Your MLB Season Preview Starts Right Now: San Francisco Treat

With approximately 28 days until the 2009 MLB Spring Training season kicks off I'll do my best to give you a small preview of every team in league.

I will try to break each team down division by division starting with the NL West and more specifically, the San Francisco Giants, today.

When you take a look at the lineup it's easy to see why the Giants struggled toward a second to last place finish in 2008.

To be perfectly honest, the addition of shortstop Edgar Renteria doesn't make much of a difference to a lineup filled with no. 7-9 hitters. Renteria didn't have a particularly good year as his .270/.317/.382 line would indicate. His age, 33, also insists that he'll only get worse from here on out with regards to his defensive range.

The rest of the lineup is comprised of incumbent players lead by center fielder Aaron Rowand, second baseman Pablo Sandoval and catcher Bengie Molina.

Rowand put up numbers in 2008 that mirrored his 2005 season with a .270 average coupled with great defense. The problem is that Rowand is getting paid like a premier player, which is he not. In the first year of his contract with the Giants he tallied 13 home runs and 70 RBIs which was a considerable dip from the 27 home run, 89 RBI season he had with the Philadelphia Phillies in 2007.

Sandoval figures to be a prime candidate for a breakout season after posting a .345 average over a span of 41 games. The Puerto Cabello, Venezuela native is only 22-years-old could be a nice player to have at the top of the lineup.

The final player I'm highlighting is Molina because of the fact he led the Giants in home runs (16) and RBIs (95). It's a scary thought to think that Molina would lead his team any category but that just goes to show how bare the offensive cupboard is at AT&T Park since Barry Lemar Bonds left.

While the offense will struggled to get more than three-plus runs-per-game ownership may have one more move up its sleeve. Throughout the winter free-agent left fielder Manny Ramirez has been rumored to stay in Los Angeles or leave for rival San Francisco. If the Giants pull in Ramirez it obviously makes the lineup significantly better while adding the starpower void left by Bonds' departure.

If they don't add anyone else the pitching staff could keep the Giants in the race in a very weak division. With NL Cy Young award winner Tim Lincecum and Matt Cain returning and the addition of Randy Johnson, the rotation should be rock solid if Johnson has any gas left in the tank. Should the Giants get anything respectable out off the 100-million dollar-plus man Barry Zito, it will have one of the better rotations in the game.

But unless the back end of the rotation shapes up and the offensive gets a shot in the arm the Giants probably aren't good enough to bump the Dodgers from their perch, much less the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Giants sign Johnson, will field NL's oldest team and take advantage of Medicare

Randy Johnson is the newest member of baseball's most elderly team.

In an attempt to field the oldest team in modern baseball history, the San Francisco Giants have signed free-agent starting pitcher Randy Johnson to a one-year deal.

The aging Johnson (45) comes to the Giants with a laundry list of Hall of Fame credentials. He's a five-time Cy Young Award winner, a 10-time All-Star and has notched 4,789 punchouts. Johnson, who posted an 11-10 record with the Arizona Diamondbacks last season, has aspirations of possibly being the final modern-era starting pitcher to win his 300th game. He currently has 295.

With all that said, chalk up another questionable signing for both parties involved. Johnson joins shortstop Edgar Renteria as the second senior citizen to sign with the Giants this offseason, an offseason in which the Bay Area Bums were expected to dump payroll and go young. On top of that, I'm not sure if San Fran is the place where the Big Unit can pick up his 300th win.

Again, he only needs five 'W's' to do so, but Matt Cain (who is half of Johnson's age) notched only eight wins last season and he has more in the tank than Johnson does. Only Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum and Barry Zito notched double-digit victories ... and I'm not sure how Zito and his 5.15 ERA were able to manage that.

If Johnson is looking for run support, he would be hard pressed to find it even if he had bifocals and a microscope. Even Giant hitters are wondering where the offense is going to come from. The days of Kenny Lofton being driven home by Jeff Kent and Barry Bonds are over. Now it's Aaron Rowand and Randy Winn to the rescue.

Best bet is that Sabean turns Johnson into prospects at the trading deadline ... if Johnson's body can hold up that long.

Offense Would Definitely Be A San Francisco Treat

I guess I wasn't the only one who wasn't rounding the bases and scoring this weekend.

The San Francisco Giants scored 12 runs in their three-game series against the Chicago Cubs.

The only beneficiary was Tim Lincecum, who picked up his 11th win.

But really, 12 runs? That sucks! But I'm not surprised, they're run differential is minus-59. That means they've given up more runs than they've scored. And that's with Lincecum on the team.

Damn!

The Giants also rank No. 27 of 30 teams in runs scored. 20th in hits. 30th in home runs. 26th in RBIs. 21st in batting average. 25th in on-base percentage. 24th in OPS.

Giants fans, do you miss Barry Bonds yet?

So you're thinking to yourself that putting up crooked numbers isn't something the G-Men are good at. But maybe there's something in the water out there.

Take into consideration that the San Francisco 49ers scored the least amount of points in the NFL in 2007 (219) and averaged 13.7 points per game.

At least the Bay Area has the Warriors, who apperently understand the concept that you can't win if you don't score. In the 2007-08 season, the Golden Stater's averaged 111 points. But they didn't make the playoffs.

Well, neither did the 49ers. Neither will the Giants.

Wanted: Someone That Can Provide The Big 'O'

No, this isn't the tagline of a craigslist ad. Instead, it's something that the San Francisco Giants pitching staff would put in a personal ad as the G-Men search for some runs to support their staff with overwhelming stuff and underwhelming stats.

Lucky for the Cubs they get to face both Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum in this weekend's three-game set at Wrigley Field. And the fact that I'm even writing this post ensures that San Fran is bound to score 20 runs per game in support of this dynamic duo.

But let's break it down, shall we?

Tim Lincecum should be starting the All-Star Game for the National League. He's 10-2 with a 2.66 ERA. That's 10 frickin' wins on a team that has 39 wins. More than 25 percent of the Giants' wins have come thanks to the golden arm of Tim Lincecum.

He's got 126 strikeouts in 121.2 innings pitched. He's limiting opponents to a .243 batting average. He's posting a 1.27 WHIP. He's allowed 36 earned runs. Teammate Barry Zito has given up 61 earned runs and is making $17,595,000 more than Lincecum.

Lincecum would be a deity if he was on the Cubs, Mets, Yankees or Red Sox. Instead, he's the real San Francisco treat.

Also deserving of some love is Matt Cain. Despite h is 5-7 record and 4.30 ERA, Cain is able to devastate hitters with a mean high-90s fastball and a buckling breaking ball. His problem is that he gets little to no run support, meaning he's pitching with no margin for error.

His 112 strikeouts ranks third behind Licecum and lefty Jonathan Sanchez who has 115 punch outs. By the way, Sanchez is 8-5 with a 3.97 ERA which isn't bad for a guy making $395,000 in 2008.

If Lincecum, Cain and Sanchez had an offense that wasn't -57 in the run differential category, they'd all be All-Stars.

Instead, it's up to Aaron Rowand, Bengie Molina and Randy Winn to put some crooked numbers on the board.

Good luck with that, boys.