Giants sign Nori Aoki

[rxmeister]

The Giants finally have a left fielder and it's Nori Aoki signed to a cheap 1 yr 4 million dollar deal. It's been said he turned down much better deals to sign with the Giants, so that's really nice to hear in this Sandoval/Lester offseason. This of course frees Blanco to play CF when Angel Pagan gets his inevitable injuries. I'm very happy with this signing!

[rxmeister]

Just to add, there's a team option next year for 5.5 million dollars, so unless he's a bust, (which I doubt will happen) this is a two year deal.

[sfgdood]

We won't beat Maris' HR output in '61

[rxmeister]

The two teams in the World Series last year finished 17th and 30th in home runs. They're nice to have, but certainly not necessary.

[sfgdood]

The WS champion was the one that finished 17th...Id take that in a heartbeat, but even at that, we needed an unprecedented performance by Bumgarner to get it...AND we just BARELY made the playoffs, as a lot of people seem to forget. We lost pop and replaced it with patty cake.

The Royals also just barely made the playoffs and got on a roll, buoyed by their amazing bullpen.

[klaiggeb]

When the post season began, Aoki would not have been my first choice for LF.

But... at THIS POINT IN TIME, since the Giants are sitting on their wallets and playing for 3rd place, IMHO, I'm okay with the move.

They could have done a lot worse.



I know they won't do it, but with Aoki's speed, I hit him 1 hole, and Pagan 2 hole.

but I know Bochy and Pagan. That's not going to happen.

boly

[Islandboagie]

I would bat Pagan 3rd, after Aoki and Panik.

That's what I like about the move, it gives us flexibility at the top of the order.

Unfortunately the season is already in the books and the Giants have finished in third place. It went by so fast I feel like I didn't even get to catch a game.

[sfgdood]

If only the offseason could go so quickly...it would have been easier to forget what a colossal failure it was

[klaiggeb]

Pagan 3rd, Boagie? Why?

that puts Pence or Belt 6th. I want them coming to the plate more often.

However, that said, it's not altogether a bad idea.

Of course, Bochy will never do it.


boly

[klaiggeb]

Boagie--Unfortunately the season is already in the books and the Giants have finished in third place. It went by so fast I feel like I didn't even get to catch a game.

****boly says****

Obviously, you disagree with my assessment, Boagie.

It might not be in the books...yet...but you've been reading both the arguments of Randy and myself.

If you disagree, please, tell us where and how we finish higher than 3rd...IF everyone on the Dodgers, Padres, and Giants stay healthy.

Seriously, I'm curious, Boagie. I'm not being a smart alec here. You see something Randy and I do not.

boly

[sfgdood]

Boly has always been one that preferred a lineup with 8 speedburners with zero pop...not surprised that he likes Choke-y

[klaiggeb]

You're right, mostly, Randy. In OUR park, I want speed and defense, but, and this is the part most forget, I want a couple of guys with power... like the Cardinals of Willie McGee had.

boly

[sfgdood]

Only one problem there, Boly...the Giants don't have the starting pitching to win with that kind of lineup. We need more power and with Pablo and Morse gone, and Posey looking like a limp noodle in the playoffs, I'm not liking the lineup.

[sfgdood]

and just think...WHEN (not if) Pagan goes on the DL, our outfield will be Pence, Blanco and Aoki with Ishikawa as #4...ewwwwww

[Rog]

El Dooderino -- We won't beat Maris' HR output in '61

Rog -- The Giants hit 100 homers without Pablo and Morse last season. It's conceivable they will hit more than 61 this season.

Read more: sfgiantsmessageboard.proboards.com/thread/2660/giants-sign-nori-aoki#ixzz3P1lvevde

[Rog]

El Dooderino -- and just think...WHEN (not if) Pagan goes on the DL, our outfield will be Pence, Blanco and Aoki with Ishikawa as #4...ewwwwww

Rog -- Sounds better though that the Giants' outfield in last year's postseason. How did that one turn out?

Read more: sfgiantsmessageboard.proboards.com/thread/2660/giants-sign-nori-aoki?page=1#ixzz3P1mSdIfw

[Rog]

El Dooderino -- Only one problem there, Boly...the Giants don't have the starting pitching to win with that kind of lineup.

Rog -- In last year's postseason, the Giants beat the Nationals despite a .278 slugging percentage. They beat the Cardinals despite a .355 SLG. And they defeated the Royals with a .357 SLG even while using a designated hitter.

Read more: sfgiantsmessageboard.proboards.com/thread/2660/giants-sign-nori-aoki?page=1#ixzz3P1mzVFFJ

[sfgdood]

In a short series it can work...for 162 games? I don't think so

[rxmeister]

I'm not predicting a World Series championship this year and there always seems to be a hangover effect, but this team is solid. The idea that the San Diego Padres are better than the Giants is downright laughable. The Dodgers probably but the Padres? Every year some team jumps up, makes a bunch of moves in the offseason and everybody writes about how good they'll be, and the actual games start and they fall flat on their faces. That will be the 2015 Padres. If a good team adds two or three solid players it can put them over the top, but you can't fix a bad team with a couple of big splashy moves. Myers hit .222 last year and the Dodgers thought so little of Kemp that they're paying 31 million of his contract AND trading him to a divisional rival. Let's not put them in the playoffs yet. Call me though if they get Cole Hamels.

[sfgdood]

I wouldn't dismiss so quickly what the Padres have done. They were probably the best team in the division the second half of 2014. They weren't far off, only needing to improve offensively, which most would agree they did. Meanwhile the Giants stunk it up in the second half of 2014, lost two huge cogs to their lineup and replaced them with table scraps. Yet some sycophants are still wildly eating this up like a bunch of Pavlovian dogs and putting down what San Diego did. Pretty amazing.

[rxmeister]

What did they do? Add a player that's always hurt in Matt Kemp? A .222 hitter in Wil Myers? A hitter you whined that you hoped the Giants wouldn't get in Justin Upton? If the Giants had made these moves you'd be whining about how terrible they were. That's the kind of fan you are. You know what three championships in five years have done for most Giants fans? It's made them happy optimistic people proud of their favorite team. You know what's it done to you? Made you into a spoiled brat who thinks the team has to win it every year and whines like a little baby when the Giants don't cut 200 million dollar checks for every free agent out there. Grow up!

[sfgdood]

I would have loved to get Upton IF he wanted to come...but he hates SF and everything about it. Kemp had a couple of rough years injury-wise but he played 150 games last year and had an OPS of .852. I'd have made a deal for him too if we had the pieces to do it. Wil Myers is a young right handed corner outfielder with pop. He was first brought up in 2013 and had a great Rookie year. Last year the league caught up with him and he was having a rough sophomore year--not uncommon--before hurting his hand I think. He wasn't able to recover very well. Point is he's a real right handed corner outfielder with pop...exactly what we need. I'd swap Aoki for him without even thinking twice.

You can think what you want about what kind of fan I am...I love what the team has accomplished...but that doesn't mean I'm going to give the GM a pass when he screws up, especially after seeing what happened in '11 and '13.

[klaiggeb]

Randy--.I love what the team has accomplished...but that doesn't mean I'm going to give the GM a pass when he screws up, especially after seeing what happened in '11 and '13.

***boly says****

I'm with you, Randy. It looks like you and I are hanging out there on that tree limb all by ourselves.

Honestly, I'm shocked, stunned, surprised that you and I seem to be the only 2 on the board, or of Giant fans in general that I know, that are taking a realistic approach to what has NOT happened this off season. Everyone seems to be content with saying, "what? Now you suddently think managment has gotten stupid? Crimenee! We've won 3 World Series in 5 years!"

And I won't quibble with that.

We can argue that they have, or didn't have the money.

We can bitch and complain that they could only do what they could do. (Which, as I've continually maintained, is a crock)

But the fact is; they didn't do much, and IMHO, they didn't do near enough of what needed to be done to give us a decent chance to compete.

IMHO they put bandaids on some problems, and pretended others, like Starting pitching, didn't exist.

As to Upton, personally, I would NOT want a player like him on the club.

Everything I've seen about him and read about him, is that he broods when he isn't going well. In spite of his talent, he still fights himself, takes that unhappyness onto the field, and isn't focused on the game.

That's not good for the team.

Give me players with an attitude like Pence, and Morse and Peavy; exhuberant.

Give me guys like Posey and Belt and Pence and Pagan and Crawford and Morse and Peavy and Posey who put "team" in front of self.

Give me a group of talented guys, not necessarily super starts, but good players who love the game, play it hard, and focus on US, not ME.


Right now, we have those kinds of players, attitude wise, but we lack the talent to over come our short commngs.


Managment blew it big time, IMHO, and when the season begins we're going to see just how big.

I hold fast to what I've said; 3rd place.

I wish I saw things differently.

I wish I felt like I did when last year began: that this was the BEST Giant squad I've seen since 1962.

Only I don't.

It's depressing, and though I miss watching baseball as much as it can be missed, it breaks my heart because I feel like myself, and all the fans, got a gallactic enema by managment.

And that's sad.



boly

[Islandboagie]

I think you said it well, Boly. You made a very strong case against your stance. The Giants have a strong clubhouse, and the swagger of champions. They refuse to lose. Many teams have chimed that phrase in the history of sports, but during the post season I cannot think of a better phrase that describes the Giants in 2010, 2012 and 2014.

Am I dissapointed that they weren't able to resign Pablo? Of course! But we know exactly how it went down. The Giants put up the money, Pablo decided against resigning with the Giants. Like him or not, that's what happened. That's not Sabean's fault.

Same goes for Lester. Unless you weren't paying attention, it's quite clear that the Giants were serious contenders, and like Pablo, Lester decided against the Giants. Again, how can you blame Sabean for a personal decision from a player? You can't.

And now we know that the Giants attempted to trade for Zobrist. I wanted Zobrist as much as anyone, but after learning that the Rays were asking for too much (rumored that Crick or Panik were the Rays target) I'm glad Sabean didn't bite, just to get a deal done.

I think Sabean has been very aggressive, while also being smart.

I think we're a better team than we were going into last season. We're deeper all around. We have a lot of young arms in the system, we'll see some this season. We have potentially two solid backup catchers to compliment the best catcher in baseball.

We have Ishikawa to backup Belt at first.

Duffy and Arias to backup the rest of the infield.

Blanco, Ishikawa, Perez, and Brown to backup Pence, Pagan and Aoki.

Will Aoki be the answer? I don't know.

Will Pagan be on the DL for a portion of the season? Perhaps.

Could Posey need more rest?

Will Cain be the Cain of old? I hope so.

None of us know the answers to these questions, yet. But in my opinion we have a deeper squad to pickup the slack if some of these question marks don't go our way.

I like Hector Sanchez, but I feel more comfortable with Susac backing up Posey.

I am very comfortable with Petit being our long man, and filling in some spot starts.

While I have appreciated pitchers like Kickham, I will be much more optimistic having Blackburn and Crick as our next in line after Petit.

If you really think about the 25 man roster, there's really no weak spot. I'd rather have Pablo over McGehee, and I'd rather have Lester over Peavy, but McGehee and Peavy are quality players.

I like our team. I like the youth movement clogging the bench, and the young arms we'll all be introduced to before the season's over.

You can have the egos on the Padres and Dodgers, I'll stick with our guys.

[sfgdood]

Blind loyalty...how sweet

[Islandboagie]

I don't see how you can call it blind loyalty when I just listed many reasons for optimism about next season. It might be loyalty, but it's not blind. I know what we have and I know what we're up against. We just don't agree, much like we didn't agree on Miguel Tejada.

I think depth has been a big key to our success in '10,'12 and '14. The difference between this year and the other years is we're starting the season with depth, while in the other years we added depth during the season.

[sfgdood]

You're right, we definitely disagree. The offenses of those other teams were better, the pitching was a LOT better (although the difference in pitching between last year and this year is not as huge).

There are just so many question marks that you do not want to acknowledge. You prefer to be hopeful that things will break on the positive side, even when that is less likely. The two large holes in the order were filled, but with vastly inferior replacements. Whether you want to give Sabean a pass or not is fine...but it is a fact that this team is inferior to last year's and that both San Diego and LA are better at this time.

To deny this is to be blindly loyal.

[rxmeister]

When someone calmly and intelligently lists his reasons for liking the team it isn't fair to label it "blind loyalty." You have no respect for any opinion that doesn't echo yours. You're entitled to your opinion, we're entitled to disagree. As for your opinion on Kemp, you're not mentioning that he almost failed his physical because he has two arthritic hips. The trade was close to being cancelled as the Padres were demanding insurance. Again, you don't trade a player of his caliber within the division unless you have serious doubts about him. I'm guessing the Dodgers are pretty sure Kemp won't come back to haunt them and that they were taking advantage of a rookie GM who was being over aggressive. Myers was out of shape last year and admitted it. Why would a team with payroll problems trade a young affordable player like that? I wanted Upton too, but he's streaky and struck out about 180 times last year. His power will suffer in Petco. They have so many more question marks than the Giants it's ridiculous. You could be right, but we don't think so. The games will start soon and we'll see who's right and who's wrong.

[klaiggeb]

Boagie, I agree with you that our roster is deeper than it was last year when the season began. No question.

Remember, I'm okay with our line up. Not as good as it could be, but as I outlined in my "Power outtage..." thread, we've got some pop in the middle, and I believe that we have more than enough to score an ample amount of runs.

Without Morse in LF, our defense will be much, much improved. Sure, Aoki wasn't his usual best in RF last year, but his history is that he's a good defender.


But starting pitching? Well, I've had my say on that many times, and won't go into it again.

Suffice it to say I'm not predicting a 3rd place finish based upon our lineup, but our starters. For me, it's that simple, and that complex.

boly

[sfgdood]

why the anger, Rx? Touch a nerve, did I? I've shown no more disrespect for anyone's opinion here than you or Rog or anyone else. No poster is more condescending than Rog and yet you never feel the need to scold him. I'm not the one telling other posters to "grow up"...how much more disrespectful does it get than that?