MDP

Voting for the Edgardo Alfonzo Award begins today. The EAA is awarded to the most disappointing Giants player of the season, and past winners include:

• 2006 - Randy Winn
  
• 2005 - Armando Benitez
  
• 2004 - A.J. Pierzynski
  
• 2003 - Edgardo Alfonzo
  
• 2002 - Rich Aurilia
  
• 2001 - Livan Hernandez

Some were able to reclaim some portion of their career; others were Edgardo Alfonzo and Armando Benitez. The candidates:

• Rich Aurilia

  Was supposed to be: The Swiss-Army knife of the roster. He was supposed to be able to play every infield position, hit for power, and be the lefty-mashing part of the first-base platoon.

  What he was:A questionable defender everywhere but first, and his "lefty-mashing" was more of a "lefty-sensual-massaging." There were no happy endings.

• Barry Zito

  Was supposed to be: The ace. Seriously, though, he wasn't supposed to be terrible. An above-average starter with an ERA in the high-3.00s would have been nice.

  What he was: An unwatchable disaster in the first-half, and solid pitcher in August and September.

• Ray Durham

  Was supposed to be: The clean...the clea...the cl...I can't write it. It's just too painful. The Giants entered the 2006 season with Ray Durham as the clean-u...the number fou.... if I don't type the words, maybe it never happened. It wasn't really realistic to expect him to be the 26-homer guy from 2006, but it was perfectly realistic to hope he could just be Ray Durham.

  What he was: The worst everyday player in baseball, as he posted his first below-average offensive season in over a decade. And by "below-average offensive season", I mean "an offensive season you would expect from Kirk Rueter getting 450 at-bats with an 83 oz.-bat."

It seems like the answer is obvious, but I don't really want to taint the voting by revealing my pick to the sycophants masses.