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Justin Miller Appreciation Thread


This past offseason, the Giants signed a plethora of minor league free agents. Some of them vanished quickly (Francis Beltran, we hardly knew ye). Some of them spent most of the season injured (sorry, Josh Phelps and Dallas McPherson - lucky thing we didn't need a power hitting first baseman anyway). Some of them were Ramon Ortiz, but the less said about that the better.

But several of them made the roster and contributed more than could have been expected. Juan Uribe, Andres Torres, Brandon Medders all turned out to be excellent pickups. And so did Justin Miller, whose season is now over with an injured elbow. He walked too many and struck out not enough; but he threw a lot of innings, especially in the first half when Sanchez and Johnson had a lot of 5-inning starts, and kept the Giants in most of those games. (Being the Giants, they lost most of them anyway, but that's not Miller's fault.)

In the second half, he got a lot less work (15.2 IP after the break as compared with 41 before) and was less effective, but before his last 5 games blew it up he still had a 1.83 ERA. His first half WHIP was a mere 1.098. Even with a lousy ending, he ends his season with a 1.306 WHIP and 3.18 ERA, very respectable for a back of the bullpen guy.

With the emergence of Joaquin and Runzler, it seems like a long shot for Miller to return next season. If he doesn't, I wish him well - as long as he doesn't sign with the Dodgers - and salute him for being much better than I expected.

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