Good randomly generated collection of characters from Bay City Ball on Conor Gillaspie, who knows how to control the strike zone, and is still just 24. He had an above-average year in Fresno, so why aren't we more excited about him?

Maybe "excited" isn't the right word. The better question: Why is he an afterthought, then? At least, that's how I've been viewing him, lumping him in with the Dan Ortmeiers of the world. He's the beacon of plate discipline in the system, though. Which is a loaded statement in a couple of ways, but it's true.

When Bill Mueller was 23, he put up a .302/.435/.425 line with a BB/SO ratio of 103/47 in 544 plate appearances. That was more impressive than what Gillaspie did in his age-23 season last year -- .297/.389/.453. Well, it's more impressive until you consider that Mueller was in A-ball, doing that in the California League, while Gillaspie did his work in AAA.

Am I saying that Gillaspie will leave the Giants and lead the AL in hitting in a few years? Of course I am. Those who forget history are doomed to be force-fed cliches. But the larger point is that Gillaspie has the tricky part down already -- he can walk, and he doesn't strike out a lot. There's no guarantee that the doubles power will develop, but Mueller's ISO was worse at the same age, two levels lower.

Starting to think he could be a decent hitter one of these days. It looks like the corners are locked up for the next few years, so the Giants will have to figure something out if he forces the issue. BCB suggests trying him at second. Sounds good to me.

From Henry Schulman, we have the annual five questions. He put these up weeks ahead of schedule trying to get the jump on the other beat writers who haven't even started to think about their five questions! Wily, wily Henry Schulman.

The five questions are as follows:

1. Will Buster Posey be an offensive force again?
2. Can the team score 700 runs?
3. Is this the year (Brandon Belt) emerges?
4. Will 2012 be the final year in San Francisco for Matt Cain and Barry Zito?
5. Will Brian Wilson's elbow hold up?

Gimme yes, no, yes, no, no on those. I'd truly like to believe that there's some sort of difference in the length of the leash the Giants will give Aubrey Huff this year compared to last year, and I'm almost coming around. I have trust issues with this team, though.

I still have no idea why they got Jose Vizcaino and Rey Sanchez to block Rich Aurilia, for example. I guess Aurilia was the original Belt, and that must mean Belt will be around in 2022, annoying us by starting over the prospect of the hour.

When I'm missing baseball, I just stare at Madison Bumgarner's page on Baseball Reference for a while. That's the kind of sentence that separates us from the rest of society, and I should work on that, right after I finish removing this poster of Bumgarner's K/BB ratio from this copy of Tiger Beat and taping it to my wall. So beautiful.

And when that's not enough, I cull through Baseball Reference's play index to find tidbits about where Bumgarner ranks all time for his age. I usually share them here, but they're always lists that feature people like Dwight Gooden, Bret Saberhagen, Neil Armstrong, and Thomas Paine. Bumgarner is an amazing, amazing young pitcher when it comes to his ability to throw strikes. Aw, heck, one more time: a list of pitchers who had a K/BB better than 4.00 in their age-21 season. It's a list that fits on a matchbook.

Then I like to see what other control mavens were doing when they were 21. Tom Glavine was walking 33 guys in 50.1 innings for the Braves. Greg Maddux had a 5.61 ERA and a 4.3 BB/9 with the Cubs. Cliff Lee was walking 36 batters in 44.2 innings for the low-A Cape Fear Crocs. Curt Schilling had a 3.7 BB/9 for two different AA t … wait, the Cape Fear Crocs? What the hell …

All of those prospects turned into pitchers who became the personification of super-plus-control. But when they were 21, they were jumbly messes of pitches outside of the strike zone. They still had to climb the snowy peak to get to the wizened control guru meditating at the top. They still needed to hone their mechanics. They were raw lumps of pitcher ore.

Madison Bumgarner is not raw. He still has things to learn, of course. But even if he doesn't learn anything over the next five years -- even if he completely plateaus --he'll still be an awesome pitcher. If you're a fan of FanGraphs' fielding-independent stats, he's already the Giants' best pitcher.

Continue reading this post »

When I was 12, I didn't know that catchers aged like ... like ... large men who had to do deep-knee bends hundreds of times every day for several years while wearing heavy equipment. I just knew that Gary Carter was a catcher and that he was awesome. So when the Giants signed him before the 1990 season, I was a little giddy.

He did just fine for the Giants that year, but he couldn't pitch, so he didn't get to help the Giants back to the World Series. A search through the New York Times archives brings back news of his signing:

Now that's some fancy negotiatin'. Giants fans don't have the decade of memories that the people in Montreal do, nor did we watch a stunning World Series victory with him playing a crucial role, but he was still a Giant for a year. Even the fact that he was a Dodger the next year doesn't ruin that.

When you grew up in the '80s as a fan of the National League, you knew that there was Gary Carter at the top of the catcher hierarchy, and then there was everyone else. Rest in peace, Gary.

Allow me to lead off with two things from last season.

First:

The Rays are acting like drunken goofs. It wasn't Suppan or Lawrence, but rather Vogelsong in the conservatory with a new shoulder. And teams still aren't supposed to have rotation depth. Zito is the fifth starter, and Eric Surkamp is the contingency plan. I'm fine with that. It's a good thing the Giants never traded Zach Wheeler. Helps take the sting out of trading Zack Wheeler.

Second:

This comes up know because Travis Blackley is back. We'll win that Jason Ellison trade yet.

He also walked 635 batters, give or take, but there's no harm in taking the lefty with the good arm and putting him in the earthquake kit. And if you're really interested in Australian baseball, I'll be on Perth radio next Thursday at 7:00 a.m. That's not made up. The radio appearance, I mean. I think "Perth" is pretty clearly made up. Wikipedia says that's a city with over a million people, but the thing about that site that a lot of people don't know: They let anyone write for it.

Anyway, we got off track with the topic of the day, which you don't even know yet because I've been too busy putting previously written words in gray boxes. The topic of the day: emergency starters. The Giants re-signed Ramon Ortiz yesterday. Now we have Travis Blackley back in the fold. Note: The last time he started a Giants game, Kevin Frandsen was the starting shortstop, Dan Ortmeier was the starting first baseman, and Dave Roberts started in center. It's almost like this is one of the middle steps in an AA program. We're listening, Travis. We're listening, and we're sorry.

Here are the emergency options that the Giants have signed. At least a couple of them will be in Fresno, ghoulishly waiting for a call:

Continue reading this post »

Now Ramon Ortiz is tied with Russ on the Giants' all-time reacquired Ortiz list. This was unexpected.

Of course, Ramon Ortiz has never started a game for the San Francisco Giants. He started 16 games for the Fresno Grizzlies in 2009 and bounced around three different organizations after that. He'll be 39 in March, but he's still putting up decent K/BB ratios in AAA, so he's not ready to retire just yet. That's commendable, in a way. There will be a lot of time to not pitch, so keep going for it as long as you have teams offering contracts. Or maybe he just likes Fresno. It's possible.

Even in his prime, Ortiz wasn't much. He had a nice season in 2002 -- of course he did -- but after that he was average at best, pretty bad at his worst. So this is probably non-news.

But this story goes on the front page for one reason: Ryan Vogelsong. When Vogelsong was signed, I didn't even make former-Giants-prospect jokes. I just ignored it because there wasn't any way he was going to make a difference in 2011. I learned my lesson.

So this is a story about Ramon Ortiz, who will end up leading the 2012 Giants starters in ERA. You read it here first. Note that my powers to edit a post never go away, so I can tidy this up later. All screenshots are obviously doctored. I can tell by the pixels and from seeing a few character-assassination attempts in my time.