So I just got back from a quick jaunt to the Bay Area for an extended weekend and my family's annual trip to two ballparks. This year, we visited some concrete structure in Oakland and AT&T Park. Read on to find out what I, ahem, liberated during my tour of AT&T Park.

Warning, this is crazy long. And no pictures, yet. And this is just the first part, since, you know, I'd like to get to bed soon.

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Ooh, look at me and my clever headlines!



Seriously though, lets get an OT going. I know that we suck and all (and that I really have no reason to bitch since I've been MIA all season, but you gotta get it started somehwere).

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Well I felt obligated to post this, so I did. I saw this little gem in the UT online today and thought it was worth posting here.

A couple things about this article really surprised me, but none more than the fact that I never knew the team stopped paying him outright after the locker incident. I always thought that they filed a grievance after the fact, but it turns out the player's union filed a grievance first so that Khalil would get his money. The team then countered with a grievance to recoup salary.

For whatever reason, the FO just really soured on the guy and I'm glad he's in a new place where I think he'll be given greater degrees of patience than he was here. I also like that LaRussa seems to understand that despite his quiet demeanor, Khalil really cares about the game.

As an FYI, I won't be posting here as often because my job has instituted a new zero-tolerance policy on using the Internet at work. This cuts me to the bone as Gaslamp Ball was often the only thing keeping me sane while I was trapped in front of my computer for 8 hours a day.

I'll do my best to participate in the OTs during the season. There is legitimately nothing better than watching the Padres and cracking jokes about PFOB or seeing what crazy cocaine patterns TTG regales us with next.

I don't write this lightly. For a long time, I have been a vehement defender of the FO. I have been especially committed to Sandy Alderson's approach of trying to build a winning team by assembling under-rated parts with under-appreciated abilities. But as events have unfolded since about August 2008, I have now come to question whether or not Alderson is hurting the San Diego Padres.

From strictly a baseball perspective, I think the guy has a track record that speaks for itself. He came on in 2005 and the Padres instantly won the West two straight seasons and narrowly missed a third. He's had demonstrable success in Oakland and the Padres enjoyed three of their four best seasons under his watch.

Unfortunately, Alderson is no longer just making baseball decisions. Somehow he's become the face of the FO, and it's his interactions with both the public and the players that have forced me to question Alderson's net impact on the team. Follow me below the fold for the rest of my reasoning.

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So the UT today has an extremely long article today that is supposedly about our young hitters but is really a primer for the Padres offseason. KT went through most of the lineup and gave his thoughts.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2008/oct/03/padres-1s5padres21488/?padres

Anyone else find some of these nuggests interesting? Obviously I'm interested in the fact that the team's not really sure what to do about Khalil, but the idea of possibly trading Jody Gerut seems completely stupid to me. Thoughts?

I cross-posted this at Ducksnorts this morning, and there's a healthy discussion going on over there. However, I know that our two blog communities think a little differently, and I wanted to get the GLB opinion on this matter.

This is something I’ve been thinking a lot about recently, but how do we make this team better?

Our OF seems to be set. The Headley/Hairston/Gerut/Giles combination seems to be functioning well and all indicators at this juncture point to us keeping Giles next year. Unless someone offers Gerut stupid money, I can’t imagine not keeping that group together for next year.

Our weakest batting positions at this point are SS and C, two spots that are notoriously hard to fill and are notoriously light-hitting. I don’t think anyone would argue that Khalil and Bard aren’t having atrocious seasons, but are these just bad years or are they indicative of their true talent levels (as opposed to their track records as Padres)? But really, outside of these two positions, how do we upgrade the team?

Which brings us to pitching. I really, truly, honestly believe that our bullpen in particular and our pitching staff in general has killed this season for us. I firmly beleive that if our pitching staff were performing more like last year’s iteration that we’d be right in the thick of things.

It’s just interesting how little attention our pitching seems to get from “the experts.” Everyone points to Khalil and our catchers as our problems, but in reality, our pitching has killed us more than anything else.

What do you guys think? How do we fix this team?