Kickin' tires...Throwin' hubcaps...Body slammin' lugnuts

What is going through Brian Sabean's mind now? I wonder, as he gets ready to lay his head on the pillow tonight, what he might be thinking? I wonder, in the wake of his now very public boil over to 4 reporters in the Giants Las Vegas suite, what the phone conversations with management were like? Better question...I wonder if management even asked him about it?

For those who have yet to see, Brian Sabean basically tossed 4 reporters (http://blogs.mercurynews.com/extrabaggs/2008/12/10/angry-sabean-rails-against-media-questions-sabathias-interest/#more-677) out of his suite mid interview. It might be a first for him. Sabean seemingly imploded on questions surrounding CC Sabathia and the search for a big hitter, more specifically Mark Teixeria. Sabean then went on to blame the media and internet rumors for causing the perception he didn't create. Maybe...

For Brian Sabean's part, I actually agree with him (I can't believe I just said that), kind of. Then again, I think he needs a wake up call too! He is right, the media did HELP to create this perception. But so did he. He probably never had any intentions of signing Sabathia, nor Teixeria, but he certainly didn't give much reason for people to think otherwise. Back in the late part of theseason, in an interview with the Razor & Mr. T on KNBR 680, he said under hypothetical scenario's, that yes indeed the Giants would be willing to sign another pitcher to a $100+ million contract. The media did run with every little snippit of info they could, alot of it false, but is it really their fault, our fault? Ours? How could it be ours?

What Brian Sabean doesn't seem toget, who he seems to want to blame, is not just the so called media, it's all of us. Every one of us, writing a blog, reading what others write and then commenting back, listen to every interview. We are all to blame then. I think, in todays age of technology, we are esentially all the media. If you think about it, never before have we had so much at our fingertips. At any moment, we can turn on youtube, listen online to a radio interview (live or podcast), read a newspaper article or an authors own blog on what his article may be, or browse through websites built completely about trade rumors. We can comment ourselves. We all have our opinions and that's why we do it. Every one of us can choose to start a blog, answer someone elses opinion, try to sway public perception to what we think needs to be done. At the same time, we can have direct communication with those credentialed reporters. How does it differ between myself litening to a radio interview given by Brian Sabean, then blogging about the details and linking the site to my blog and reading a Baggerly report on his rant which included exerpts from the same interview associated with the rant interview. Other than Andrew Baggerly being a credentialed and respected journalist, nothing really. Both were reported in the same fasion, a blog. My point is this: esentially, we are all the media.

In the Internet rumor era, (because face it, we are there) we as fans, have crossed over from the audience to the media. We are both. We request and require all the knowledge we can and we also provide it. We share it amonst ourselves and with our beloved journalists. Most of us will never attend a press confernce, talk to a baseball executive on their private cell phone, or sit in the press box at a game. It doesn't mean we don't have the ability to share, learn, and report. We are doing it. This is what Brian Sabean is not getting. This is what he needs to understand. We are not going away. We want more. We will get more. As long as we are the audience, the journalists, editors, and most importantly the advertisors will see us for what we are: Profit and Success. And that will assist us to continue to crossover into the world of reporting.

As long as Brian Sabean is pointing fingers at us, he is missing the big picture. If Sabean cannot figure out a way to use us to his advantage, he is doomed in todays changed world and we WILL eat him alive. This is our Giants team, not his. We buy all the tickets, hotdogs, and Jersey's, we pay all the salary's. He needs to figure it out or get out.