#tim lincicum

When I think of the San Francisco Giants, even now, it’s difficult to separate my feelings about the team from my attachment to the one that won the World Series in 2010.

At the very least, this explains a lot about the Bay Area’s breathless focus on Buster Posey’s rehabilitation efforts. yes, Posey is good, but Sandoval is probably better; and yet Posey’s recovery is the single most important story of the Spring, overshadowing even the (lack of) news on contract negotiations with Matt Cain. Melky Cabrerera has just as much potential as either one of them but it’s Buster that we, the fans, truly adore. A large part of our affection stems from the fact that fans and journalists alike can successfully argue that without Buster’s presence Giants would never have morphed from a 4th place team into a championship team two seasons ago.

Therin lies the emotional reckoning that is coming for Giants fans everywhere. Posey helped lead the band of misfits but he was only one of them because he, like Bumgarner, was so improbably good at such a young age that he catapulted San Francisco to victory. In his heart, Posey is something else entirely and the 2012 team is a much better reflection of the real Buster - but are we ready for that? I want you to think back to the unexpected miracle of the 2010 season. Focus on the players and how you felt about them. Who are the names you remember?

Tim Lincecum, the ace pitcher who only could have fit in on a San Francisco team.

Matt Cain, the stoic and steady staff leader.

Brian “The Beard” Wison, whose antics were still confined to YouTube.

Aubrey “Rally Thong” Huff, with his quick wit and faster bat

Pat “The Bat” Burrell, who gave us his last great year and bonded the team with the glue of a character that few fans could really understand.

Andres Torres, who was so well loved that his trade sparked hundreds of tributes even weeks later.

Maddison Bumgarner, who probably should have been ID’d for trying to enter a champagne party.

Mark DeRosa, the consummate veteran who players young & old looked to for advice, even when his wrist turned into bubblegum and duct tape.

It was a team of lovable misfits who for one magical stretch became something so much greater than the sum of their parts. The following year, the wheels came off the bus. The Giants suffered catastrophic injuries and the only player who had enough plate appearances to qualify for a Giants batting title was Aubrey Huff. His year was awful.

Above all else, the 2010 Giants were a team that loved playing baseball and genuinely enjoyed playing together. They seemed, to our adoring eyes, to be friends. They embodied the cultural romance of the American passtime and they closed the door on SF being a football town. The 2010 Giants were a reflection of how the city sees itself: overlooked in favor of the big cities, passionately liberal, different like Apple, and succeeding in spite of the world’s expectations. Only in San Francisco could a pitcher be arrested for smoking weed and be almost universally loved for it. As a result, even now, when I think about the 2012 Giants, my giddy feelings of excitement are motivated by the bond I shared with our 2010 champions. Alas, it was as I considered the future of Aubrey Huff that I realized how truly different this squad is from the one we all fell in love with. Pat the Bat is retired. Mark DeRosa’s influence is giving the Nationals squad some much needed cohesion (he’s a future manager for some lucky club). Tim Lincecum is on a short contract and if Matt Cain isn’t signed, he’ll be testing the $100mm+ waters of free agency after this season. Andreas Torres is busy winning the hearts of a skeptical New York fan base who want to love him with a victor’s passion, if he’s up to the task. Brian Wilson, under the Giants current budget structure, is unlikely to be around after 2013. So who are we left with from that magical 2010 year? Where is the character? Our belief in Timmy and Cain as the face of the franchise has been shattered. The Beard’s antics have gone mainstream and it is likely that his arm will follow. Of the three joker-kings (Burrell, DeRosa, Huff) only one remains and his future is tied to an unlikely renaissance. Thus I come to the crux of this article: the only strong leaders that remain from the misfit era are Posey and Huff; and Posey wasn’t really a misfit. Both are players are question marks, and both are critical to maintaining what made the 2010 team so special to this city: character. Look fans, I love Brandon Belt. I believe he should be the every day first basemen for the Giants but I have to grudgingly pull for one last Huff revival because of what it will mean if he doesn’t make it. For lack of a better phrase, the Giants will become a stoic workman-like team crafted in the image of something like Carlos Beltran meets a Norman Rockwell painting. While this isn’t a bad thing, it’s a very different thing and it will mean letting go of 2010 for good. Am I ready to do that? I’m not sure, but we may be past the point of nostalgia mattering even a little bit.

Let’s take a look at the character of the guys who will likely lead the Giants. They have some wonderful abilities, and they can win for us, but it’s not going to feel like the 2010 team we want so desperately to love again:

Buster Posey: The unquestionable leader of the clubhouse. He is a truly dynamic personality, full of hope and optimism. Buster represents the best of what the team’s new character can be. As I said to open the article, much rests on this man’s shattered ankle.

Pablo Sandoval: We love the Kung-Fu Panda but, let’s be honest, as English speaking fans, we love him as a caricature. The man plays great baseball and brings an infectious love of the game (and smile) to the dugout, especially in his support of the other guys. Still, as fans we have made him into a cartoon character, both figuratively and literally. We can’t confirm or deny our caricature of him because he also speaks fairly broken English - though to be fair he’s becoming something of a Spanish Speaking Buster Posey to the Latino fan base. Late addition: I was called out on Pablo speaking perfectly fine English. Perhaps I missed that interview. He knows enough to get by but I'd hardly call it perfectly fine. I love the guy, but not for his stellar English language interviews. For Los Gigantes de San Francisco, that’s a very good thing (Los Gigantes are just as important as The Giants - a subject for another day) but Sandoval wasn’t one of the misfits. He owns a series ring but he mostly sat on the bench during the 2010 championship run. His character belongs to the new era.

Brandon Belt: Developed start to finish by the Giants farm system, Belt appears to be the third position player product of a successful coaching staff following Sandoval and Posey. While he may not start the year at first base, he will almost certainly finish it there, unless Huff has some leftover magic inside from two years back or Pill turns out to be more than an average+ player (think Nate Schierholtz). The thing about Belt though is that, struggles and streaks completely aside, he spent most of 2011 looking like a wide eyed kid on his first visit to Toys’R’Us. He didn’t endear himself to anyone when he spent the last two weeks of the season talking about how tired he was (Crawford, by comparison, never complained and simply got to work on Winter ball). He’s a kid with great skills, a bright future, and a long ways to go before he’s mature enough to be loved and adored vs hopefully expected.

Brandon Crawford: He’s steady. I penned an article on him on Monday so I won’t go into the details of why I think he’s going to surprise people this year. My favorite thing about Crawford is his patient resilience. He has never once lashed out at an ungrateful fan base or media, who have derided him for his struggles moving from High A to the MLB with barely a breather in Richmond. Crawford is a hard working dude with a ready smile and a perfectionist streak that will serve him well as he matures,  though he will need to have a breakout year before he is able to wear the mantle of a team leader. When he does, he could become a force in the clubhouse but he’ll probably never be a misfit.

Freddy Sanchez: Is struggling, to be honest. He doesn’t have even half the arm speed or bat power that he had in 2010. I’m pulling for him but I suspect his career is over. Either way, he’s another serious & steady worker. He has a good heart and the passion of a kid on the diamond but he was a performer in the series run, not a leader.

Melky Cabrera: The further we get into Spring Training, the more I realize how deftly the Giants seem to have replaced Carlos Beltran in their lineup. Not only does the Melk Man look poised to repeat his stunning 2010 performance (18HR, 4.8 oWAR) but he also carries the same gruff businesslike approach that was Beltran’s hallmark. This became abundantly clear in a March 6th postgame interview following a 2 home run performance. Cabrera barely cracked a smile when asked about it through a translator: “I’m here to work,” he said. “But are you having fun?” the reporters asked. “Yes. But I’m here to work.” Many Giants fans feel that the club could have used a lot more Melky and a lot less Orlando last year, especially with his efficient attitude and equally efficient results. The character cost will, however, be staggering. His response couldn’t be further from the thong-wearing antics that came to personify 2010. He’s a perfect example of a 2012 team that can win but will probably never entertain on the level of our beloved heroes.

Among the pitching staff this leaves Sergio Romo, who is Robin to Wilson’s Bruce Wayne, along with a few other high profile regulars. Jeremy Affeldt is a genuinely good guy and smart as a whip, though he’s as religious as Tim Tebow. With that said, middle relievers aren't known for morphing into clubhouse leaders. Lincecum and Cain are still locked in for the year but unless the Giants can sign Cain to a long-term deal, his steadying presence may be diminished. Either way, Cain is another workman-like player. If Vogelsong performs, he has the potential continue his fairy-tale comeback but he’s a bit of a question mark for the time being. Ryan Vogelsong could have been a misfit.

So I say again that we as fans have a reckoning coming. This team will be good and has the potential to be extremely good with a bit of magic dust from the Baseball Gods sprinkled in. Good, in this case, won’t feel like the Giants we have loved though. The 2010 season was full of hope and magic. It was full of laughs and thrills. Torture became exaltation and through it all, the team on the field just considered themselves lucky to be there. They were, by and large, either too young or too washed up to have expected a championship ring but there it was. You could feel the thrill of it every time the Giants took the field. San Francisco, you are unlikely to ever experience that again. Your 2012 Giants are very good but they are a cross between Cabrera’s Beltran-like efficiency and Posey’s all-American kid charisma. Around the edges you have the wide eyed stares of Brandon Belt and the yet unblossomed potential of guys like Crawford and Brett Pill. There is a dearth of experienced team leaders and if Huff falls behind, the misfit spirit of 2010 will finally be a thing for the history books. Am I ready for that? Are you? Are we, as a city, ready to let go of the Band of Misfits and embrace the east-coast like efficiency of a hard working team with a job to do? Could we still love them? Here’s what I do know: we are about to find out.

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A follow up:

2 Time Cy Young winner

And he orders this from In-N-Out: