What Makes the Giants Different?

[Rog]

A recent article asked the question, what makes the Giants different?  Their conclusion?  Continuity, from ownership to general management to management to coaches to players.

I myself have said chemistry, and perhaps the two are closely related.

Another article breaks down team's 40 man rosters by home grown, free agents, trades, Rule V players and waivers.  I'm not sure whether it's surprising, given the state of the farm system, that the Giants rank 4th in home grown players.  Surprising to me though is that they also rank #1 in free agents (quantity, not quality).  Surprising too given the mid-season trades Brian Sabean is known for is that the Giants rank 2nd least in players acquired by trade.  They have the least Rule V players (none) and are just one above the best with one waiver acquisition.

So by quantity, at least, the Giants are a home grown and free agent team.  A little different than most would have thought.

But the home grown part is in keeping with the continuity theme.  In fact, 16 of the 25 players on the 25-man roster have been in on at least two of the World Series wins.

[Islandboagie]

Rog- A recent article asked the question, what makes the Giants different? Their conclusion? Continuity, from ownership to general management to management to coaches to players.

Boagie- I'm very interested to know what people who never pick the Giants to win have to say about why the Giants win.

[Rog]

Boagie- I'm very interested to know what people who never pick the Giants to win have to say about why the Giants win.

Rog -- The Giants are one of the most confusing teams in the major leagues. Probably THE most confusing.

The past five seasons they've been a good team, particularly in the even-numbered years. But a great team? Never.

Still, they have won three World Championships in those five seasons. How have they done that?

Logic says it has been luck.

In 2010 they might not have made it out of the first round if not for Brooks Conrad, who almost literally kicked the ball the Giants' way.

In 2012 they somehow came back from huge deficits in the first two rounds, and they swept the World Series. They wound up the postseason with seven straight wins, something they didn't do even once in the 162-game regular season.

Last year they won almost double-handedly. Madison Bumgarner had a postseason for the ages, and Pablo Sandoval was great in his own right. They won with a fourth outfielder playing center field and a fifth and sixth outfielder playing left.

Those things sound as if the baseball gods were looking at them with great favor. logic says this is one of the those freak things, that a team that wasn't even good enough to make the playoffs in two of the five years just wasn't good enough to win three World Championships with out a lot out external help.

Yet they did it, and they did it consistently. That suggests chemistry. I think most would say that while the Giants don't lead the league in a single tangible, they might lead the entire majors in chemistry. We don't know how valuable chemistry, but aside from sheer dumb luck, it seems the only reasonable explanation for the Giants.

One question about the chemistry though. How could it be so great in 2010, 2012 and 2014, yet skip an entire year both in 2011 and 2013?

In 2011, the Giants were in it until the final month. They added fringe Hall of Famer Carlos Beltran (probably not, but close and still going) at the trade deadline. But Beltran was at first ineffective and then injured, before bouncing back strongly when it was virtually too late.

Still, they won 86 games and missed the postseason by only four games. To the Cardinals. Who went on to win the World Series and have finished second only to the Giants the past four seasons in positive surprises.

They didn't even make .500 in 2013, winning just 76 games. Even more than 2011, they suffered debilitating injuries, the most notable of which came to Angel Pagan. Yet last season they overcame as much injury to Pagan and also season-ending surgery for Matt Cain, their 2012 pitching star.

How did they overcome injury last season when they couldn't come close to doing so in 2013? Where did the great chemistry go in 2011 and 2013?

To some extent, 2011 and 2013 could be blamed on the World Series hangover. Both mentally and physically it is tough to bounce back from playing an extra month of intense games. But why didn't the chemistry put them over the top, much as it did last season when injury struck to an extent that it was quite an accomplishment simply to make the postseason?

On the one hand, it would seem that some type of special chemistry existed in the even-numbered years. But it wasn't there in the odd-numbered seasons, so did it exist at all to the level that carries a good-not-great team to three World Series wins in five seasons?

On the other hand, how does luck alone explain three World Championships in five years? What are the odds of that happening simply due to luck? Pretty darn high, that's what the odds are.

So I would sum it up this way: The Giants have a chemistry that allows them to rise above in the postseason. The chemistry is always there, even if it lies dormant at times, and the pressure cooker environment of the postseason provides the catalyst for the chemistry to cook like an energized beaker.

They also have enjoyed a lot of luck. As important an element as the chemistry has been luck.

Water is two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen. Perhaps the sweet water the Giants have tasted is two parts luck and one part chemistry.

There really is no rational explanation. What there is is plenty of room to throw cold water on the formula I have derived.

I myself have no idea if the formula is even close to being correct. All I know for sure is that the very unusual has happened. And it has happened in a manner that skips every other season.

Call it continuity. Call it chemistry. Most of all call it a curiosity.

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[klaiggeb]

I have and continue to call it "chemistry," because really, there is no other explaination.

Chemistry is the right combination of people.

The right combination of talent.

The right combination of personalities.


And all of the above are what the Dodgers have lacked, and, I hope, continue to lack.

As long as they have selfish players such as Puig, it's going to work against them.

And the more they have with that MEMEMEME attitude, the harder it will be for them to win it all.

They lost Rameriz, they lost Kemp. 2 chemistry cancers gone. Good for them, bad for us.


We'll see what kind of Chemistry they have, and what kind of chemistry develops in their young kids.

boly

[Rog]

What I find ironic here is that one of our posters gave his usual anti-stats cry when a couple of professors tried to quantify chemistry a year ago. The Giants came out best in the study, and the Dodgers fare worse. I believe the difference was estimated to be five games.

The study focused on the right combination of people and personalities. I have to wonder if the Giants had the right combination of talent, since it would seem that combination should include more than one good starting pitcher and should include at least starting caliber players in left and center fields.

But however they have done it, the Giants have cooked up some kind of witches' brew in three of the past five seasons.

[Rog]

Here's an intriguing question, which may be almost rhetorical and perhaps even unanswerable. If the Giants had made the postseason in 2011 and/or 2013, would they have won the World Championship those years too? If not, how far would they have advanced?

[Islandboagie]

I don't think the Giants success is that much of a mystery.

In every Championship season the Giants have had the necessary ingredients.

Every season they had that big ace pitcher that out-pitched their opponent. Lincecum in 2010, Cain in 2012 and Bumgarner in 2014. Plus they had solid pitchers at the bottom of the rotation.

Every season they had thump in the middle. Posey, Burrell and Ross in 2010, Posey, Sandoval and Pence in 2012 and 2014.

Every season they had a top notch bullpen. I don't know the numbers and how they stack up to history, but I'd have to think Affeldt, Romo, Lopez and Casilla are among the best bullpens in history in a 5 year span.

Finally, they've had the best manager and GM in baseball during that period.

Maybe its hard to focus on what makes them successful because there's too many reasons, rather than a lack of reasons.

[Rog]

Boagie -- I don't think the Giants success is that much of a mystery.

In every Championship season the Giants have had the necessary ingredients.

Every season they had that big ace pitcher that out-pitched their opponent. Lincecum in 2010, Cain in 2012 and Bumgarner in 2014. Plus they had solid pitchers at the bottom of the rotation.

Every season they had thump in the middle. Posey, Burrell and Ross in 2010, Posey, Sandoval and Pence in 2012 and 2014.

Every season they had a top notch bullpen. I don't know the numbers and how they stack up to history, but I'd have to think Affeldt, Romo, Lopez and Casilla are among the best bullpens in history in a 5 year span.

Finally, they've had the best manager and GM in baseball during that period.

Maybe its hard to focus on what makes them successful because there's too many reasons, rather than a lack of reasons.

Rog -- Intriguing concept.

I think we could find some kind of issue with each of them though.

I certainly agree with the ace pitcher. In 2010 it was both Lincecum and Cain. In 2012 it was, believe it or not, Vogelsong. And of course it was Bumgarner's historic performance in 2014. (Did you know that Cain in 2010 was even better than Lincecum and arguably better than Bumgarner in 2014? Matt just didn't get the high number of appearances, but he allowed no earned runs in 21.1 innings in the three starts he was given.)

But the counterpoint was that after 2010, the Giants' starters beyond the ace weren't all that good.

You're right on about the bullpen. It's been a tremendous constant each of the past Giants World Championship postseasons.

As for thump in the middle of the lineup, not so much in 2014. Pablo Sandoval was the only Giants power hitter who excelled last postseason. More than anything else, it was the bullpen. Unless I missed one, the Giants hit all of seven home runs in 17 postseason games, three of them in one game.

The Giants may have had the best manager during that period, but probably not the best GM. Brian Sabean has made a lot of right moves, but the Beltran deal in itself probably takes him out of the #1 spot. I'm not sure that Bochy and Sabean are even the #1 tandem. That honor likely belonged to Joe Maddon and Andrew Friedman.

Maddon is considered by many to be Bochy's equal or superior among managers. ESPN's Tim Kurjien wrote that five years ago the Rays were the only team using a significant amount of shifts. Now all teams use them.

Friedman did a good enough job that Bloomberg Businessweek named the Rays the "smartest spenders" among 122 major league franchises.

It appears the only reason the Rays weren't as good as or better than the Giants was that they had half as much money to spend. As it was, the Rays made the playoffs four times since 2008, while the Giants made them only their three World Championship seasons.

You bring up excellent points. But in pretty much every case except the marvelous bullpen (which probably pitched over its head once or twice in those three postseasons), there is significant counterpoint to them.

You may be right that there are too MANY reasons, not too few. But few if any of those reasons seem strong enough to stand on their own.

I think it's still a mystery, with only partial explanations and a lot of guess work. If anyone else can figure it out, they're way ahead of me.

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[Islandboagie]

Just to be clear, some of my comments weren't just restricted to the post-season. Certainly Posey didn't add much thump last post-season, but he was considered a threat going in.

[Rog]

Boagie -- Just to be clear, some of my comments weren't just restricted to the post-season. Certainly Posey didn't add much thump last post-season, but he was considered a threat going in.

Rog -- Good point. But it was in the postseason that the Giants truly defied the odds.




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