I love that the Giants are in contention. I do. This is a flawed team, not a bad team, and any team that reaches the postseason has a shot at winning the whole thing. So even though the long-term future of the Giants looks awful from a personnel standpoint, I would be ecstatic if the Giants were as close as three games back in August.
But....
There's a small part of me that wonders what we could get for Jason Schmidt on July 31. If he kept pitching like a Cy Young candidate, that would be a feeding frenzy worth putting on pay-per-view. He'd be the lone ace on the market, and other GMs would circle around him as if he were a lingerie model that sneezed emeralds1. Again, just to make myself clear, here's the spectrum of what I would prefer to happen:
/ \ Would prefer to happen
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| * The Giants have a thrilling pennant race.
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| * I get food poisoning from an expired can of Clamato.
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| * I lose an ear in a drunken knife fight at a Finnish brothel.
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| * The Giants are so bad, they consider trading Jason Schmidt.
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\ / Would not prefer
They could always sew the ear back on, but this might be the last time the Giants contend for a while. My curiosity comes from an enviable position; that the Giants have been contenders with such regularity, they have never been in the position to have a fire sale. That's fantastic, and it's an enviable run of success. But there's still that small part of me that wants to covet the two birds in the bush. Gio Gonzalez? Lastings Milledge? Half of the Diamondbacks farm system, not that they'd consider trading that to a division rival? I don't know, but it's a fun guessing game.
In the present, then, it's worth appreciating what Schmidt is doing. An additional four feet on the fastball is making all of the difference in the world, as well as improved control and consistency with his 88-mph "changeup". I was listening to this game on the radio, pulling into my driveway in the second inning after Schmidt had given up three singles and a walk, and thinking, "My word. He isn't coming back. He's Russ Ortiz now." That was idiotically premature, and I've never been more pleased to be an idiot. A lot of the modest success the Giants have enjoyed thus far is due to Schmidt's rebound. It's interesting to speculate about his trade value, but more fun to picture him sitting atop the back seat of a convertible, waving through a confetti storm on Market Street.2
1Days until this site's first hit from a Google search of "lingerie model sneezing emeralds": Two.
2Likelihood of actually happening: .00001%. Cash value: 1/100th of 1¢. Warning: counting on the Giants to win a World Series may cause irritable bowels, upset stomach, hair loss, looking like Al Pacino on two hours' sleep, and a strong urge to drink a bottle of Robitussin to numb a pain that can not be numbed.