace, you don't trade, but with two, you have to trade one for Rios. Third, the Giants have to improve their offense now for 2008 because there's the mortgage and fans don't tolerate losing well here.

Let's tackle them one by one.

First, yes, the Giants offense suck, but it will still suck after you trade Lincecum for Rios, but now your rotation will no longer be great, it will be lucky if it is average with Cain, Zito, Lowry, Sanchez, Correia/Misch. Clearly, Rios is not Lincecum's equal in value, but KNBR is united in saying, "Well, the offense sucks so you have to trade your pitching for an upgrade in offense. You HAVE to."

Well, I think Giants fans can agree on one thing about the talent level on the Giants: it is not the greatest right now, it could be a while before the ship is righted. So what they are advocating is this: "We have a great pitcher, but we HAVE to improve our offense by trading a pitcher who could be great for a good (but not great) offensive player, we have to take lesser value because we HAVE to improve our offense." So, we have a limited amount of talent so we overpay to improve our offense? What sense does that make?

Just because we need offense does not mean we should overpay for it. You compound that by doing that when you don't have a lot of talent on your team. You compound that again when the player you are getting don't make a whole lot of a difference for your team, I'll bet his improvement of the offense over, say, Schierholtz, doesn't offset the loss of Lincecum over Sanchez.

Second, the two ace so it's OK to trade rationale still don't make sense. When does it make sense to trade off another player for a lesser talent in order to fix a hole in another part of the team? Well, when you are close to the playoffs or, even better, winning it all. The Giants are closer to the beginning than the ending of that journey. Then there's when you have so much talent in your system and team that you can make sideway steps like this move in order to boost your team. As we can all agree, the Giants are not overflowing with talent, they have a great set of pitchers, but you can trade them ALL off and the offense probably is still not going to be a top of division offense.

So why does it make sense for the Giants to trade away one of their aces when you got two of them? That smacks of desperation. And some may say, yes, but desperate times require desperate means. Hitler over running Europe is desperate times, your baseball team sucking does not even rank in terms of desperation. You have to think long-term, you have to think about what your team in the future is going to be about, you can not think desperate, desperate thinking leads to desperate acts which often don't end well.

Besides, why not reach for greatness with two aces? This decision point is very similar to when Vlad was a free agent. As I wrote then, there was not much payroll to get anyone on the free agent market. We could re-sign maybe one or two of our free agents and settle for mediocrity, or we could pony up a few millions and reach for greatness and get Vlad. Signing all those players was a sign of mediocrity and, while I could rationalize passing up Vlad and doing that because he did have the injury history (and apparently a distaste for Felipe Alou), I could not do that for a Rios deal. Trading for Rios is going for mediocrity, we must reach for the World Series, not try to figure out things along the way as some suggest, that is what we have been doing for 5 years now, we need a plan, a strategy, and we must stick to it.

Third, their position is that the fan base won't tolerate losing but as I established in the first rebuttal, adding Rios does not make the offense suddenly a winner, so then the next logical step with this argument is that the Giants somehow, magically, will trade other players to make up for the talent shortfall and become a winner. If that doesn't happen after trading Lincecum, who the hell are the Giants going to trade AFTER trading Lincecum? Cain?

Let's say, we go ahead and trade Cain after trading Lincecum for Rios. We get another Rios-type hitter for the middle of the lineup. Does the lineup look like a great offensive force now? No. But now we are short two aces. Trading away more talent than you get back is something you might do when you are close to a championship AND you have a surplus of talent. The Giants are neither of those. If trading for two Rios-type hitters don't work, how does trading for one work?

This whole position reeks of desperation and hope. Hope that the Giants can develop the talent to make up for the loss of talent in the pitching. Hope that the Giants can develop the talent to cover up the talent loss in the trade. Desperation that the Giants are so hopeless offensively that we have to GIVE away pitching just to improve our offense.

Even if Lincecum is traded, it is acknowledged that the offense still needs a lot of work. So somehow the Giants are suppose to trade their way to competitiveness, even AFTER trading Lincecum. So why trade him now? Why not wait until a team is so desperate that they trade us their Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller? There is no reason to trade now, other than to appease some misguided fans that demand that something be done. Sometimes the best move is not making any move.

2007 GM Winter Meeting: Day Two Rumors

I realized that "anti" gives the wrong impression so I'm trying some others until I find one I like. Executive Summary is too pretentious. But I like the juvenile humor of "briefs" so I'll probably go with that for a while.

MLB.com offers a take on today's doings for the Giants plus there's a similar one that I got through sfgiants.com that has similar information but also different info. Seems to be a slow day, but slow is OK, I would rather see a slow day than Lincecum or Cain traded away.

ogc briefs

Rolen rumor appears to have legs but don't know how serious Giants are. Hopefully it doesn't start walking...

Toronto appear to be mentally deranged or think Sabean is.

Rios look terrible in comparison with Lincecum, no way that's equal value.

Sabean says closer by the minute to keeping Cain and Lincecum for 2008 season.

Inge now available for 3B, Sabean probably "kicking some tires" as we speak

Sabean says Nyet to Rolen.

My Spec: CHW Crede available, good bat, great defense, wonder what he would cost.

Lastly, most Giants rumors mainly from other interested parties.

Rolen Rolen Rolen

Apparently the rumors about Rolen has more legs than I had thought. He apparently is willing to waive his no-trade rights because he doesn't like LaRussa. I assume we would trade them a starter, but I think a trade of Lowry or Sanchez for him would be a waste, it would be better to trade off one of our lower level guys who did well. Plus, the Cards should be giving us some money to take him off their hands.

In any case, I hope the trade don't go through, he's a huge risk to miss a lot of games because of injury, basically like Bonds because of his age, because back problems never get better, just managed well.

Toronto Overblown

Apparently Toronto offered Glaus or Alex Rios for Tim Lincecum. It is my hope that Sabean started laughing out loud at the audacity of that suggestion. Crazy deal if the Giants did do that.

Here's a quote that makes me laugh: "But Toronto values Rios (.297, 24 homers, 85 RBIs in 2007) as much as the Giants do Lincecum." What Lincecum is doing and could continue doing is top of the majors performance, even if it is just his first year. Rios's .297 with 24 homers and 85 RBIs is good, no question, but is he among the best around? I don't think so. That would be like the Giants saying they value Randy Winn as much as the Twins value Johan Santana.

Rios Redux

The sfgiants.com take has a lot more info on Rios, but again I had to laugh. Rios has taken 4 years to be semi-good as an OF, so he only has two more years on his cheaper years and is 26 now, whereas Lincecum was very good in his first year in the majors when he was 22 and have five more years on the cheap, relatively. Unless they are giving us Adam Lind in addition, that's not equal value to us, plus getting another two OF would probably make my head explode.

I just got the latest Chron news, and according to John Shea, it is Matt Cain that Toronto wants for Alex Rios. Again, that's crazy talk as well, but not as crazy. Still, I wouldn't trade Cain for Rios, we need a 3B not another OF, even though Sabean says that he'll get a player first then go from there.

Funny how Shea shades the same words that sfgiants.com quotes from Sabean, to imply that Sabean is inclined to trade Cain for Rios, whereas the sfgiants.com articles have been pretty clearly stating that Sabean is not very inclined to do the deal. I wonder which is the correct impression. That's the problem I've been stating about the media, taking the same quotes and giving different meanings to them.

If we are going to trade Cain or Lincecum, trade for infield help, which is where we need help, particularly at 1B which is a premium offensive position, which is only right, Cain and Lincecum is a premium starting pitcher. Or at least 3B since we need a 3B. But repeat after me Sabean: no trading of Cain and/or Lincecum is allowed! :^)

Sabean Nearly "Nyet"

There was Sabean quote on our co-aces:

Thus, Sabean said that he comes closer "with each passing day" to declaring Cain and Lincecum off-limits. Lincecum, Sabean added, has drawn more interest than Cain largely because he won't be eligible for salary arbitration -- and hefty pay increases -- for two more seasons. Cain already is signed through 2010, although his $9 million deal is conveniently economical.

Plus Lincecum pitched a heck of a lot better than Cain did. Lincecum strikes out more, has better command, is just as stingy on the hits, and is more of a groundball pitcher whereas Cain is more of a flyball pitcher. Teams would be happy to have a Cain as the leader of their staff and yet he's probably #2 on our staff to Lincecum's #1. That's why it's assinine to even think of trading either of them.

Inge Incoming?

Also had Sabean quoted about how there's often fall-out from a big trade, thus generating new talk among GMs because of the opportunity to trade. So he noted that after trades such as the Detroit-Florida blockbuster often creates a chain reaction that prompts subsequent deals. The big loser at Detroit in the big Miguel Cabrera trade to Detroit (with Dontrelle Willis to boot!), is Brandon Inge, Detroit's previous 3B starter, who now has no position and the Giants need a 3B. Need I say more?

Sabean Says Nyet to Rolen

Wow, talk about whiplash, the MLB article above says Rolen to SF is hot and heavy, the next one quotes Sabean "denies interest in Rolen".

ChiSox's Crede Available

Fitz on KNBR today reminded me that the Chicago White Sox is looking to trade either Joe Crede or Josh Fields, which I've seen for a while, but mainly Crede, and I wonder if we have what they would want for him. Given that he has issues with his health and a hefty salary, maybe it won't take too much. But he has a nice bat and plays great defense, from what I heard, and that's something Sabean looks for in players, their defensive abilities.

Misc.

There was also a post on McCovey Chronicles that reminded everyone that Sabean often keeps his moves under the radar and out of the press. That's a good reminder and so is the above pas de deux about Rolen, how Sabean normally don't spread rumors about his moves, he likes to be as stealth as possible, so any rumors out there are most probably generated on the part of the team wishing to trade with the Giants. A quote in the second MLB article captures this well:

Sabean expressed no regret over not trading for Cabrera, despite the Giants' initial interest in the hard-hitting third baseman -- who almost surely would have forced them to part with Lincecum or Cain, along with two or three other talented young players. Asked if he thought the Giants ever were close to a deal for Cabrera, Sabean said, "We didn't necessarily want to get too close."

This shows that just because the news reports that the Giants are interested in a player doesn't mean that they actually are actively pursuing the player. They might be, in Sabean's parlance, kicking the tires just to keep close in case the other party decides that the Giants have the best offer.

That could explain the rumors about the Giants and Shawn Green and Hiroki Kuroda. We need a middle of the lineup bat and Green is one. Kuroda is an interesting starter, which if we get him, would make trading young pitching easier (hopefully not Cain or Lincecum).