After the news broke yesterday that the Giants had acquired outfielder Melky Cabrera in exchange for Jonathan Sanchez and Ryan Verdugo some people think that this was a move that can help bring back Carlos Beltran.

Here is Henry Schulman writing in the Chronicle:

I also have think the Cabrera acquisition will persuade Beltran the Giants are willing to upgrade the lineup ahead of him.

Sorry I am not buying that. I don't think Melky Cabrera and his career .331on base percentage is what Beltran had in mind as a lead off guy to set the table for him no matter how the Giants will try to spin this.

In addition where is the money going to come from. Sure flipping Sanchez saved the Giants a million dollars or so but there is still just not enough left in the Giants self imposed budget to realistically go after him considering that they team has some other holes to fill and now also is talking about grabbing a veteran pitcher to compete for the 5th starter spot.

Here is the latest Giants budget numbers and it still isn't pretty.

Player	Salary	Budget Remaining
Lincecum, Tim	$    19.20	$             110.80
Zito, Barry	$    19.00	$               91.80
Cain, Matt	$    15.33	$               76.47
Rowand, Aaron	$    13.60	$               62.87
Huff, Aubrey	$    10.00	$               52.87
Wilson, Brian	$      8.50	$               44.37
Sanchez, Freddy	$      6.00	$               38.37
Affeldt, Jeremy	$      5.00	$               33.37
Cabrera, Melky	$      4.40	$               28.97
Lopez, Javier	$      4.25	$               24.72
Sandoval, Pablo	$      3.20	$               21.52
Jeff Keppinger	$      2.70	$               18.82
Torres, Andres	$      2.50	$               16.32
Ryan Vogelsong	$      2.50	$               13.82
Ramirez, Ramon	$      2.30	$               11.52
Casilla, Santiago	$      1.90	$                 9.62
Fontenot, Mike	$      1.30	$                 8.32
Romo, Sergio	$      1.30	$                 7.02
Schierholtz, Nate	$      1.20	$                 5.82
Whiteside, Eli	$      0.70	$                 5.12
Burriss, Emmanuel	$      0.60	$                 4.52
Posey, Buster	$      0.50	$                 4.02
Bumgarner, Madison	$      0.45	$                 3.57
Runzler, Dan	$      0.45	$                 3.12
Belt, Brandon	$      0.45	$                 2.67
Chris Stewart	$      0.45	$                 2.22

It sure looks like this might be the big offensive upgrade for the Giants this off season.

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