TDA Bullpen - Our Writers' Blog

Monday, May 17, 2004

Taking Stock of Trading Bonds

I live in the Bay area media market (that's San Francisco Bay, not Massachussetts or Cape Cod), and despite my attempts to filter out talk radio from my life, many mewlings from Giants fans about the sorry state of the team this year have nevertheless managed to penetrate my consciousness.

The bleating generally follows the lines of: dang, we gotta get somebody to protect Barry. They'd pitch to Barry if we had (insert your favorite candidate here, from Jeff Kent to Alex Rodriguez). There's a little bit of 'too bad we got rid of Santiago and Aurilia and their veteran clubhouse leadership' and 'I wish Dusty were back', but as you might expect there's a lot of focus on the best hitter in baseball since Babe.

I suppose there's some basis in fact for this concern. Then again...after all, the Giants arguably won back to back division titles in 2002-03, and made it within five outs of a championship in '02, with a lineup that wasn't particularly distinguished but for Barry's commanding presence. Barry's big protection in '02 was Benito Santiago.

The reality of the Giants this year, and of Bonds' apparent struggle of will as to whether to go for Aaron's home run record, is that it's an aging lineup with very spotty pitching. Marquis Grissom is hitting up a storm this year, at age 37. Bonds, of course, turns 40 this year. The only regular who's less than 30 is 27-year old newcomer AJ Pierzynski, who has not been popular in the clubhouse nor with the fans. Pedro Feliz, formerly considered a prospect due to his power potential, gained a couple of years in the off-season in one of those visa-birth certificate readjustments. After that, everybody's a thirtysomething on the offense.

The "ace", Jason Schmidt, really only has one dominating season on the books, and came out of that with shoulder surgery. The rest of the staff are unremarkable journeymen: Kirk Reuter, Bret Tomko, Dustin Hermanson (plus the interesting, but hardly dominating, young Jerome Williams). With Robb Nen's career in twilight bordering on retirement due to injury, the bullpen also has its fair share of mediocre thirtysomethings. If you discount Williams and 28-year-old rookie Tyler Walker, there isn't an active Giant pitcher under the age of 31.

This is not a very solid group of veterans, say, like the 2001 Diamondbacks, who have all the elements to put it together in a spate of career years. The team's slow, slower to recover from injury and slump, and like all of us in that demographic group, unlikely to improve in any way even on our best days with respect to physical performance. It's actually quite remarkable when you look at the Giants' roster how over the hill the gang is, collectively, and their leader is turning 40 this year.

What I find painful about all this is not watching the Giants lose. They've had a great run over the last decade, and all but the most rabid fan would have to be happy having a club that's been in contention for such a long stretch. No, the pain is in watching Barry struggle through this.

You figure if Barry has any more goals in baseball, now that he's passed Willie on the all-time list in the uniform of the Giants, they're reduced to this:

(1) winning a world's championship, and

(2) passing Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and establishing himself as clearly the greatest offensive player of all time (or at least of the modern era; Ruth is such a statistical outlier, adjusted for the competition of the era).

He got close to (1), but clearly it's not going to happen with this team. And he's going to need all the help in the world for (2), and that's not coming from either the lineup or the incessant, nearly infantile reliance on him to be the core of the offense.

Aaron had long had the World Series ring in 1973, and that year, when he hit 40 to get himself within one of Ruth, he had Davey Johnson and Darrell Johnson hitting 43 and 41 homers, respectively, and Dusty Baker hitting 20 to protect him in the lineup (if you believe in protection). I note from the archives that Johnson, at 30, was the senior member of the '73 Braves other than Aaron; the median lineup age was 27.

The Giants' problem, of course, is that in stretching what resources they had to get Barry competitive teams around him for all these years, is they've got to pay the piper. The farm system is not brimming with offensive prospects, and the pitching prospects that are left are just enough to project the team to respectability in another four or five years. The payroll is laden with these once-shiny thirtysomethings, and of course the debt burden of paying Barry himself, such that even if they did have the prospects to trade for some protection for Barry, they wouldn't be able to pay them.

There's a certain panic inherent in the way the Giants are marketing their games at now-SBC Park. Without the daily beat of a Bonds home run race, and without a credible pennant threat in baseball's weakest division of 2004, the walk-ups are declining. The Giants will still have great attendance this year, but the number of sell-outs is off, and since a lot of those tickets were bought before the season to begin with, I'm sure their marketing and sales people are projecting darker days ahead. With the Giants having a fixed cost of the debt burden on their park to pay every year, the payroll is being tightly controlled.

I wouldn't doubt that Barry's march to 756 wouldn't sell a few tickets. But the Giants seem to be in the very awkward position of relying on Barry doing that to sell seats, when the baseball logic is Barry won't be able to do that without a better lineup around him to give him opportunities to swing the bat -- and, what's probably more important, some sense of personal hope about the team around him. Bonds is more of a competitor than many give him credit for, and who knows how many of those homers in the past decade have been fueled by the sense he could propel the team around him forward to a victory? Without that hope, without protection, it will be exceedingly difficult for him to continue to bash them out,and for the Giants in turn to sell tickets on that basis.

I'd like to suggest some heresy for the Giants fan -- and the Barry Bonds fan -- and suggest that the club trade Bonds. Now.

Trading Bonds while he's still an extremely dangerous weapon -- and not, say, the seriously declining player of 41 Aaron was between 715 and 755 -- will get the Giants plenty of exchange in young players. But not if they wait, even a year, maybe not even a half a season.

Trading Bonds will save the Giants $15,000,000 - well, pro-rated, about $12 million, and about $42 million over the remaining years of his contract (necessary to get to 756 in a Giants uniform). That will cover a lot of empty seats, which could still fill back up if the Giants do something interesting with young players, which they must eventually do anyway unless Bonds plays until he's 100.

For Barry, he'd get that shot at a ring. Veterans of note from the recent era, from Dave Winfield to Roger Clemens, have skipped teams late in their careers to get that ring, so I don't think anybody's going to blame him.

He'd also, of course, get lineup protection on a better team, he'd have to get a better hitter's park by default (it doesn't get much harder than SBC/Pac Bell), and if he were on an AL team, he'd get a few more less-stressed ABs with a few days a week in the DH slot.

Bear in mind Henry Aaron hit homers 714-733 as a part-time outfielder, and 734-755 as a part-time DH.

And if Barry really cares about the Giants -- he can help the club for the next decade to come by ensuring his legacy is a thriving team, not a debt burden and empty stands.

I've even got a team picked out for Barry: the Anaheim Angels. Their superstar, Vlad Guerrero, is a man without any obvious ego problems and surely wouldn't mind playing in the shadow of Barry. And there's hardly a more offensively-oriented lineup around. Putting Barry into left field in place of Jeff DaVanon seems like a pretty major improvement, though. The Angels have a new and aggressive owner who seems like the kind of guy who'd be able to market Bonds to the O.C. crowds, and Bonds is the impact player who could put them over the top again even with mediocre pitching.

The Angels have made an investment in relatively young players, and are building a stronger fan base off the 2002 World Series championship. It's a strong enough core to carry Bonds through his 2006 date with destiny.

Can you imagine Barry batting fourth, between Guerrero and Guillen? Or maybe in front of Vlad? How many intentional walks would he get then?

For Barry's sake, for the Giants' sake, and for the sake of baseball, which could always use another greatest-ever debate, trade him. Now.

posted by The Crank 5:37 PM