Writing about things the Giants should do is like trying to craft the perfect sandwich out of the worst ingredients imaginable. You really want a sandwich. You’re starved but when you look in your cabinet all you can find pickles, coffee grinds, marmite, and half-used jar of bacon flavored Cheez Whiz. The perfect sandwich? Well, It’s never going to happen. At best it’s an exercise in delusional thinking.
Still, it’s good blog fodder and there’s something the Giants should consider doing. Send down Emmanuel Burriss and recall Kevin Frandsen (after his 10-day wait is over).
The Giants insistence that Manny Burriss is not only the 2B of the future, but the 2B of right-now is head-scratching. Burriss’ noodle bat has been well chronicled in the minors — a career minor line of: .285/.347/.337 — and he’s never really hit well at any level. Burriss started off hot in the SAL in ’07, was promoted to San Jose, didn’t hit all, and was sent back to low-A baseball where he finished the year. By April 20th of 2008, Burriss was on the major league team after never truly mastering minor league play.
In theory, for Burriss to work at the major league level he’s going to have to really play awesome defense and just be a bad hitter instead of a league worst hitter. In 700+ innings at 2B in his MLB career he rates as a +2 run defender per 150 games. That’s solid defense, but it’s nowhere near close to offsetting his bat. To this point, Burriss’ bat — by wRAA — has been worth -12.8 runs below average. That’s just in the 200+ PA’s that he’s hit for this season. If you extrapolate his current offensive production out to a full season of 700 PA’s, his bat works out to -40 runs below average. That’s a minus 4 win deficit but just hitting alone. That’s quite a hole to dig yourself out of.
Burriss isn’t a true talent -4 win hitter by his bat, but it’s definitely possible that he’s a -2 win player as a hitter at this current stage in his career. Kevin Frandsen isn’t a top prospect any more, but he’s the lesser of two evils. He should play around average defense at 2B and his bat has a better minor league track record. He hasn’t hit much better than Burriss in the majors but the Giants have to do something with 2B. If Burriss wants to remain in the majors, it’s best that he goes to AAA and plays SS for a couple of months. Burriss was another odd choice for a rushed prospect by the Giants.
It’s pretty amazing that the Giants looked at Burriss’ track record and thought “Starting Second Baseman!” instead of “Needs more time.”
Pass the Cheez Whiz, please.
Comment Starter: How much longer is Burriss with the big club?
dude, I swear I did not plagiarize you for my blog or my fanpost.
WHAT NO JUAN URIBE? I’M GLAD TO SEE YOU HAVE COME TO YOUR SENSES.
Sorry I couldn’t help myself.
@Kenshin,
>> dude, I swear I did not plagiarize you for my blog or my fanpost.
You’ll be hearing from my crack team of lawyers soon.
@Zetsuboushita,
>> WHAT NO JUAN URIBE? I’M GLAD TO SEE YOU HAVE COME TO YOUR SENSES.
That’s the next post!
The larger problem the Giants face is simply how to improve the team now without mortgaging the future. On other Giants’ blogs, all sorts of creative/insane ideas have been floating involving trades either improbable or destructive. I’ve floated a few myself. But the talent acquired via John Barr’s drafts is just rising to the surface–the key now is patience.
Chris is dead right about Frandsen/Burriss. The other trouble positions have been 1st and LF. What’s happened recently is that Juan Uribe has taken over at 3rd, moving Panda to 1st, essentially replacing Ishikawa with Uribe, and starting Schierholtz in RF, moving Winn to LF, essentially replacing Lewis (who was also rushed) with Schierholtz.
I see the Uribe move as a stopgap. He’s had a two week hot streak, but his last three years in Chicago, he clearly showed that in his good years, he’s basically Pedro Feliz with less power and worse defense. And he hasn’t had a good year since ’04.
Rich Aurelia is one of the great SF Giants. Remember ’01, when he was legitimately one of the best players in baseball? Great defensive SS, with a .324/.369/.572 line? He’s a gamer, a clubhouse guy and noted for his kindness to puppies and kittens. I love the guy, will miss him; think he’d be a great coach. Because he also can’t play anymore. Running a baseball team requires a mixture of patience and ruthlessness. Time to cut him loose.
Jesus Guzman is the most obvious 1b solution. Sabean and Bochy don’t like his defense, and both clearly believe that 1B defense is something fans underrate. That’s why Sabean kept J T Snow around far past the point when his bat justified the roster spot. I don’t think Jesus Guzman is Albert Pujols. But Guzman had a fabulous run in the Venezuela winter league, and is hitting in AAA. He should get a real shot, not just 10 ABs. He should be able to exceed Ishikawa’s .689 OPS, probably by a hundred points or more. As for LF, I don’t mind the Schierholtz solution, though so far this season Lewis has outhit Schierholtz. But if we’re going to send Lewis down to work on his stroke, the guy to bring up is Bowker. Wouldn’t mind having a 4th OF with some pop.
So here are the moves: 1) send Burriss down, Frandsen up, and see what Frandsen can do at 2nd. (Probably not much of an offensive upgrade, but maybe a little, and Burriss could get the AAA seasoning he never had). 2) send Lewis down, play Schierholtz in RF, bring up Bowker and make him a 4th OF/PH. 3) Move Sandoval back to 3rd (assuming his arm’s all right), Uribe back to the bench, bring up Guzman, start him at 1st. Keep Ishikawa around as late inning defensive replacement/PH. Deal with Rich Aurelia the way Roy Rogers dealt with Silver.
Would these moves turn us into legit contenders? I think these moves would improve the team’s offense incrementally, possibly at the cost of a little defense. I think we move from a team that could plausibly win 85 games to a team that could plausibly win 87. That might be enough to move us into the Wild Card conversation. But we also wouldn’t touch the core of the team that should contend from 2011-2015.