The Lunatic Fringe

I like Huff.  I really do.

But Brandon Belt is the future.  Pretty much everyone agrees with that.  There’s just no place to play him.  He doesn’t need more Fresno time.  He’s done all he can there.

There’s three legitimate first base options (Huff, Belt and Brett Pill), and that’s before you mention that Buster Posey might be used at first on days they want to rest his ankle and not take him out of the lineup.  Pill makes a nice platoon option for either of the lefties…but three first basemen aren’t a great way to build a lineup.

What about the outfield?  Well, that hurts the team as well.  Right now, none of the outfielders are playing like they don’t deserve a job.  Nate Schierholtz has the toughest numbers from a corner spot (.292/.320/.333), but they aren’t too terrible for spring and his defense out there is a plus.

And this is all about the future.  You’ve got three huge pitchers coming into free agency in the next 19 months.  How do you convince a pitcher to stick around in San Francisco?  I’ve got a two-step process:

• Give them a Gold Glove caliber defense in the outfield, of which the Belt/Huff choices don’t qualify, but a Cabrera-Pagan-Schierholtz outfield would, and a Peguero-Brown-Schierholtz outfield down the line also would.

• Give them a core of young hitters that they know the team can be built around to help the offense.  Like Belt.

The Giants aren’t in a team-building zone right now.  They are in a dynasty-building zone.  They need to go for it this year, but they also need to go for the next half-dozen years of pitching contracts.

Belt fills both need.  Get it done

P.S. – Either you’re too young to remember this reference, or you’re old enough to which means you have memory issues and can’t remember it. Either way, here’s a video version of the classic routine.