The Giants held a press conference to announce the Casey McGehee trade, and there were some delightful revelations. Let's just jump right in:
The Giants don't plan on talking to Max Scherzer
(Source)
That's almost a relief. For as healthy as Scherzer has been over the last few years, his occasional bouts of shoulder fatigue (dating back to college) weird me out. The people signing the checks would have much more information than I would, and "doctors" and other "medical professionals" might have a better way to evaluate that sort of thing than my methods, which consist "staring at Scherzer's Baseball Prospectus page and looking at the injury history."
Still, he weirds me out. Plus, he hasn't been good for that long. Remember when he faced the Giants in the 2012 World Series? He started being good at preventing runs about three months before that. Of all the $180 million pitchers to side-eye, he's high on the list.
The Giants now have "limited financial flexibility"
(Source)
The Giants aren't being cheap. The Giants aren't being cheap. The Giants aren't being cheap. The Giants aren't being cheap. Sometimes I need to say it over and over again, too.
That doesn't mean they're allocating their money well. Jake Peavy makes sense on a team with a better starting pitcher to slot behind Madison Bumgarner. Sergio Romo makes sense on a team with a little extra money to spend. McGehee makes sense on a team that needs to conserve its funds for a more expensive player. If all three of them are the offseason, that's a bad way to allocate resources, considering that internal options could have approximated the value of Romo and McGehee, and there are pitchers better than Peavy available.
This is where I'd normally link the "If we get Vladimir Guerrero ..." quote, except the Giants have won three World Series since then. I don't get what they're doing either, but not being able to make fun of that quote the biggest downside to all that lousy success.
Marco Scutaro is probably broken
Like, permanently broken. From Alex Pavlovic:
Finally, an odd and ominous note: Asked about Marco Scutaro, Sabean said that trainer Dave Groeschner will have some sort of announcement next week about Scutaro's status, which is unusual for this time of year. There are 40-man roster implications at play here because the Giants still need to re-add Romo and Peavy, and those deals are done and will be announced early next week.
When Bochy was asked about Scutaro at the Winter Meetings, he was taken aback and said something like, "Yeah ... I need to call him," as if he had completely forgotten about him. It would be stunning if Scutaro ever started another game in his career, unfortunately.
It's absolutely bizarre that the Giants traded for two different second basemen who just sorted floated off into space after helping them win a championship. The odds on that ...
There you have it. If the Giants got Jon Lester, they probably wouldn't have had money to get McGehee, Peavy, and/or Romo, but they would have been a better team. If the Giants got Pablo Sandoval, they probably would have had money to get Peavy and/or Romo, and they would have been a better team. As is, the Giants are scrambling for spare parts, and the early returns are underwhelming.
On the other hand, the Giants just won the World Series with only one really good pitcher, so maybe we should just embrace not knowing what in the hell is ever going on.