Zito going to the Bullpen!

[boomboom]

                  Rec.     ERA 
2002              23-5     2.75  
2003-08 Avg.     11-11     4.07

SAN FRANCISCO -- Barry Zito was demoted to the bullpen Monday by the San Francisco Giants, who hope the former ace can correct his problems by working in relief.



The move was first reported by ESPN The Magazine's Buster Olney.



Zito, who only 16 months ago signed a $126 million, seven-year contract with the Giants to lead their rotation, was informed of the move in a meeting with manager Bruce Bochy.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=3372794

[HoustonGM]

Worst free agent signing. Ever.

[Alloutwar]

Maybe Zito can play another position? The Giants could use a...well, I guess any other position, really.

Maybe they can trade him to the Yankees for Pavano?

[gRYFYN1]

Yep at least other signings, like hampton, had injuries to blame for the bad luck, but SF signed a self-described "flaky", soft-tossing lefty who walks way too many batters.

[gRYFYN1]

Maybe they can trade him to the Yankees for Pavano?

As a Red Sox fan, even i have to admit that the Yankees aren't THAT dumb.

[HoustonGM]

Yep at least other signings, like hampton, had injuries to blame for the bad luck, but SF signed a self-described "flaky", soft-tossing lefty who walks way too many batters.

Hampton at least pitched okay for 4 years of the contract, too...

[HoustonGM]

Oh, and hit 15 home runs!

[Alloutwar]

Actually, I think I saw an article in the bay area times about Zito entering in an agreement with BALCO...something about cream and clear...I think the Giants may have a new large-headed slugging outfielder. Of course, his arm isn't too good...

Oh yah, here is that article...

[gRYFYN1]

Hampton at least pitched okay for 4 years of the contract, too...

Didint work well for Colorado where he went 21-28 with an ERA over 5.50 (and i think they are still picking up part of his salary)

[HoustonGM]

Didint work well for Colorado where he went 21-28 with an ERA over 5.50 (and i think they are still picking up part of his salary)

He had one average year and one bad year with Colorado, while providing excellent hitting.

Colorado stopped paying in 2005 (a total of $43 million), and also has to pay his $6 million buyout for his 2009 option.. The Marlins also paid $23.5 million, which sucks for them especially because he never even pitched for them.

[RickD]

Signing him to that long of a deal was dumb...one year with incentives would have made more sense....now they have a high priced relief pitcher who may not work there as well.

[HoustonGM]

Signing him to that long of a deal was dumb...one year with incentives would have made more sense....now they have a high priced relief pitcher who may not work there as well.

There would have been no way Zito would've gone for a 1 year deal, but teams should not have been willing to sign him to such an outrageous deal, and should've waited until he brought his asking price down. Read a report today that the Mariners had offered him 6 years/$90 million which is still really high for a #3 starter, which is what Zito was at the time of the signing, but more reasonable than the deal the Giants gave him.

[Arctic Blast]

Has to be the worst free agent signing of all time in the sport of baseball. Another example of an agent completely and totally manhandling a GM in negotiations. You wanna blame agents for the state of the game? Please! Blame GM's willing to sign ridiculous contracts like this one!

[ohms_law]

The whole thing about Zito is that the Giant's should have known. Heck, the Met's should have known. Look:

Year	Ag	IP	H	H/BFP	R	ER	HR	BB	BB/BFP	SO	SO/BFP	BFP
2000	22	92.7	64	0.170	30	28	6	45	0.120	78	0.207	376
2001	23	214.3	184	0.204	92	83	18	80	0.089	205	0.227	902
2002	24	229.3	182	0.194	79	70	24	78	0.083	182	0.194	939
2003	25	231.7	186	0.194	98	85	19	88	0.092	146	0.153	957
2004	26	213	216	0.233	116	106	28	81	0.087	163	0.176	926
2005	27	228.3	185	0.194	106	98	26	89	0.093	171	0.179	953
2006	28	221	211	0.223	99	94	27	99	0.105	151	0.160	945
2007	29	196.7	182	0.214	105	99	24	83	0.098	131	0.154	850
2008	30	28.7	41	0.291	30	24	4	15	0.106	11	0.078	141

Increasing hits per batter, increasing walks per batter, and decreasing strikeouts per batter... not a good pattern. In my opinion, Barry Zito was overused from 2001-2006, and now him and the Giants are paying the price. Hindsight is 20/20, but the trend was there before he signed with the Giants. The Mets sure must be sighing in relief though.

[HoustonGM]

Yep, all his stats were trending in the wrong direction, and it's a shame that a major league front office couldn't recognize that (or didn't care).