Why I'm okay with the Omar deal:
The Giants have four gaping lineup holes - shortstop, first, third, and one of the corner outfielder spots. In a perfect world, the team would fill those holes with players who can get on base and hit for power. They only have two or three pitchers to trade for such players, and the free agent market is a nightmare.
They probably won't be able to fill all of the gaping holes, so they should use the resources at their disposal to fill whatever holes they can fill with players who provide both power and on-base skills. It was always a long shot to get one of those players at shortstop. If the Giants had to fill one of those four positions with an all-glove/no-hit player, shortstop was the correct position to concede.
And Omar's cool. We all love Omar. Maybe he'll manage the Giants one day. If I had a choice between Neifi Perez at $500K or Omar at $5.5M, I'd shoot Perez twice. Wait, that's the punch line to a different joke. You get the idea, though. Omar is more watchable than Tomas De La Rosa or Luis Figueroa. It ain't my money, so I choose Omar.
And I'll use the line again because it's the best way to make my point: Kevin Frandsen is a shortstop like Pedro Feliz is a catcher. Emergencies only, people.
And, heck, maybe Omar still has a .270/.340/.370 season left in him.
Why I'm upset with the Omar deal:
This is the first priority? Re-signing a terrible hitter on a team that can't contend because of a terrible offense? Maybe Sabean did his due diligence around the league, and determined that there just weren't any other shortstops that made sense. I doubt it. Omar is Sabean's blue blankie, and Omar's name recognition and public relations value makes it a popular decision for marketing too. This was probably the Post-It note stuck to Sabean's fridge since May.
When the offseason began, the Giants needed to hit .750 in order to have a chance at an average lineup. Now they need to hit 1.000. And the guy in charge of the roster has been in an 0-for-34 slump for a couple of years. The Rajai Davis trade was catcher's interference, so it doesn't count.
Why I'm terrified about the Omar deal:
Because of this kind of hypothetical situation:
I can live with Omar, but this has to mean that Feliz is not coming back. I'm still silly enough to believe the Giants can cobble together an average 2008 offense that won't hurt their efforts to build a good future offense. The Giants need to trade one of their non-Lincecains for a third baseman if there is any chance for that to happen.