Posts tagged Aaron Rowand at FanHouse

It's no secret that the Giants need offensive help. They've finished 15th in the National League in scoring two years running. It's also become abundantly clear that they're gearing up for a run at the NL West crown in 2009, having signed Randy Johnson, Edgar Renteria, Jeremy Affeldt and Bobby Howry this offseason.

So it shouldn't come as a surprise then, that San Francisco is making a run at the biggest and best bat still available.

The Giants, the NL West's most active team this winter, are quietly making an aggressive play for free agent Manny Ramirez, according to a major-league source.

Acquiring Ramirez would come with a number of headaches -- from simply having the mercurial slugger on their roster to likely having to trade one of their incumbent outfielders (Randy Winn, Aaron Rowand, Dave Roberts). But all in all, he'd probably be worth it for a team that isn't all that far from seriously contending. They play in a soft division where 85 wins could easily equal a playoff berth.

That's especially true when you consider three factors: (1) the market for Ramirez is severely depressed because of the number of all-hit, no-field corner bats on the market, (2) signing him would simultaneously improve the Giants' offense and weaken the rival Dodgers and (3) it would save GM Brian Sabean from having to engineer a complex trade for a bat that would cost him one of his top young pitchers like Jonathan Sanchez.

Sign Manny? Sure, why not? It's not like folks in San Francisco aren't used to having a sometimes-surly, Hall of Fame slugger prowling around in left field after all.

Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2009.

The Giants were not a disappointment in 2008 as far as I'm concerned, because they only lost 90 games and did not finish in last place. Going into the season, in looking at the rosters, Giants fans had to expect 100 losses and a definite last place finish. Moving forward, there is hope for a quick franchise turnaround.

Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain, Jonathan Sanchez, and even the injury-prone Noah Lowry have the makings of a quality young starting rotation. They could be above average with offensive support and an improved defense. Bengie Molina and Aaron Rowand can be helpful players on a good team, but they cannot be the centerpieces of the offense, as they were this past season. Randy Winn and Fred Lewis are viable starters for '09, but they need to be slotted at the end of the batting order.

The key to the approach for 2009 is to try and compete without foregoing the future. The rotation, closer Brian Wilson, and potential stars like Madison Bumgarner, Conor Gillespie, and Buster Posey are too valuable to deal in a trade just to land one player.

I was at U.S. Cellular Field last night sitting behind home plate when Carlos Quentin hit his major league-leading 35th home run of the season into the left field seats. Seeing Carlos go deep this season was nothing new, but there was something different about his blast on Monday night.

It didn't mean anything. The White Sox were already sporting a 12-5 lead on the Mariners, so his solo shot didn't factor into the game's result. Very rarely has that been the case for Quentin this season. Carlos came to the White Sox in an offseason trade with the Diamondbacks, and he came with very little fanfare.

At the time most White Sox fans - including myself - were still a little sore about missing out on Torii Hunter and local legend Aaron Rowand. So when they found out that Kenny Williams' big plan was to bring in some outfielder nobody had ever heard of, and one that was coming off of shoulder surgery to boot, Sox fans weren't pleased.

Well thank God Kenny Williams runs the team, and the fans don't.

The only reason Quentin even made the Sox roster out of spring training was due to a groin injury suffered by Jerry Owens. Owens' injury opened a spot in the outfield, and Carlos was going to keep it warm for a few games until he could come back.

Maybe the All-Star Game is a meaningless to the players and just an excuse for Bud Selig to admire himself for a week. That doesn't mean that the selections should be stupid. Today, the MLB 'Haus gives you All-Star Grievances.

Grievance: Aaron Cook over Cole Hamels, or to stay in division, Chad Billingsley and Jonathan Sanchez. Mmmm-mmm. Home cookin'! Cook has been pretty good this year, but to call him All Star quality dominant might be a bit of a stretch. Hamels is a no-brainer and Billingsley and Sanchez have been erratic at times, but both have helped shore up their respective team's rotations with high strikeout pitching (they are 20 shy of collectively quadrupling Cook's totals.) Also, it really bothers me when the manager for a team uses his power to grab a homer pick. Or when people reward wins (which, partially = luck).

Grievance: Brandon Webb starting over Edinson Volquez or Tim Lincecum. Webb has been great this season, but he's scuffled recently. All three deserve to be heading to New York, but the reality is that Lincecum or Volquez should be starting, if we're basing the "award" on recognizing the entire first half of the season.

On Deck is FanHouse's look at the day's most intriguing baseball matchups.

Florida Marlins (36-31) at Tampa Bay Rays (39-28) - 6:10 PM ET

All right, so I'm having a conversation today with a buddy of mine and we're discussing the fact that it's June 14th, and both the Marlins and Rays are still relevant in the conversation of baseball. I'm sure that neither of these teams are content with just being in the hunt in mid-June. But the question is, are either of these teams capable of being in the race all the way through? Could both teams be there at the end? Regardless of what your feeling is on this, it will be fun to see a Florida interleague game with some juice ... even though both the Marlins and the Rays have more intense rivalries out there.

P.S. If I had to choose one team there at the end, my money's on the Rays. But that's if you put a gun to my head.

Like many White Sox fans this past offseason, I wasn't very happy with the moves the White Sox did/didn't make. They missed out on Torii Hunter. They missed out on Miguel Cabrera. They missed out on Aaron Rowand, Kosuke Fukudome, and just about anybody else who they thought they were going to get.

It was during this time that I would often make the joke with my friends or other Sox fans, "But we got Carlos Quentin! Get your World Series tickets now!" Yes, I spent a lot of time this winter making jokes at Carlos Quentin's expense, but now over a quarter of the way through the season, the only one laughing is Quentin.

He's been carrying the White Sox. Just ask his manager.

"Oh, he has carried this ballclub,'' manager Ozzie Guillen said. ''A kid without that much experience in the big leagues batting third and having the kind of two months he has had, I never thought that was going to happen. I didn't expect this kid to be carrying the ballclub. We needed help, and he gave us help.

''We hit the lottery with him.''

After hitting his eleventh home run of the season on Sunday afternoon, Quentin is now hitting .301/.415/.589 and trails only the juggernaut that is Josh Hamilton for the AL lead in RBI's with 37. Those are better numbers than any of the other players the Sox had targeted.

And to think, he wasn't even supposed to be on the team.

The San Francisco Giants and Chicago White Sox are continuing to talk about a possible trade that would send Joe Crede from Chicago to the bay, a deal we already know Aaron Rowand is fighting for. One of the players the White Sox were looking at to get in return for Crede is Giants starter, Noah Lowry.

The Sox even had scouts in attendance for Lowry's start yesterday against the Texas Rangers. After seeing Lowry's performance, I think it's safe to say the White Sox may be taking him off their wish list.

In less than two innings of work, Lowry walked seven batters. Seven. As if that wasn't bad enough, he also managed to throw two wild pitches in the first inning, and sent a pick-off throw into the stands during the second inning before Bruce Bochy mercifully pulled him from the game.

It's Lowry's second straight horrible performance of the spring. In his first start against the Cubs, he lasted only an inning and a third, walked three hitters, hit another, and threw two fastballs to the backstop.

Needless to say, neither Lowry or the Giants coaches have any explanation for what's going on, much like the Cardinals never could figure out what went wrong with Rick Ankiel. Combine Lowry's performance with Barry Zito getting rocked for 8 runs in two-thirds of an inning against the Athletics, and the Giants can't be very confident in their starting rotation right now.

On the bright side, if they wait a few years and give Lowry some HGH, they'll finally have a replacement for Barry Bonds in left field.

During my life as a White Sox fan, there haven't been many players on the team that I've liked more than Aaron Rowand and Joe Crede. Crede I love just because I grew up playing third base so I tend to favor third basemen, but his impeccable defense and clutch hitting didn't hurt much. As for Rowand, what baseball fan doesn't love the guy who's willing to run face first into walls time and time again to help the team?

The admiration isn't just amongst fans like me, though. Apparently Rowand has developed a man crush on Crede over the last few years that is above and beyond anything I've ever felt. Since Aaron signed with the Giants this off season, it's seemed like he's spent every waking minute trying to get Crede to the bay as well.

''Joe's a great guy and a great baseball player and a great friend, so ... would I like to have him on this team? Of course,'' Rowand said before a Cactus League game against the Cubs. ''I'm definitely biased, not only friendship-wise, but as a player, too, because I think the world of him.

"We'll see what happens. Nothing's ever for sure in this game. A lot of weird things happen. Things don't happen that are supposed to happen. For now, I'm sure Joe's going about his business and thinking about being with the Chicago White Sox, just like I'm doing here.''

I wouldn't be surprised if Aaron gets his wish soon, because it's pretty clear that the White Sox feel Josh Fields is going to be a stud, and that if Crede shows his back is better this spring they're going to move him. The White Sox have always tried to avoid working with Crede's agent, the evil Scott Boras, and since he's in the last year of his contract, it's unlikely he'll be back in Chicago next season anyway.

Alfonso Soriano is a bad defensive left-fielder. That's part of the reason he's in left field, and not in center -- left field is where the dregs of defensive outfield play. It's where they feel at home. It's where they can become the goofy 10-year-old in Little League, more content to pick dandelions than throw the ball to the cutoff man.

Soriano is no different. What is different about Alfonso, though, is that he openly admits something professional athletes are not supposed to openly admit: fear:

"I have no problems running from side to side or running to make a catch in front of me," he said. "The only problem I have sometimes is running backward because I'm scared of hitting the wall. But I'm working very hard in spring training to get better. ... That's one of the only places that has [bricks] in the back [instead of padding]," Soriano said. "But the work in spring training will help me there and in different ballparks. I just have to work to make myself more comfortable."

For so brazenly admitting that he's scared of a wall, Soriano is no doubt going to be pummeled today and throughout the season every time he lets a ball drop on the warning track or so much as slows his gait as he approaches the ivy. What most of these antagonists will fail to recognize, however, is that it's patently dumb to force Soriano to play the wall hard if he's not comfortable with it. He sucks at defense anyway; why jeopardize his offensive ability too?

Alfonso will get made fun of for this. Repeatedly. But the notion that Soriano is somehow going to drastically increase his defensive value by Aaron Rowand-ing a brick wall or two is just as silly as Soriano's fear is funny.

The Giants have yet to fill the hole at third base created by the departure of Pedro Feliz, but Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun-Times suggests that a solution may be on the horizon:

Joe Crede: The whispers around the organization still seem to point to the idea that if the third baseman shows up to camp and the back looks strong he will be gone by the middle of Cactus League play. The top suitor remains San Francisco, who may even have a deal in place with the Sox, contingent on the back recovery. The big reason why? Aaron Rowand. ... Don't think for a second that Rowand isn't in the ear of Giants' brass, campaigning for Crede to come West and be locked up to a contract extension.

Crede's an attractive option only in that it probably wouldn't take too much to pry him away. He's coming off an injury-riddled season in which he hit just .216 with four home runs and 22 RBI in 47 games, not quite the encore the ChiSox were hoping for after his .283-30-97 2006. With Josh Fields around to provide similar production at a fraction of the price, there's no reason to hold onto Crede.

Like Feliz, Crede is an excellent fielder, but sadly, that's not where the similarities end: he's also almost as bad coaxing a walk, posting a career .305 OBP that makes him a huge liability when he's not poking 30 balls over the fence (and perhaps even still). But, he's relatively cheap: as MLB Trade Rumors points out, he's making $5.1 million this year before hitting free agency next winter.