The above link will take you to a recap of the Giants improbable victory over the Philadelphia Phillies last night to claim the National League pennant.
SportsReaction
Watching the Giants win last night probably brought up many different feelings for many different people. For me (since I am a nerdy baseball geek) the first thing I thought about was the contributions of two players that were completely “out of nowhere.” Those two players that danced in my mind were Aubrey Huff, and Pat Burrell.
Both were horrible players that had, supposedly, reached the end of their careers last season. In the simplest terms two of the Giants best offensive players were supposed to “stink;” or at least they should have stunk when you consider their previous season’s statistics.
Before I display both players numbers I want to point out I am going to include traditional statistics along with one of my favorite stats; WAR (Wins Above Replacement). WAR is a measure of how many wins a player contributed and makes adjustments for everything you can imagine, and includes defense--an absolute must when evaluating a player:
| Players | 2009 Batting | WAR | 2010 Batting | WAR | WAR Diff |
| Burrell | .221/.315/.367, 14 HR, 64 RBI | -0.4 | .266/.364/.509, 18 HR, 51 RBI | 2.8 | 3.2 |
| Huff | .241/.310/.384, 15 HR, 85 RBI | -1.4 | .290/.385/.506, 26 HR, 86 RBI | 5.9 | 7.3 |
*These numbers are only the statistics that Burrell posted after being picked up by the Giant at mid-season. It’s important to note that while Burrell was with the Rays this season he posted .202/.392/.333 batting line with a (-0.2) WAR.
Pay attention to that last column titled “WAR Diff.” This column represents how much better each player was in 2010 than they were in 2009. This is an unbelievable turnaround for both players, especially when you consider that Huff and Burrell are both 33 years old and well past their primes. It looks to me like Brian Sabean (San Francisco GM) got extremely lucky with these two pickups.
Please don’t take the above comment as a shot at “Sabes.” Every team that wins their league in any year needs a good amount of luck to take home the pennant. It just seems like both of these signings had no logic behind them. Since 2005 Huff only posted a WAR greater than 1.2 just once, while Burrell broke the 1.9 barrier only once since 2002! Not only were both of these players historically bad in 2009 (costing their teams victories); they weren’t that great of players in many of the preceding years.
Sabean did draft and develop Buster Posey, Tim Lincecum, Jonathan Sanchez, and Matt Cain though; so it definitely wasn’t all luck.
Overall Sabean has done a great job constructing this San Francisco roster. In this write-up I just wanted to point out that a little luck was required; and I have put faces, names and numbers to that luck. Pat Burrell and Aubrey Huff represent the definition of “fortunate signings” and when you combine them with astute draft and development as the Giants have done, you can win a National League title.
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