Stupid Giants

The San Francisco Giants took another step deeper in their relentless quest to become the New Cubs. The team has extended the contracts of sleepwalking General Manager Brian Sabean, and career sub-.500 manager Bruce Bochy.

The last time the Giants won a World Series was 1954, while still in New York. The Giants have lost three World Series in San Francisco—to an Act of God in 1962, in utter disgrace in 1989, and a historic choke in 2002. The Giants are the third most long suffering team in baseball, trailing only the Cubs and the Indians. Keeping Sabean and Bochy reflects the club's determination to stay in this charmless circle.

Now, Bochy is not at all contemptible. Indeed, he's funny. He talks about nothing, really, in response to questions about something. And I'm pretty sure he thinks he's answering the question, too. He says "step up," and "get a few in there for us," and stuff like that. His voice is gravelly and deep and he sounds like Hoss on "Bonanza." And he manages like Hoss would, too.

Bochy is the kind of guy who works on your transmission, and you think him an all-around good guy. Then your car dies in the fast lane on a bridge in rush hour because your transmission was put together wrong. When you confront him about it, he keeps his cool and looks off in the distance and rambles on about U-joints and bad fit for your model and the weather and the high property taxes.... He's not evading the question, he just doesn't understand your problem. If the transmission needed to be functional, well, it woulda been that.

He doesn't really care because he doesn't really have that depth people have when they really care. Bobby Cox has that depth, Terry Francona has it. Tony LaRussa has that depth. (And more—LaRussa has the uber-depth of care that will kill you in your sleep if you're not careful.) But most managers learn to act the part and baseball people are usually happy enough with the actor. A fella like Bochy is unique, though. He doesn't seem to notice the lack of depth or the need to act. He is not manager material, either genuine or fake. He's a security guard, whose job is to monitor the playing of baseball games by experienced men whose experience needs monitoring, not direction.

Even if those experienced men hit .240.

The last manager of this caliber, that I remember anyway, was Ralph Houk. Houk took over the Yankees from Casey Stengel and led that juggernaut to three consecutive World Series. He became General Manager the next year and the Yankees began a 14-year post season drought. The Bombers transformed from Mantle-Maris-Ford to Pepitone-Cater-Kekich and Houk slunk away after '73. He was immediately snapped up by the aging Detroit Tigers—does this sound familiar, Giants fans?—and he presided over the disarticulation of talent in Tiger Town. When he left the team after 5 years, the transformation from annual contenders to nameless patsies was one for the books. (Does this sound familiar, Giants fans?)

Houk was a favorite of veteran players. He let them play when they wanted and only benched them in favor of youth when they decided to rest their aching stiff legs and aching batting average. Indeed Houk, like Bochy does now, had some genetic code that made him physically ill if his pen wrote a young player's name on the lineup card. I mean, you could look it up.

This kind of guy—a Houk guy, the guy Bochy is— is the guy a daydreamer like Sabean would make a multi-year mistake with. And he did.

Sabean himself built the Giants into a formidable National League power after becoming GM in 1997; but it was a power that managed to lose whenever it mattered most. Especially after after the colossal loss in 2002: Sabean lost any skills he had: He acquired Sidney Ponson, Barry Zito, Ray Durham, Michael Tucker and Armando Benitez; and turned up his nose at Joe Nathan, Adam Dunn, Manny Ramirez and Vladimir Guerrero.

Now don't get me wrong. Sabean is not a hack. He's just not competent. Maybe it's age, or maybe the temptations of the Bay Area. Whatever the reason, he's through. Unless you count the two year extension, which you have to. Which hurts real bad.

When Sabean speaks with Bay Area media, incidentally, he treats them with absolute contempt. Problem is, reporters there don't treat him like a chump—they ask boring, money-based, business-oriented questions. You know, the kind of stuff GMs handle. Sabean's hatred is a total contradiction to his frowsy performance since 2002. Maybe if his dealings with players, agents and other GMs was as tough, the Giants would be worth a poo.

But that's just my opinion.

A final thought: Bochy is a Padre, been one all his adult life. He came to the Giants when Sabean went looking for a bargain to manage a bunch of underachievers and make it all seem OK for the players, and hope that fans and press would be duped. Well, Bochy wears Giants colors, but he's a Padre first and last. They have Tim Flannery on the club, for chrissakes. They get old Padres to make month-long cameos. The Giants play like the Padres, and win (or not!) like the Padres. And now fans are talking about getting Adrian Gonzalez! It's creepy.

Sabean's a failure and Bochy is a loser. Both just got re-hired. If you're looking for total disservice to baseball, to fans and to the gods themselves, look no further.