The answers to the trivia.
1. Judging by his stuff, it's hard to figure out how ___ retires hitters.
Kirk Rueter. I was prepared to write, "Kirk Rueter. Duh.", until I tallied up the answers. Felix Rodriguez kinda sorta fits, if you subscribe to the "every major league hitter can hit a fastball" theory. I had forgotten about Mark Gardner, and he would have been a good answer too.
2. There is always the hope in San Francisco that ___ will fully harness his physical talents and become one of the best starting pitchers in baseball.
I had the answer before the question, so Livan never crossed my mind. Shawn Estes was so legendarily flaky that he seemed like an easy answer. It turns out we had a lot of flakes.
3. Although ___ has an accurate arm in the outfield, his routes are inconsistent and he doesn't have the raw speed to make up for his mistakes.
Inconsistent. Depressing. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. Marvin.
4. In fact, ___ provided virtually the same RBI per at-bat as teammates Barry Bonds, Burks and Jeff Kent.
Armando Rios. We never should have traded that guy, even though I can't remember what we got. He had a pretty nice season in 2000, as did most everyone.
5. ____ was especially effective during the second half of last season and overmatched lefthanded hitters.
Remember when Felix Rodriguez was someone we all loved? He just ate up lefties, which, of course, required Dusty Baker to remove him against tough lefties. Probably in favor of Shawn Barton, or something.
6. ___'s 37 doubles provide a glimpse of what is expected to develop into home-run power down the line.
Tony Torcato. Someone must have exposed the film in the camera.
7. Scouts noticed that ____ seemed to fear tough situations far less than most rookie pitchers.
Aaron Fultz, who always looked like some D-III wrestler from Wartburg University to me. That's a real D-III wrestling champ, by the by.
8. ____________ was the Giants' fastest player down the first-base line last season.
Ellis Burks. It was probably a typo. It was supposed to read, "The noises made by the grinding of bone against bone in Ellis Burks' knees traveled at the speed of sound, which could lead an insane person to say Burks was the Giants' fastest player down the first-base line last season. I miss Burks.
9. __________'s production against lefthanded pitchers has slipped to near-pedestrian levels.
Barry Bonds. He was just winding up his career.
10. Since signing as a nondrafted free agent in 1999, _____ quietly has made his presence felt by overmatching older competition.
The trick question. The Scouting Notebook was hundreds and hundreds of pages. There were bound to be a few slips. Jerome Williams, however, was a first-round pick.
The winner was Pants Man, who scored a very nice 8. The prize was just a dummy prize, but still very much yours for the taking should you want to wreak havoc. Stay tuned for more meaningless junk for the next off day.