Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
March 01, 2007
Raising Cain

The San Francisco Giants locked up Matt Cain for four and possibly five seasons:

"When you have an opportunity to cement a working relationship with a young man like Matt, you definitely have to investigate it and I think both parties are happy that we were able to work it out," general manager Brian Sabean said in a statement. "Obviously, we all saw his immense talent over the last two years, but we all have to remind ourselves that Matt is only 22 years old and his best years are ahead of him."

Cain led rookies with 13 wins and 179 strikeouts last season, going 13-12 with a 4.15 ERA in 190 2-3 innings, finishing in a tie for fourth in NL Rookie of the Year voting. Cain, who also led the Giants in victories.

The BIS pitcher projections for 2007 put Cain at 13-10 with a 3.52 ERA. He's projected to walk a lot of batters but strike out even more. If he can find some control, I'd expect that ERA to go even lower. With impressive minor league numbers and his youth, this looks like a very good deal for the Giants.

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Posted by David Pinto at 09:34 PM | Transactions | TrackBack (0)
Comments

I'm not up on the intricacies of major league contractual arrangements, but this strikes me as a year or two premature -- in terms of finances and talent management. Moneywise, don't teams have the right to hold onto their young players for a few years after they reach the major leagues? Couldn't they have gotten another year or two out of Cain at rock-bottom prices, and still had plenty of time to lock him up? Talent-wise, so many pitchers who excel at a young age run into injury problems. Some come back, some never do. I'd think they would want to see another year or two of solid performance before committing to a multi-year deal.

I raise questions, but really it's a positive sign for the Giants to be thinking seriously about young talent. They've been over-reliant on aging players for too long.

Posted by: jvwalt at March 1, 2007 09:58 PM

The Giants are just taking a page out of the their neighbor across the bay's playbook. The A's signed the "BIG 3" of Hudson, Mulder, and Zito when they had 5 years to go before free agency and the Giants have now done the same first with Noah Lowry last year, then with Matt Cain this year, and don't be suprised to see them do the same with Tim Lincecum either next year or the year after.

Posted by: giantsrainman at March 1, 2007 10:16 PM

With prices of pitchers rising quickly, the Giants may feel they'll get a better deal now than waiting for arbitration to kick in. They've basically saved themselves that worry where Cain is concerned. I don't think it's a bad thing to lock up players early, it might even help you down the road prevent them from becoming free agents.

Posted by: David Pinto at March 1, 2007 10:24 PM

As a Padres fan, I hate this deal. The Giants locked up a good young talent for well below market value.

Posted by: Geoff Young at March 5, 2007 06:49 PM
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