The Giants have made four major player moves so far this offseason.  These are the acquisitions of Edgar Renteria, Randy Johnson, Jermey Affeldt and Bobby Howry.  We all know this already but I feel compelled to list their names before talking about how I feel to have them around.

I am most excited about Johnson.  From what we saw last year, the man still has some gas in the tank and though he was a little bit pricey may still prove to be valuable.  Hopefully he stays healthy and lives up to expectations.  If he does, our rotation is going to be pretty filthy. 

Signing Affeldt so quickly I think was a pretty strong move by Captain Lunatic Fringe.  A hard throwing, improving, bullpen lefty is a pretty helpful piece and he probably wouldn't have last long.  I wish I could say I was excited about Howry, but I am not.  Howry I think will be one of those relievers that we see in losing games.  I really believe Affeldt will help a lot.

As for Renteria...what is there to say?  We probably overpaid for him by quite a bit but it is only for two years.  The team seems confident that he will be worth it.  This could turn out to be true.  We definitely have a need at SS.  At the very least it will allow the younger guys some more seasoning.

The team still has not addressed the biggest most obvious flaw: power.  This team was anemic last year.  We need some pop and we need more solid hitting.  If we don't fix this we really have no shot.  Fortunately there is a guy out there that we should be able to land.

Manny.  Yeah, of course.  Anyone who says they don't want him is just not thinking about it enough.  There is not a better hitter available.  We have a glut of outfielders?  So what?  Also, all those BS projections that he is only slightly better than Lewis are totally ridiculous and it is shameful that they are being used as evidence against signing Manny.  Sometimes statistics can be taken too far.  The team would be better with Manny so get him.

We all hate Roberts.  We all love Lewis.  We all want to see Nate get a shot.  We all think Rowand was a dumb signing.  We all see Winn as tradable but deep down want to keep him cuz he is our best OF.  So there we have our current group of five OFs but where would Manny fit in?  Who knows.  Who cares.  He is better than any of those five.  DFA Roberts.  Trade him and pay part of his salary.  Just get Manny.

There is another thing blasting through the media right now and that is the Barry Bonds situation.  The federal government wants to get him so bad, especially after wasting millions of taxpayer money to accomplish this stupid goal.  I think it is becoming more and more clear that he is going to be fully exonerated.  The feds have successfully proven him guilty in the court of public opinion and made him spend millions of his own dollars.  Their case is also going to crash and burn and finally the whole ordeal will be over.

This is important.

The season starts in just about two months now.  What an exciting time!  Now we discuss the future and I am going to mentally masturbate for a minute.

Assuming we do the smart thing and sweep Manny out from under the Dodgers our lineup will probably look something like this:

Renteria

Winn

Manny

Molina

Sandoval

Rowand

Ishikawa

Frandsen

Yeah, yeah.  No Lewis.  He is the obvious man out.  He can sit on the bench and be pinch hitter #1, late inning D and start 3 or 4 games a week while spelling one of the other three.

Lincecum is entering year #3.  He is young, dedicated, incredibly talented and focused on getting better.  I don't think we have seen his best yet and I fully expect him to be even better in 2009.

Cain has pitched just fine and things have to balance out eventually.  All he has to do is continue pitching as well as he has and we have nothing to complain about other than being third best and making too many pitches.  Unless I am mistaken, he is actually younger than Lincecum.  Expect improvement here, too.

Sanchez I think is a bit of a question mark but still believe he will be better, too.  He pitched great on many occasions in the first half of the season.  As the #5 starter he should be fine.  He will likely be a league average starter at the minimum.

Johnson is a bit of a question mark but he should still be better than league average.

Zito has GOT to be better this year.  We all want him to be.  His offseason workout has got many of us asking: can he consistently throw 90 again.  If he can, he should have more good starts than bad.

Overall, the starters should give us a good chance to win the majority of their games.  I'm going to wager that for ever two times through the rotation they will give us a really good chance to win (ie: if we score 4 or more) 6 or 7 times.  I think that is a pretty modest projection, too.

The bullpen is a question mark but Wilson should improve a bit in terms of his pitching and regress a little in terms of his production.  Still a solid closer.  Romo, Affeldt and the gang should be an improvement, too.

I can easily see us running away with the division if these things all come to be.  I also don't expect Bonds to be offered a contract by any team, even after he no longer faces possible jail time.  This brings me to:

Sign Bonds in August for the playoffs.  This will give him enough time to get in shape and will terrify the opposition and give us a disgusting WS lineup (DH).  Will this happen?  Who knows, the future is the future and I can make anything up that I want.  Just imagine this lineup:

Who cares

Who cares

Manny

Bonds

Who cares

Who cares

Who cares

Who cares

Man, isnt' that sweet?  Ooooh yeah.