SF Giants Off Season Thread

I've been thinking about it a lot lately and I don't think I'd actually mind Holliday at this point. Regardless, I doubt he's going to leave such a sweet gig in St. Louis. I don't feel like Bay is going to be worth it at all and I'm not particularly interested in the Giants acquiring him. I would imagine they'll extend Sanchez for a couple to a few more years considering the debacle that would ensue in trading Alderson for essentially a one year rental. This off-season is not going to be pretty, that's for damn sure.

Originally posted by itlynstalyn:
I've been thinking about it a lot lately and I don't think I'd actually mind Holliday at this point. Regardless, I doubt he's going to leave such a sweet gig in St. Louis. I don't feel like Bay is going to be worth it at all and I'm not particularly interested in the Giants acquiring him. I would imagine they'll extend Sanchez for a couple to a few more years considering the debacle that would ensue in trading Alderson for essentially a one year rental. This off-season is not going to be pretty, that's for damn sure.

I would much prefer Holiday over Bay but I am guessing that: 1) he will be much more expensive and 2) he will probably stay in STL when its all said and done.

I did read some article that said the Mets, Yanks, and Giants would be the biggest players for Holiday besides the Cards. Of course, that was just one writers specualtion.

lets just break the bank/ farm and trade for puljos

ESPN.com's Jorge Arangure Jr. reports via twitter that Wagner Mateo may sign with San Francisco in the next couple of weeks.

Arangure said nothing is final, but it's looking like he's headed to the Giants.

Wagner, a 16-year-old outfielder from the Dominican Republic, saw his contract with Cardinals fall apart last month when he failed a physical.

Originally posted by maximill15:
ESPN.com's Jorge Arangure Jr. reports via twitter that Wagner Mateo may sign with San Francisco in the next couple of weeks.

Arangure said nothing is final, but it's looking like he's headed to the Giants.

Wagner, a 16-year-old outfielder from the Dominican Republic, saw his contract with Cardinals fall apart last month when he failed a physical.

Yes. I saw that article and I ahve to say that I would be very cautious if I were the Giants. I trust the Cardinals management MUCH more than the Giants and I just cannot believe they would have totally walked away from this kid unless the eye problems were pretty severe.

The Cards GM:
"We did our due diligence and we concluded that he had a pre-existing injury and he also is currently dealing with another injury," Mozeliak said. "Having both those issues out there, we realized it was in the best interest of the club to void the contract."

Originally posted by Ninerjohn:

Originally posted by maximill15:
ESPN.com's Jorge Arangure Jr. reports via twitter that Wagner Mateo may sign with San Francisco in the next couple of weeks.

Arangure said nothing is final, but it's looking like he's headed to the Giants.

Wagner, a 16-year-old outfielder from the Dominican Republic, saw his contract with Cardinals fall apart last month when he failed a physical.

Yes. I saw that article and I ahve to say that I would be very cautious if I were the Giants. I trust the Cardinals management MUCH more than the Giants and I just cannot believe they would have totally walked away from this kid unless the eye problems were pretty severe.

The Cards GM:
"We did our due diligence and we concluded that he had a pre-existing injury and he also is currently dealing with another injury," Mozeliak said. "Having both those issues out there, we realized it was in the best interest of the club to void the contract."

yeah thats not good at all! Maybe he will come cheap! But knowing sabean he will prob sign for 2 mill and then get arrested

Originally posted by maximill15:

Originally posted by Ninerjohn:

Originally posted by maximill15:
ESPN.com's Jorge Arangure Jr. reports via twitter that Wagner Mateo may sign with San Francisco in the next couple of weeks.

Arangure said nothing is final, but it's looking like he's headed to the Giants.

Wagner, a 16-year-old outfielder from the Dominican Republic, saw his contract with Cardinals fall apart last month when he failed a physical.

Yes. I saw that article and I ahve to say that I would be very cautious if I were the Giants. I trust the Cardinals management MUCH more than the Giants and I just cannot believe they would have totally walked away from this kid unless the eye problems were pretty severe.

The Cards GM:
"We did our due diligence and we concluded that he had a pre-existing injury and he also is currently dealing with another injury," Mozeliak said. "Having both those issues out there, we realized it was in the best interest of the club to void the contract."

yeah thats not good at all! Maybe he will come cheap! But knowing sabean he will prob sign for 2 mill and then get arrested

In a tweet from last June, Arangure said that San Francisco came closest to signing Mateo away from St. Louis' grasp in the first place, but got "cold feet" offering a bonus of $3.5MM. The Cards and Giants were two of several teams interested in the highly-regarded young outfielder.

Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

Originally posted by BigRon:
Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

dayum, why would we want to sign someone who wont be able to hit??

Originally posted by maximill15:

Originally posted by BigRon:
Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

dayum, why would we want to sign someone who wont be able to hit??

Because Brian Sabean is our GM. I would pass on this kid. The one thing all great hitters have is terrific eyesight. They need that to be able to pick up the spin on the ball very quickly after it leaves the pitchers hand. He might be worth a look at 300K but 3 million? No way.

Originally posted by Ninerjohn:

Originally posted by maximill15:

Originally posted by BigRon:
Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

dayum, why would we want to sign someone who wont be able to hit??

Because Brian Sabean is our GM. I would pass on this kid. The one thing all great hitters have is terrific eyesight. They need that to be able to pick up the spin on the ball very quickly after it leaves the pitchers hand. He might be worth a look at 300K but 3 million? No way.

in sabean's case the kid will be signed for 4 mil. right now i'll trust another organizations GM than ours

Originally posted by maximill15:

Originally posted by BigRon:
Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

dayum, why would we want to sign someone who wont be able to hit??

isnt that what we usually do?

anyone read the articles at FanGraphs


FanGraphs Logo
Bengie Molina Hits The Market

by Jack Moore - October 23, 2009 - Share this Article

2010 is not exactly a banner year for free agent catchers. Bengie Molina will enter the hot stove league as the only type A catcher available*, according to Cot’s Contracts 2010 free agents list. Bengie Molina has been a standby in the league for years, but he will be 35 for most of the 2010 season.

*Assuming the Red Sox pick up Victor Martinez’s $7M 2010 option

Bengie’s career has been a model of consistency. Since 2003, he’s put up 14.8 WAR, for an average of 2.1 WAR per season, and has always stayed within the 1.0 to 3.0 WAR range. Keep in mind, however, that our catcher WAR on FanGraphs doesn’t take defense into account. We can be relatively certain that he is not the gold glover of 2002 and 2003, though. His CS% has dropped from 40%+ from 1999-2003 to 32% for his career now. Also, the elder Molina doesn’t excel on the bases, and WAR doesn’t include non-SB baserunning, depressing his value even more.

Given Molina’s age, production, and previous contract (6M in 2009), it’s hard to imagine the Giants offering Molina arbitration, especially with Buster Posey almost ready. As such, he likely won’t have the dreaded type-A tag that doomed Orlando Hudson to a contract with a base salary of only $3.38 million.

So what can he expect? With his wOBA dropping below .310 for the first time since 2002, it’s fair to say 2009 was a down season. His BABIP of .273 was only 8 points below his career average. Still, a catcher with a wOBA of .308 is still valuable on the free agent market. However, teams will be taking into account the fact that Molina is aging and his defensive value will only drop as the years go on.

Jason Varitek, with a similar 2008 to Molina’s 2009, received a 5 million dollar contract. Molina might be able to expect something similar, but he doesn’t have the “captain” moniker to aid him. Still, he does hit for power – his .177 ISO ranked 3rd in the majors this year. If he can avoid injuries and provide near-average defense, his power will make him a 1.0+ win player, with a 4 million dollar contract or more on a one-year deal. Plenty of teams will have needs at catcher. The question is which one wants Bengie.

Originally posted by maximill15:

Originally posted by BigRon:
Here is a link to an impressive article from the ST Louis Post dispatch talking about the issues.

dayum, why would we want to sign someone who wont be able to hit??

It's not a matter of him not being able to hit, it's the fact that his vision could deteriorate. He can hit, and has been doing so pretty well. I believe the reason they haven't tried laser vision correction is because he's so young.

He is pretty much a true five tool center fielder, but I guess it's not really worth it considering they already are trying to develop RafRod in the same way. Can't ever have enough position players developing though. Not worth the $3 million the Cards gave him with those sort of health questions though.

Originally posted by BigRon:
anyone read the articles at FanGraphs


FanGraphs Logo
Bengie Molina Hits The Market

by Jack Moore - October 23, 2009 - Share this Article

2010 is not exactly a banner year for free agent catchers. Bengie Molina will enter the hot stove league as the only type A catcher available*, according to Cot’s Contracts 2010 free agents list. Bengie Molina has been a standby in the league for years, but he will be 35 for most of the 2010 season.

*Assuming the Red Sox pick up Victor Martinez’s $7M 2010 option

Bengie’s career has been a model of consistency. Since 2003, he’s put up 14.8 WAR, for an average of 2.1 WAR per season, and has always stayed within the 1.0 to 3.0 WAR range. Keep in mind, however, that our catcher WAR on FanGraphs doesn’t take defense into account. We can be relatively certain that he is not the gold glover of 2002 and 2003, though. His CS% has dropped from 40%+ from 1999-2003 to 32% for his career now. Also, the elder Molina doesn’t excel on the bases, and WAR doesn’t include non-SB baserunning, depressing his value even more.

Given Molina’s age, production, and previous contract (6M in 2009), it’s hard to imagine the Giants offering Molina arbitration, especially with Buster Posey almost ready. As such, he likely won’t have the dreaded type-A tag that doomed Orlando Hudson to a contract with a base salary of only $3.38 million.

So what can he expect? With his wOBA dropping below .310 for the first time since 2002, it’s fair to say 2009 was a down season. His BABIP of .273 was only 8 points below his career average. Still, a catcher with a wOBA of .308 is still valuable on the free agent market. However, teams will be taking into account the fact that Molina is aging and his defensive value will only drop as the years go on.

Jason Varitek, with a similar 2008 to Molina’s 2009, received a 5 million dollar contract. Molina might be able to expect something similar, but he doesn’t have the “captain” moniker to aid him. Still, he does hit for power – his .177 ISO ranked 3rd in the majors this year. If he can avoid injuries and provide near-average defense, his power will make him a 1.0+ win player, with a 4 million dollar contract or more on a one-year deal. Plenty of teams will have needs at catcher. The question is which one wants Bengie.

I was saying months ago that there 2 certainties:
1) No chance the Giants would offer Molina arbitration
2) No way any team would sign Molina if they had to give up a #1 pick to the Giants

I think Molina's best bet is to sign a 1 year deal for about 3 million base and incentives. I just dont see him getting more than that given his age. Varitek got more than that but I think that was because of loyalty by the Red Sox.