Sabean: Giants Will Not Be Sellers In ’08

Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle has some telling quotes from Giants GM Brian Sabean. Despite a 17-24 record and being 8.5 games behind the D-Backs in 3rd place of the NL West, Sabean says the Giants are not going to give up on the ’08 season and will not be trading off their veteran players.

"As long as we’ve got a chance to stay in and around third place, why not?" Sabean said as he stood along the dugout rail and watched his players take batting practice. "Why wouldn’t you want to think that way? These guys think that way"

"You’re seven games under .500. That’s where you don’t want to be, but I really feel good about the energy around the club and I feel good about some of our choices. We’ve now got a solution at first base. We’ve got a solution at third. We’ve gotten Omar (Vizquel) back. Freddie Lewis has come into his own and (Emmanuel) Burriss has been a real factor lately.

"I don’t think we’re going to lose as many games as we did last year. If anything, we’re going to be a second-half team."

These comments seem odd considering that the Giants have several players that would appear to be good candidates to be traded, including Ray Durham (free agent at end of year), Dave Roberts (on DL, $6.5MM in ’09), Omar Vizquel ($5.2MM team option in ’09), Rich Aurilia (free agent at end of year) and Bengie Molina ($6MM in ’09). Of course, even if Sabean did want to move those players, he might have a hard time without eating a good portion of the contracts remaining.

Cork Gaines writes for Rays Index and can be reached here.