"Lowry is a great example to use for anybody who wants to argue against buying out a young player’s arbitration years. Since he signed that extension he’s been an injury-riddled, mediocre mess. That’s not to say that the risk wasn’t worth taking, but you never really hear people talk about the downside to this strategy." Funny I look at Lowry’s contract has a great example of what happens when a manager stays stuck in the 80’s ( or before) and piles work on an under 26 year old arm. Going from 92 MLB innings ( 189 if counting Minors in '04 at age 23) to 204 innings in the Show during '05 at age 24 was a large risk. The injuries and flame outs are the stakes when you run that gamble. To each their own I guess.

@Paulie Lowry's contract is a great example of how sometimes things take a turn for the worse. What's interesting to me is that the trend in baseball seems to be reversing, ie: young players going year-to-year instead of settling for deals like Lowry got that buy out portions of their arbitration years. Lincecum has already stated that he wants to go year-to-year and I believe Jonthan Papelbon is doing the same. I know if I was a young player, I'd most certainly take the financial stability of a guaranteed contract.

Lowry is a great example to use for anybody who wants to argue against buying out a young player's arbitration years. Since he signed that extension he's been an injury-riddled, mediocre mess. That's not to say that the risk wasn't worth taking, but you never really hear people talk about the downside to this strategy.

OGC, Good history on some of those bad trades. Barnes was flashing 84-86mph at times in college at St. Johns, but he apparently made some tempo adjustments in the 2nd half and worked in the upper 80's with more regularity, touching 90 now-and-then. He's got a really funky delivery, his moves his head in a weird way, almost like Hideki Okajima does for the Red Sox. When he releases the ball, he's not looking towards homeplate. He struggled with control in college, posting BB/9's of 4.92, 3.21, and 4.48 in his three years which might be a byproduct of his delivery. King already works around 90mph and has the ability to touch low-to-mid 90's on occasion. His mechanics are also wacky. King played Juco ball and had a nice final season at Surry Community College: <cite>King spent just one season with Surry, compiling a 1.79 ERA, striking out 110 and allowing 35 walks, 21 runs, 14 of them earned and 40 hits in 70 1/3 innings.</cite> Both guys are probably getting some help by the deception in their deliveries, and control will probably be a hurdle for them as well. I'll take King for now because his velocity is greater but that's not a knock on Barnes, it's probably a toss-up at this point. FYI: BA had Barnes ranked higher in their pre-draft rankings, he was 128th to Kings 145, so it's pretty close. Definitely happy to have both in the system.

Yeah, the 1971-2002 period was horrible for pitching, Krukow as nice, so was Big Daddy Rueschel, Dave Drevecky, but we never had any dominating guy since The Count in terms of strikeout aura, until Cain, then Lincecum, came along. We were suppose to get another one when the Giants traded for Sudden Sam McDowell (gave up Gaylord Perry), but according to rumors he was a drunk and he was done, essentially, before he even put on the Giants uniform. And of course Perry went on to fame and fortune and Cy Young... It was trades like that that yielded nothing that killed the Giants in that period, Perry, Cepeda, Foster, Kingman, Jack Clark, Chili Davis, Gladden were all traded and while they went on to further very productive, All-Star level play, the players we got in exchange essentially did zip for us, except for Clark which at least got us the iconic "Ooo-Ree-Bay" but we lost on big on that trade still. Plus the loss of key young players like Ron "Bear" Bryant (career basically ended diving into pool with not enough water), Atlee Hammaker, to injuries, and non-development of players like Mark Grant, Mike Remlinger, others, that contributed to the mediocre play during most of the 1972-1996 period, except for the oasis of the Al Rosen years. Have to like Barnes more right now, he's doing better at a much higher level. And he is dominating and should be right in there age-wise for that league, maybe a little too old for a true blue-chip prospect, but look at that H/9, BB/9, K/BB, K/9, that is pretty much shut down goodness, much like how Lincecum was chewing up the Cal League in his first pro experience. So how poor is Barnes's velocity? Velocity is nice but as you know if he has great control over his breaking pitch, that separation is what is key. If it's under 90 MPH, then I can understand your reticience to select him over King.

DUDE STRIKES OTHER DUDES OUT!

Good gawd, Schmidt's 251 in 2004 is absolutely absurd! Too bad his arm fell off shortly thereafter. :( I can't say anything about Timmy that hasn't already been said -- watching him pitch this year has been an honor.

Also, in a weird parallel to the 200K Club, I decided to see which Giants starting pitchers struck out the fewest amount of batters since 1956. Before I even looked at the results I thought "Kirk Rueter" Turns out he wasn't #1 (that goes to Jim Barr for his 1978 season, 163 IP just 44 strikeouts) but he was #2 for his 2004 season. In '04 Woody threw 190.1 innings and struck out just 56 batters. He appears in the top-10 3 times. Go Woody!

I wasn't sure where to add this to the original post, so I thought I'd post it in the comments. The Giants have a couple of left-handers that they drafted on the 2nd day of the draft that are pitching well. LHP Scott Barnes: Augusta, 26.2 IP, 11 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 0 HR, 7 BB, 35 SO, 1.35 ERA He struck out 14 in 6 innings on August 23rd. LHP Aaron King: Arizona Rookie League, 28.2 IP, 21 H, 9 R, 9 ER, 1 HR, 13 BB, 37 SO, 2.83 ERA I liked them both as 2nd day picks. The Giants tend to find good pitching value on the 2nd day and in later rounds. It's still incredibly early and you can't draw much (if anything at all) from the first 20 innings of a players pro-career, but it's good to see them have success on some level. Of the two, I probably like King the most, he's got a little more velo than Barnes. Both have funky deliveries.