Sabean has managed affairs quite well
by WILLIAM GUM, DugoutCentral
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Two and a half centuries later, Giants GM Brian Sabean is a popular whipping post of critics who sound just a little bit like Lee's generals. It's hard to disagree with those critical analysts as prized acquisition Barry Zito finds himself banished to the bullpen to sort out his failures and the Giants languish in or near the cellar, almost five years removed from their most recent division championship.
Trades like Joe Nathan, Francisco Liriano and Boof Bonser for A.J. Pierzynski leave moments for pause. And Sabean's never-ending revolving door of aging veterans (Michael Tucker, Moises Alou, Omar Vizquel, Steve Finley and Reggie Sanders among others) make you wonder if owner Peter Magowan's main money-making venture is the manufacture of Metamucil, and the primary purpose of the baseball Giants is to produce new and familiar poster children for the product.
Sabean is not a fan and sportswriter favorite. He certainly wasn't afraid of moving fan favorites like Kirk Rueter, Matt Williams and Russ Ortiz. Even manager Felipe Alou lamented over the large number of aging stars designated for assignment. For years, the rumor around the league was that instead of Gatorade and candy bars, the vending machines in the back room were stocked with Geritol, Tums and Polygrip.
There is no truth to the rumor that the Giants were paying more in Depenz adult diapers than they were in laundering player jerseys. No, it certainly seems like Robert E. Lee's generals in the baseball business were on the mark in making claims that he was doing nothing more than throwing old, tired soldiers against the ramparts of strong, successful franchises.
However, if we look a little closer we may find a little of Bobby Lee's observation that Sabean, like Grant, has handled his affairs quite well. Among current general managers, only the Padres' Kevin Towers has enjoyed a longer tenure with the same club. He's held his position longer than any other GM in Giants' history. Sabean brought the Giants a wild-card tie-breaker, a wild card, three NL West division championships and a National League Pennant. Most importantly, he turned around a chronic loser (six losing records in seven years).
Any leader tasked with the challenge of turning around a losing operation can describe the difficulty of the task. Morale is low, talent is fleeing the organization and it seems almost impossible to stem the flow of red ink. The survivors act petty, they backbite and blame everybody else for their failings. They proclaim that the new owners don't know anything and don't know what they're talking about. Clients are apprehensive about doing business with the firm while competitors entice the most profitable ones away. The goal of instilling a culture of success and high performance seems daunting.
Sabean turned the Giants around quickly, and gave the team a good decade of winning results. He obviously had a good strategy, built primarily around Barry Bonds and trading away his younger talent for proven veterans to fill out the lineup.
Times change and markets change. Strategies must be reassessed and strategic changes in direction become necessary to maintain a winning profile. The "Gints" have been in a funk for the past few years.
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The older guys started breaking down.
There was nobody left on the farm to fill in the gaps.
And what about Bonds? Sabean had the most prolific hitter in baseball approaching the all-time home run record. What could Sabean have done? Bail? Trade him away to rebuild? Turn him into a major-league babysitter and surround him with 19- and 20-year-olds that aren't quite ready for prime time? No, you do what Sabean did. You surround your marquee player with the best and most affordable talent you can find — even if there's not enough there to keep you on top. Here's why:
"THE BUSINESS OF AMERICA IS BUSINESS." That was Calvin Coolidge's assertion almost a century ago, and over the decades America's business scions have perfected that saying to an art form:
Show me the money.
Money talks and B.S. walks.
He who has the dough controls the flow.
Those are all slogans that have earned their place in the American Businessman's Hall of Fame. The goal of a business is to make money, and Sabean did such a good job. He was able to make money while losing on the field. He had the best draw in the game — Barry Bonds. Barry paid the freight at the gate. It would be folly to throw the mightiest home run hitter in the game out into flotsam and jetsam awash in the shallows of McCovey's cove.
There were a lot of challenges Sabean overcame to keep that modern-day meal ticket from self-destructing and spoiling the profits. Barry was quite a slugger, but he's never going to win any Dale Carnegie awards. He carried an attitude with him that turned off no small number of fans outside the Bay Area. Then came the steroid scandal. Sabean rode that horse as long as it could gallop, and the price he paid was a few losing seasons. I would think they were "money-making losing seasons."
It will be interesting to see if Giants owner Peter Magowan gives the unpopular Sabean a chance to rebuild again. Most GMs wouldn't get such a chance, and Sabean's rebuilding effort is sputtering early.
Zito was a good choice to build around, but he hasn't panned out yet. Aaron Rowand is a good centerfielder, but he's not the big-name draw that a large-market club needs to show strength. Alex Rodriguez would have been a good acquisition for the Giants, and perhaps Scott Boras was going to play the Yankees against the Giants to maximize A-Rod's salary before A-Rod panicked.
If I look at Sabean from a baseball fan's standpoint, I might have a lower opinion of him. If I look at Sabean from a Giants fan's viewpoint, I might consider him a GM on the downslide, whose magic has fizzled and should be replaced. But if I review Sabean's performance from a professional businessman's point of view (and if he's made Magowan as much money as I imagine he has), then I must concur with Robert E. Lee: "He has managed his affairs quite well."
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