All Time Giants

All Time Giants

                  We wrap up the NL West with another powerhouse team in the Giants. The Giants were originally from NY before heading to SF in 1958. The Giants have won the most games of any team in the history of professional baseball, and have won eight division titles, 23 NL Pennants, and played in 20 World Series, winning 8 of them, including 3 in 5 years recently. The Giants have 55 players and 11 managers in the Hall of Fame, and one of the most controversial players not in the Hall of Fame in Bonds. This team might be better than the Dodgers overall, and their lineup is probably the best one we’ve seen yet!

Original NY Giants Logo

Original SF Giants Logo

This Giants lineup packs a ton of punch. They have the best card created in Bonds, second best catcher card in Posey, 4^th best and highest points second basemen in Kent, and the 11^th best CF card in Mays. Scutaro is definitely the weakest link in this linup, but he still provides 9 OB and +3 defense, and every other card can do work.

There's no 2001 formatted card but here's his chart

This lineup is going to cause nightmares for opposing pitchers, there are only two 9 OBs, and all of the 10 OBs have multiple home runs and extra base hits. Led off by the Kent/Burks combo, you get plenty of extra base opportunities with decent speed to set the plate. Anchored by Bonds’ ridiculous card, and supported by Mays and McCovey behind him, this lineup will hurt you over and over again. Aside from Scutaro, the next worst player is Huff’s card that provides an very solid 10 OB, 19 HR and a bunch of extra base opportunities. This will most likely be the best outfield we will see, and there’s a damn good reason why. The Rockies had some competition with the Dodgers but have had their doors blown off by the Giants. Unlike the Dodgers though, this rotation is not one that can carry the team, and luckily it doesn’t have to. They are led by a great Juan Marichal card that gives you 5 Control, 8 IP, 17 to get on base and no doubles and Linceum’s Cy Young Season which led to a very similar card just with 7 IP and a walk and three singles instead of the even split.

Similar to McCovey, here's his chart. 

After the one two punch there’s a small fall off with Vogelsong which many might see as a surprise here, however he sneaks ahead of Cain and Bumgarner. Personally I’d put Vogelsong below them in trust levels, however the numbers prefer Vogelsong. There’s not a ton of drop off from top to bottom here as Cain and Bumgarner both trop out 7 IPs and no doubles, all singles charts that will get the job done day in and day out. Four out of the five cards here all are from the the Giant’s period of domination when they reeled off 3 of 5 World Series wins. Their bullpen is similarly extremely solid, led off by the 2001 Robb Nen who evaded me as one of my final pieces in my 2001 collection. While not on the upper echelon of closers he comes in right behind and should give you confidence going out against anyone. The rest of the bullpen is all solid, which given this lineup is all you really need. No one jumps out as being particularly scary, although I’d try and keep Casilla out unless he’s on mop up duty.

Also doesn't have an OG card and there's not many options of him actually pitching so here's him stunting in some glasses. 

All in all this team will be one of the best ones out there due to their unbelievable lineup and all around solid pitching. With three additional bench spots our top hitting options are Beltran 2011, Melky 2012, Orlando Cepeda 1961 and Tom Haller 1962. For pitching we have Bob Shaw Classic and Livian Hernandez 2001, and relievers we have Bolin’s Classic, Smith 2018 and Afeldt 2012. I think the top three hitters slot in here due to Beltran having a great card and the other two providing extra defense in the two +0 positions, while not giving up offense to do so. 

Cepeda also bring a +1 defense at 1B with this chart. 

This powerhouse lineup comes in at a whopping 4,860 points, the rotation an even 2,900, the bullpen 1,450 and the bench at 1,230 for an enormous total of 10,440. Big time players cost big time points. 

Hitters

Starters

Relievers

For the Giants Bonds has the top slots in 01/02/04, Mays the next three in 63/64/65, Bonds again in ’96 and then Roger Hornsby in ’27. McCovey’s ’69 season makes an appearance too, but the top 20 of 25 are Mays and Bonds. Mel Ot’s 1938 season, Kevin Mitchell’s ’89 and Will Clark’s ’89 also Make appearances. Hornsby’s ’27 was to the tune of .361/.448/.586 with 26 HRs, 133 Runs, 125 RBIs, which might bump Kent out, and Mel Ott in ’38 would bump Sandoval. Ott hit 36 HRs, had 116 Runs and RBIs, and slashed .311/.442/.583. Will Clark would be the final piece to truly maxing out this lineup with his ’89 season in which he slashed .333/.407/.547 with 104 runs, 111 RBIs, 23 HRs, 38 doubles and picking up 196 hits. For pitchers the top two are from the 19^th century, and we get Christy Mathewson among other early 20^th century teams. Aside from the old timers, Marichal has three of the top 4 modern era pitching performances, and Lincecum’s ’08 is the other. In 2008 he had an 18-5 record with 265 Ks, a 2.62 ERA over 227 innings, which was enough to give him the Cy Young award. Gaylord Perry’s 1970 season is right behind in which he started a ridiculous 41 games for 328.2 innings. He finished with a 23-13 record, 3.20 ERA and 214 Ks. In the bullpen Rob Beck’s ‘92/’93 seasons both would make for good cards, as well as Tim Worrell in 2003, and Greg Minton in 1982. Overall the Giants have enough cards that these players, while obviously better, wouldn’t make as big an impact as for most other squads. Overall this is going to be a tough team to top.