Winn is a good comp for what we hope Lewis could be, but look at their minor-league numbers and it's clear that Winn had accomplished a hell of a lot more by age 27 than Lewis has. And he's a better fielder as well.

Sheehan, btw, is a Yankee fanboy. Just read his gushing piece, when the Yanks signed Clemens at the start of the season.

Is BPro "biased"? Of course. The same way BA is "biased" It's biased towards a certain way of thinking about, and viewing baseball.

Yeah, there writers don't all agree with each other on specific players or details. Why is that a bad thing.

Fred Lewis walks, Nate Schierholtz, not so much. That is probably why Sheehan likes Lewis that much.

But things have gotten better lately with Goldstein, Normandin, Dan Fox, etc.

For comparison, the Giants ERA+ in 2006 was 97.

They had 4 pitchers pitch more than 180 innings of better than 110 ERA+ each: Verlander, Rogers, Robertson, Bonderman.

Of the guys whom they used as their 5th starter: Mike Maroth had a 3.56 ERA as a starter in 48 IP, Wil Ledezma a 4.29 in 35 IP, Zach Miner a 5.31 ERA in 79IP. League average ERA in Detroit was 4.56.

Of their 5th starters, both Maroth and Ledezma were better than league average pitchers.

The typical #5 starter is well below league average.

So, of Detroit's starters in 2006, only 79 innings were below league average.

The pen was also very good.

Zumaya 83 innings of 235 ERA+. Jamie Walker, 162 ERA+ in 48 IP. Rodney, 130 ERA+ in 71 IP. Jones, 116 ERA+ in 64 IP.

The Tigers had phenomenal pitching and defense in 2006.

OBP is valuable. That "fancy statistical analysis" is based on actual real world results.

I looked back at the 2006 BP to see how they have projected the Tigers.  I remember that I expected a lot more wins from them in 2006 than in 2005, and I suspected that was at least in part because of what I had read in BP.

Sure enough, BP mentioned that the Tigers didn't score as many runs in 2005 as their hitting indicated they should and that they didn't win as many games as their run differential indicated they should.  Such teams are prime candidates for improvement (unless like this season's Giants, they rid themselves of their only really good hitter).

BP also indicated that in order to win, the Tigers would need to do so on the backs of their pitching.  And as was pointed out in another post, the Tigers went on to fashion the AL's top ERA in 2006.

It seems to me that people just LOVE to criticize the so-called "experts."  Heck, I criticize Brian Sabean a lot, and he's probably an average GM (or at least close to it).  Brian actually used to be one of the best, but I fear the game has passed him by (much like Boly on our other board).

Brian made a series of generally REALLY good trades through the end of the 2002 season. Now his problem is that he doesn't have much to trade that he can AFFORD to trade.  He also seems to be being hurt by other GM's being able to read the tea leaves better than he can.  

As you know, I called for the Giants to trade Noah Lowry when he started off successfully last season.  My sense is that Brian overvalued Noah at the trade deadline.  Now he is finding that Noah's value may never be higher than it was through the trading deadline.

Brian is no dummy.  That said, I suspect some of us right here at the McCovey Chronicles have been more right about the deals and free agent signings made by Brian since the 2002 World Series than he has been.

Brian probably was a bit lucky through the end of the 2002 season.  He probably has been a bit unlucky since then.  I would evaluate him as in the vast middle ground of GM's over his career with the Giants, but the past five years he seems to have suffered both from bad luck and an inability to grow as much as other GM's around him.

Ironically, had Brian hired someone from BP as a consultant and learned from said BP person, he probably would be a better GM today.  BP's analysis isn't nearly as simple as you make it out to be.  Brian Sabean's, perhaps, is.