BY ANDREW BAGGARLY ON NOVEMBER 1ST, 2011

UPDATE: Placido Polanco beat out Pablo Sandoval for the NL Gold Glove award at third base. Carlos Beltran lost to Andre Ethier in right field.

What were you doing exactly one year ago today?

Odds are, you were watching Brian Wilson throw a third strike past Nelson Cruz to win Game 5 in Texas. Yes, in case you’d forgotten, it was exactly one year ago today that the Giants hoisted the first World Series trophy in 53 years of major league baseball in San Francisco.

Maybe you screamed yourself hoarse. Maybe you took to the streets. Maybe you imbibed or partook in your substance of choice. Or maybe you tore your Achilles tendon while jumping for joy. Hey, torture was the theme, right? (If you get hazy on the details, just pick up this.)

Who knows? If the Giants had won just four more games in 2011 and found a way to squeeze into the postseason (much like the St. Louis Cardinals did), we could have seen a repeat performance. Once the Phillies were dispatched, it didn’t seem like any playoff team could match the Giants’ pitching.

The Giants feel strongly about keeping their pitching staff as intact as possible. That much is clear already, even with the hot-stove league barely underway.

Giants GM Brian Sabean said a month ago that his first order of business would be to take care of that staff, and he wasn’t fooling. Not only did he pick up Jeremy Affeldt’s $5 million option, but he made his situational lefty, Javier Lopez, an offer generous enough (two years, $8.5 million) to forgo the free-agent waters.

Lopez told me in September that he was really, really looking forward to free agency. Last offseason, he missed qualifying for it by just five days of service time. Club officials had told me that Lopez probably would find greater riches on the open market. But $4.25 million is pretty generous for someone with a 1.3 WAR. I assumed the Giants would try to find another lefty specialist at the trade deadline next season. Instead, they stepped up to keep Lopez.

(Yes, I do believe the Lopez/Affeldt signings will turn lefty Dan Runzler into an almost certain trade chip.)

Hard to believe the Giants, who scored the fewest runs in the major leagues, would spend $9.25 million on two left-handed relievers rather than use that money to help the offense. But we’ve all seen how tough it is for the Giants to get free-agent hitters to take their money and play at AT&T Park. Sabean told me a few weeks ago that even the “versatile” second-tier free-agent hitters will get a lot of action. I presume that would include a Michael Cuddyer type. The Giants tried to trade for him in July as a second baseman, remember?

So my hunch is that the Giants will be active in courting free agents but might be even more active on the trade front. Who knows? Maybe there will be another Randy Johnson-type free agent out there that could make Jonathan Sanchez more expendable to package in a deal.

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When you win with pitching, it sure is handy to play solid defense. Pablo Sandoval, even as he got a bit plumper during the season, continued to play third base with agility and energy. He’s one of three finalists for a Gold Glove Award, along with Philly’s’ Placido Polanco and the Cardinals’ Daniel Descalso. (Third base was a weak position in the NL this year. Ryan Zimmerman, who could win a dozen of these things before he retires, was hurt for most of the season. So was David Wright.) Anyway, the results will be announced at 7 p.m. Pacific time on ESPN2.

Sandoval is halfway around the world right now, playing for Bruce Bochy on a big league All-Star squad for four exhibition games in Taiwan. Ramon Ramirez is there, and in a bit of a surprise, so is Andres Torres. I spotted Torres in a couple video travelogues on MLB.com. (To see Torres gulp a shot of snake blood, click here.)

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In other news, ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick reports that Carlos Beltran has switched agents from Scott Boras to Dan Lozano, who already had a busy winter representing Albert Pujols and Jimmy Rollins. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale wrote an insightful piece on Lozano, who left the Beverly Hills Sports Council last year.

The Giants knew all along that Beltran would get a full view of the market before making any decisions. The decision to switch agents would seem to signal that intention as well. The Giants still want to re-sign Beltran, but they’re realistic. If he gets a third or fourth year from an AL team that can DH him in his late 30s, he’ll be off the chessboard to return.

By the way, Beltran is also a Gold Glove finalist in right field. In the interests of limiting your critical comments, a helpful reminder: Coaches and managers vote on these awards. Not the BBWAA.