Overall, today's news gives more credence to the idea that Sabean's strategy is heavily "influenced" by Magowan.  So as much as kenshin might love to see Omar extended, I'd say that would be as risky as signing Zito.  Perhaps any blame or credit for either action should be placed at a higher level than Sabean's desk.

On the other hand, I'd love to have a GM who's committed to blending the best of both scouting and statistical analysis. Here are some candidates:

1.) Grady Fuson of the Padres. He has a reputation as a "super-scout" kind of guy, but he's also worked in stat-heavy organizations like the A's, Rangers and Padres.

2.) Kim Ng of the Dodgers. She has a strong analytical background and has worked with a variety of bright executives with different strengths -- Brian Cashman, Paul DePodesta and Logan White. She also has said she would be committed to player development, and let's face it: We all love rooting for homegrown players.

3.) Chris Antonetti of the Indians. He's a prominent member of a front office that gets praised by both scouts and statheads.

As an outsider, of course, it's hard to evaluate these people without being able to do interviews.

So rebuilding doesn't faze me, so long as it's smartly done, with some sort of clear plan and purpose.

Of course, Magowan isn't worried about folks like me necessarily, but with the more casual fan, the people who turn a 35,000 crowd into a 41,000 sellout.

But rebuilding IS necessary, and delaying it only means that when the crash comes, it's going to take that much longer to rebuild. Instead of a couple lean seasons and then back in serious contention, you might be looking at a longer period of low attendance due to shitty play. Which doesn't help Magowan's bottom line any better.

Two Words.

Metal Bats.

Talent displayed under the same conditions as the MLB game is hard enough to project in young people. Throw in an abberation like super-alloyed metal bats and you reduce your probabilites of succesful projections by a huge amount.  In addition to trying to predict what an 18 year old kid is going to develop into by age 24, you now have to project what this 18 year old is going to be able to do when you replace his kryptonite bat with a wood one in the ensuing years leading up to the Big Leagues.

Generally, if a pitcher can make the transition to working both sides of the plate after college/high school, and pitching against metal bats, he can continue to develop.  To wit...Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain. If a kid can dominate against his peers using metal bats, it is easier to forecast success for him than it is to predict what a kid with a metal bat who has to transition to wood bats is going to do.

Sabaen is merely playing the odds. Particularly since almost half of his roster is made up of pitchers, it is more dollar wise to develop as many of them as you can, and overspend on position players and the occasional Barry Zito, Jason Schmidt, Rob Nen.

Uhm, this guy has less credibility when it comes to the Giants than Jenkins, Lupica, Del Grande, and a slew of other hacks.

I think Sabean did a remarkable job from when he arrived, through the end of 2002.  As a result, the Giants saw post-season play in 1997, 1998 (sort of), 2000, 2002 and 2003.

The one thing that can't be brushed aside, though, is the repeated failure of the farm system, particularly with respect to position players.

In the beginning, no one seemed to notice this trend, and since Sabean brought with him from New York a reputation as one who had been instrumental in developing the Yankees then-vaunted farm system, the league seemed to just assume that the Giants' minor leaguers would also be high quality.

So, Sabean was able to foist off a host of not-even-mediocre farm system flotsam and jetsam to unsuspecting GMs around the league, for their soon-to-be free agent stars.  Unfortunately for Sabean and the Giants, two things seem to have changed since the end of 2002:

1. The league's GMs now seem to be wise to the fact that, once you get past the odd Lincecum, Cain and Villalona, the Giants' farm system is largely bereft of real talent.  Where Sabean once was able to unload no-talents like Ryan Vogelsong, Nate Bump, Chris Magruder and Darin Blood back in the day, he now can't even get a sniff when attempting to peddle the Todd Lindens, Merkin Valdezes, Erick Threetses and Tony Torcatos of the more recent farm system.
2. Teams like the Pirates, Royals and Marlins, when faced with their few stars' impending free agency, once gladly cast off those players into Sabean's waiting arms.  Now, they are more likely to keep those stars and sign them to long-term contracts--thanks in large part to revenue sharing.

And while the pre-2003 Sabean made savvy (some might say "lucky", but not me) trades for Kirk Rueter, J.T. Snow and Jeff Kent that paid huge dividends for many years, his more recent trades for players like Randy Winn and Ricky Ledee have disappointed, by comparison.

So, while I'm one who appreciates what Brian Sabean did prior to 2003, I still think he has to be called to account for his failures over the past few years.

One thing I really have to reject here is the notion that the Giants haven't really been able to develop their farm system because the team was built around Barry.  Or that the Giants are unable to rebuild as long as Barry remains on the payroll.  The rationale here seems to be that having a player like Barry Bonds and having a productive farm system are two mutually exclusive things.

First of all Bonds is only one player.  Granted, he's been a colossus for the Giants but another seven position players are still needed to fill out a lineup and field balls that are put into play.

If the argument is that Bonds takes up a huge chunk of payroll, then wouldn't it have made even more sense for the Giants to have developed some decent hitters in their farm system to fill out the lineup?  Instead Sabean has forever had to go outside the Giants farm system--usually at great expense--to bring in bona fide hitters (some less than bona fide--yes, I'm looking at you, Edgardo, Michael Tucker, Steve Finley and Shea Hillenbrand).  

The thing is, developing a productive farm system seems to be one of the least expensive things a baseball organization can do.  It certainly seems to have been the case with teams like the A's, Marlins and Expos/Nationals.

The other thing is, as long as the Giants were going to have a farm system, as long as they were going to pay good money to all those scouts, managers, coaches, instructors (roving and otherwise); and as long as they were going to draft, sign and bring up all those position players...why not actually have a few of them be good once in a while?  Wouldn't that have been a good thing?

So, this I think is something that Brian Sabean is now having to answer for, and rightly so.