Kuzul

Cliff Lee just shocked the baseball world by going back to the Philadelphia Phillies.

The Texas Rangers and New York Yankees were widely thought to have been the front-runners for his services, but they’re now left in the dark after his signing.

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After winning their first World Series since moving to San Francisco, the Giants took their first step in the offseason by giving their first baseman Aubrey Huff a two-year, $22 million extension. The deal also includes a $10 million club option for 2013. This is a great deal for the 33-year-old first baseman. 

After his 32 home run season with the Baltimore Orioles in 2008, Huff struggled a bit due to some injuries. Despite his struggles, Huff was picked up by the Giants and had bounce-back year.

The big first baseman hit .290 with 26 home runs and 86 runs batted in. Huff definitely earned this deal after the season he had, and also his World Series performance. Huff had five hits in five games including a big two-run home run in Game 4.

This is a big move for the World Series champions because they need some power in the lineup and that is exactly what Aubrey Huff brings. The chemistry on the Giants roster is great and it is important for them to keep these guys together, and signing Huff was the start of it.

Giants’ manager Bruce Bochy will definitely be happy to have Huff for two more years because he gives the Giants a better chance at repeating.

With the pitching staff on the Giants, anything is possible for them. Starters Tim Lincecum and Matt Cain were outstanding in the playoffs and all they needed was a little help from the offense, and Aubrey Huff was apart of that help.

This is a great deal for Huff and the Giants as they look forward to next season so they can defend their title.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

At the beginning of the 2010 season, there were very few people in this world who could have predicted that the Giants would beat the Rangers in the World Series.

But it happened.

Now we have the opportunity to look back with the most glorious of hindsight and laugh at all the predictions we made.

There’s no more what-ifs to think about, and no regrets on any decisions, because every trigger Brian Sabean pulled, every double-switch Bruce Bochy made, and every sign that Buster Posey threw down brought us to where we are right now. 

World Series Champions.

Anyways, it’s time to look back on all the ridiculous ideas I had rattling around my head on March 1, 2010.

And there were some crazy ones.

Again, for those not familiar with the term, SWOT stands for Strengths,Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

Let’s take a gander.

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The 2010 MLB season was quite the ride.

We had six no-hitters (well, seven technically), which ties the record set in 1969 and 1990.

There were plenty of midseason transactions that would alter the course of the rest of the season. A few small-market teams proved that sporting a payroll under $100 million doesn’t mean your team is automatically out of it.

We had brawls and 20-inning games. We saw a team come back from 10 runs to win a game.

We followed three players that had a chance for the Triple Crown all the way up to the end of August. We watched a few bench-clearing brawls.

We said goodbye to a legendary player and manager.

We watched a team go through bankruptcy, only to find themselves in the World Series a few months later. And we watched a tortured franchise finally be able to call themselves the champs.

Here are the top moments of the season that was in baseball.

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The San Francisco Giants have been the 2010 World Series Champions for about a week now, which means Tim Lincecum and his buddies are probably just now fully appreciating what they’ve done for the city.

However, as the champagne from San Francisco’s first baseball title goes flat and the last scraps of confetti get washed away by November rains, greedy Bay Area eyes are already turning toward 2011 and beyond.

The rosier lenses in the region see a lot more winning down the road.

With the young rotation bristling with talent and forged by postseason experience, Buster Posey behind the dish, and a budget that can/should expand efficiently, there is plenty about which to be excited if you follow baseball on the shores of the San Francisco Bay.

Yet any discussion about los Gigantes that involves a look to the future inevitably comes back to Lincecum, his slight build, and his importance to the team. The (sound) logic is that the horizon gets considerably grayer if the Franchise isn’t taking the pearl every fifth day and his skeptics are perpetually predicting the first muscle strain or bulging disc that will announce the beginning of the end.

For Timmy and for the Giants.

But those skeptics haven’t been paying attention.

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Pablo Sandoval is on the verge of eating his way out of baseball, and the San Francisco Giants and their Panda marketing blitz are as much to blame as Sandoval’s apparent inability to push back from the dinner table.    

Regardless of whoever first came up with the “Kung Fu Panda” nickname, there is no doubt that the San Francisco Giants and their marketing machine seized upon it almost immediately to pump money into the team.  The Giants worked feverishly on converting an image of a happy-go-portly Sandoval into massive dollars in the form of ticket sales and fuzzy panda hats (available in two colors) at the ballpark. 

There were MLB-licensed panda shirts and signs, and a gigantic advertisement poster of Sandoval with the tag line “There’s Panda Inside” slapped on the side of AT&T Park.  When he hit a homer, they cued not only the requisite hype-music, but also a giant “Panda-monium” which flashed in multi-colors on the scoreboard.  

They were essentially making fun of the fat guy in the room who didn’t mind being made fun of.  

It would be easy to jump all over Sandoval as exclusively responsible for his predicament, because most of us make tough diet decisions all the time, and without a spot in a Major League lineup hanging in the balance.  We give up the extra piece of cake, begrudgingly go salad versus fries, drink almost undrinkable diet soda and avoid the dessert bacchanal at the Mandalay Bay’s buffet extravaganza.  

Most of us make these so-called healthy choices for our own well-being and vanity.  Moreover, we often cast judgment on those who don’t make these same healthy decisions as we do, because deep down, we’d probably all love to be saddling up to the all-you-can-eat chicken wing pile versus going the rabbit food route.  Misery loves company.  

We remove the imagery of the overweight and unhealthy from the chronicles of our popular culture, and then add “Guess the Celebrity Fatty” pictures to the covers of our supermarket checkout rags.  We put ridiculously skinny and attractive news reporters in fat suits, and then watch as hidden cameras expose the cold public scorn and blatant discrimination our reporter-come-actress faces as she tries to get a job or an apartment.  

We eat our carrot sticks, we hit the gym, we judge and we shake our heads…and we’re doing it right now to Pablo Sandoval.  More important to the professional livelihood and future of Sandoval, so are the Giants.  Problem is, they started it.  

As widely reported, San Francisco Giants GM Brian Sabean has thrown down an ultimatum to Sandoval—commit to a smaller waistline this offseason or have fun in the minor leagues.  Team dinners at Morton’s steakhouse next summer in Chicago while in town to play the Cubs…or ones at a Bennigan’s in Fresno with the Grizzlies AAA club.  

Your choice, buddy…but not that simple.  

Turns out, Sandoval might not be as good as the Giants initially thought or perhaps not mentally strong enough to withstand the amount of pressure the Giants and their “Panda” marketing blitz threw on his back.  Arguably, it would be a lot of pressure for anyone to withstand, much less a young player with one good year under his belt.     

It is hard to imagine now, in the wake of a World Series championship and Brian Wilson and “The Machine” appearing on Jay Leno, but “The Panda” and Tim Lincecum were about all the Giants had to market a year ago.    

Now, the very obese theme of this extensive, MLB endorsed, check-out-our-jolly-panda-bodied-player campaign is being flogged by the Giants as evidence of Sandoval’s apathy.  No longer used to endear and market to the fan base, Sandoval’s roomy frame is now being criticized and used to threaten his career.  

Apparently, the panda t-shirts and hats aren’t selling like they did when he hit .330.  

In the end, if Pablo Sandoval doesn’t shape up this offseason and squanders his once-in-10-lifetimes opportunity in the Majors, it will be mostly on his shoulders. 

That said, simply ignoring the role the Giants have played in this situation is just being intellectually ignorant.  It casts the blame all upon Sandoval, while ignoring the fact that his overweight body might be the physical response to a man not being able to live up to lofty expectations.  It omits the San Francisco Giants’ involvement in the creation of the entire “Panda” phenomenon, the money they made off this image, and the subsequent pressures on Pablo Sandoval to live up to this impossible marketing cartoon.  

The Giants may indeed be shaking their head in disgust come next year at an out-of-shape Pablo Sandoval, but will bear a large responsibility if that outcome comes to pass.   

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

The MLB season is over and the offseason has officially begun. Some teams will look to improve, while others simply hope to keep the talent they have.

Many player will be on the move this offseason, perhaps a Hall of Fame shortstop, a notable pitching ace, or maybe one of the league’s best sluggers.

Regardless, always remember that these are bold predictions, and in honor of the title that they shall be.

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2011’s biggest free agent catch will probably be Tim Lincecum.

Then again. it might not be. More on that inside.

San Francisco signed “The Freak” to a two-year, $23 million contract prior to the 2010 season.

That’s great and all; it kept him from becoming a free agent after this year, which probably prevented the Giants from shopping him at the trade deadline, which would have crushed their World Series chance.

Yet, that also means he’ll be a free agent after next year. Trouble could be on the horizon for the newly crowned world champs.

As far as the rest of MLB, is Lincecum the best player available after next season? Here are five reason saying yes, five saying no, and an overall analysis.

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The Bay Area has been rejuvenated with the San Francisco Giants winning the World Series against the Texas Rangers.

In light of that great playoff run, it’s time to take a look at some of the most popular names in Bay Area history.

Where does Tim Lincecum rank?  Let’s find out.

Here are the most popular San Francisco and Bay Area sports stars ever.

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As a die-hard Dodgers fan, it is hard to say the words “The Giants are World Series champs.”

Yet, not only were they champs, they made the rest of the MLB, and especially the Dodgers, into chumps.

They showed what a real team is all about.  It is not about how much money you have to spend, and not about free-agent mercenaries like Manny and the like, and not about individual performance or dictatorial managers and selfish rich-guy management.

It is soley and purely about teamwork.  It is about what we are supposed to teach our kids every day when they head out to play teeball and Little League.

As we hopefully leave the steroid era behind, we can perhaps gain a glimmer of hope from San Francisco’s new champs.  First, you gotta hand it to their general manager. We Dodger fans can only squrim at the idea of an ownership who will go out and get the players necessary to fill voids in the lineup and on the field.

You have to marvel at and applaud the Giants ability to scout and then sign such players as Buster Posey and Tim Lincecum (who the Dodgers passed on, by the way).  These guys came out of their system, an almost passé way to view team-building.  The Giants proved that this old-school way of building a team is a great way to build a foundation.

A lot of teams pooh-poohed Lincecum, the slight pitcher with the huge stride who is on his way to the Hall of Fame.  As for Posey, well, he truly is “The Natural,” and bravo to the Giants for finding him and signing him…then bringing him up this year.  Without Buster, the Giants would be…a bust!

You cannot say enough about the entire Giants pitching staff, from outstanding starters to strike-throwing middlemen to tough and obviously eccentric closers…the best staff in the bigs. 

You gotta love the makeshift yet somehow glued-together nature of the Giants team. It may start from the top with Bruce Bochy, who made swift moves (benching Sandoval for instance) to shore up his infield, or maneuvering and empowering his fantastic pitching staff.

He knew that he didn’t need a lot of runs per game with a staff whose ERA was record-breakingly low, but somehow he got the key hits and the runs to edge the Padres, beat the dynastic Phillies, and then crush the wannabe Rangers with the impressive line-up.

Huff, Uribe, Renteria, Rowan, Burrell, Ross, Sanchez…are you kidding me?  Then again, why not? Each has a pedigree of his own.  Each has shown in the past that he can hit. Sanchez has won batting titles.  Renteria has been with World Series Champs before.  Huff has always been a solid hitter, and so has Burrell and Rowan and Ross.  Put them together and you have Giant Goulash…a stew that comes together in a delectably winning fashion. 

These “misfits” roughed up Halladay AND Lee…take that!

Some have said it is the worst lineup to ever win a World Series.  Better to say it is the best “team” to have won it in a very long time.  They gelled like no other team has done in quite a while, and they were a juggernaut that few saw coming.

Now, when you think of the word Champion, you can think of this year’s Giants team.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com