Giants sweep Dodgers, prove they are unquestionably the better team

Nothing cures a depressing season quite like a sweep of an archrival. The Giants did just that last week, rudely kicking the Dodgers out of town without a single win. Coming into the series, the Dodgers were 7-0 and the Giants were 1-9. Didn’t matter. The Giants played like a team as desperate for wins as they were. San Francisco twice won on walking-offs, reversing their early season trend of flailing in the clutch.

A few notes from the series.

• Justin Maxwell could well end up being the prize of the offseason. The 31-year-old journeyman went 4-for-11 with a triple, a homerun, and a walk-off single. Can he keep it up? Who cares! He has already produced more than one would expect from a nonroster invitee to Spring Training. (He has had two more home runs in Colorado and is currently in a tied for most on the team.)
• Tim Lincecum had his second superb start of the season, lowering his overall ERA to 2.00 flat. His velocity is still way down, but if he can keep this up, I’m not complaining.
• At 1-1 with a 4.07 ERA and 1.315 WHIP, Clayton Kershaw has looked very human. Not dreadful. But certainly human.
• Alex Guerrero could be primed to haunt my nightmares for the upcoming seasons. The Cuban defector (are they still considered defectors?) had four hits and two homeruns in the series despite only making one start.
• Don Mattingly is a bad manager. This is not news. He has seemingly been on the hot seat for the entirety of his career. But for reasons unknown, the Dodger’s owners refuse to cut him loose. Yes, the Dodgers have won back-to-back division titles, but with that roster and that much money they cannot be happy having yet to even make the World Series, let alone win it. (The Giants did that last year, in case you forgot.) I believe that Mattingly is standing in the Dodgers way of taking the final step. And I am a-ok with that.
• Example of Mattingly’s ineptitude: he intentionally walked Brandon Belt in the 9^th inning despite Belt having two strikes on him. Angel Pagan had just stolen second base so first base was open. But Mattingly should have at least tried to get Belt to chase out of the strike zone, instead of giving up on a batter that was already two-thirds of the way to a strike out. Again, I’m not complaining.

Good wins Giants! That’s the most fun I’ve had blogging about this team yet.

Giants show tremendous fight, still lose.

Every night the Giants find new, hideous, ways to lose baseball games. Although it is difficult to imagine they will come up with a more unsettling way than last night. Because last night’s game had so seemed like the picturesque way to bust a team wide slump.

In uncharacteristic fashion, the Giants came to life late. Twice they tied the game in their would-be final at bats. The offense, which had been next to nonexistent recently, came to life to score five runs between the 7^th and 12^th innings. They even got a few hits with runners in scoring position!

And yet the result was the same. Another loss. Making that seven in a row–good for the worst such stretch in the past five years.

The Giants could not have asked for much better opportunities to walk-off and get their first victory at AT&T this year. Twice they had the winning run on third with the bases loaded. And twice they were unable to get him home.

They literally could have “walked” off with a little more patience. The graphic below (provided by fellow blogger Grant Brisbee) shows a ninth inning, bases loaded, at-bat by Nori Aoki. In the at-bat, Aoki struck out despite not actually seeing a pitch within the strike zone.

It is hard to criticize Aoki, as he is one of the few Giants who, ninth inning at-bat notwithstanding, is consistently playing to his potential. Worrisomely, One player who is clearly not playing to his potential is Brandon Belt. Not playing to his potential has become a theme of Brandon Belt’s career. He was once considered a top prospect but whether due to injuries or inconsistency, Belt has never put together the spectacular season that his natural talent suggests he is capable.

When Belt is on he has a dazzling glove at First Base and enormous power at the plate. For an example of his otherworldly power, look no further than this game winning homerun from last year’s 18-inning NLDS victory in Washington: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTOFbJg4-k0.

However, when Belt is off, watching him bat is as maddening an exercise as any Giants fan can undertake. He swings at pitches he couldn’t possibly make solid contact with, his specialty is missing low-and-in sliders. Last night, Belt was at his worst, going 0-for-6 with three strikeouts. The evening brought his batting average down to .087. He has yet to get an extra-base hit. At this rate he is going to play himself out of the lineup.

Now if the pitching, specifically the bullpen, had been able to contain Arizona the offense would never have had to play catch-up in the first place. But when the Giants are struggling this bad, it is hard to address every failing element of the team in one blogpost.

(Sidenote: I don’t care that this is the age of Bryce Harper, Yasiel Puig, and Giancarlo Stanton; the batter who strikes the most fear in me if I am a National League pitcher is Arizona’s Paul Goldschmidt. As evidenced by his fifth inning three-run homerun.)

This skid will end. The Giants are not going to finish their season with a .272 winning percentage. But until it does, they could not further resemble the World Champions of a mere six months ago.

Oy Vey.

Oh, what a week it has been.

Not a whole lot is going right for the team by the Bay at the moment. Sure, they got a splendid Opening Day start from rookie Chris Heston (Side note: over the offseason you could have given any Giants fan a thousand guesses as to who would start the home opener, I promise no one would have come up with rookie Christ Heston.) And the Giants have gotten to celebrate last year’s glorious accomplishments in front of their adoring fans.

But besides Heston and the pomp and circumstance about last year, one would be hard pressed to find any recent good news about the Orange and Black. Last week I pronounced the Giants offense was on life-support. Now, it seems the offense is at least five and a half feet underground. The Giants have scored all of one run in the first two home games of their World Series Championship defense.

The most maddening element of the Giants struggles is that the Colorado Rockies pitchers have hardly been overpowering. The Giants have had ample opportunity to score in these past two games against. However, they are squandering these opportunities at a nearly unprecedented rate.

The Giants are now three for their last 40 with RISP (Runners In Scoring Position). Bringing their collective batting average with RISP to an unsightly, .068. It is called batting under the Mendoza line when you hit under .200 but I am not sure there is a name for hitting below .100. That is the level of ineptitude we are dealing with.

However, even those longer-term numbers seem positively delightful compared to the past two days in which the Giants have gone 0-for-14 with RISP.

I would almost rather they just get no-hit.

Needless to say, the inability to score runs has not done wonders for the Giants record. They are now 3-6 on the season; good for last place National League West. Granted, it is only halfway through the second week of the season so standings still do not mean much. For instance, the Washington Nationals are currently in last place in the NL East, and most experts still peg them as World Series favorites.

But one can start to look at this early in the season is trends. And the Giants current trend of being utterly unable to get a hit with RISP is cause for some concern.

Then again, the Giants did win the World Series last year (as they did two years before that, and two years before that). Which is not to excuse their play in the early stages of this season. But, as the title of my blog suggests, one does to check their privilege as a Giants fan and be at least somewhat faithful. The Giants are not going to hit .068 with RISP forever, and when the hits with RISP start comings, the wins will start coming.

Here’s hoping they come quickly.

Ugly. (The game, not that handsome man with the log)

Well, that didn’t go to plan.

The San Francisco Giants were supposed to be the team of Madison Bumgarner and the four questions marks. It was all so clearly spelled out for us in the spring training. Lincecum is washed out. Hudson is ancient. Cain is broken. Peavey is a combination of the previous three.

But Bumgarner! Madison Bumgarner was supposed to be our security blanket. We just assumed The World Series Star/ Mythic folklore hero going to be practically immaculate every time he pitched! We got so used to that last October!

But that was not the case last night. In a match up of the last year’s World Series team’s aces, James Shields clearly pitched a better game as his Padres bested the Giants to the tune of 10-2. Shields cruised through seven innings with a Joaquin Arias homerun the only blemish on his evening.

Contrarily, Bumgarner was atrocious. He only finished three innings and needed 79 pitches to get just nine outs. In that short time, he managed to get himself shelled for five runs on 10 hits.

Now just as a warned in yesterdays blog not to read too much into Lincecum’s excellent outing, we probably shouldn’t read too much into Bum’s poor one. Bumgarner caught some bad luck. A number of the base hits he allowed were groundballs that found holes. Moreover, of the ten hits he allowed, only one went for extra bases, a Matt Kemp double in the first. Plus, good pitchers have bad games. Bumgarner lost ten games last year. He even lost one in the postseason!

But I’m not going to try to sugar coat yesterday’s game as anything but an unholy shitstorm. On top of the underwhelming pitching, the Giants lost Casey McGehee in the first inning to a left knee strain. I’ll be the first to say that McGehee is no great shakes as the key addition in a World Champion defense. But with Hunter Pence and Brandon Belt already out, the Giants found themselves playing the majority of Saturday’s game without their would-be 5-6-7 hitters. They don’t want this to be a trend going forward.

Moreover, in all the general hideousness of yesterday’s game, one could forget that the Giants only scored two runs, bringing their grand total in the series to three. They don’t want this to be a trend going forward either.

If Giants fans can take any solace from yesterday, it’s that the Dodgers had just as much of bummer of a day, if not more so. Their ace, reigning Cy Young and MVP Clayton Kershaw, was rocked for six runs. The Dodgers also lost not one but two third basemen to injuries, with both Justin Turner and Juan Uribe having to leave midgame.

Somehow that just doesn’t do wonders to cheer me up.

At times like this, it is important to remember that in this long season, the Giants are going to have some off nights. Let’s just hope they don’t have too many that are as off as this one.

Lincecum Thrives, Giants Lose, I Remain Unconvinced

            One day after I gloated about the Giants winning a 1-0 game they had no right to win, I got what I deserved. The Giants lost a 1-0 game they, specifically starter Tim Lincecum, had every right to win.

Tim Lincecum turned back the clock Friday night and pitched a gem, going seven strong innings without surrendering a run. However, for the second time in as many days, the Giants offense seemed to forget they have a responsibility to score runs when their starters pitch their hearts out. So far in the San Diego series, the Giants have scored one run in the past 21 innings. That’s not an anemic offense, that’s an offense on life support.

But why dwell on the negative! Tim Lincecum is back! Well, maybe he’s back. Hopefully, he’s back. He might not be back.

I don’t want to take anything away from Timmy or his brilliant performance, which kept the Giants in the game despite such a putrid showing on offense. But I have been tricked into thinking Timmy was back before. And I don’t want to be tricked again.

There are a number of circumstantial explanations for why Timmy was able to silence Padre bats last night, which make me hesitant to declare his renewed Cy Young candidacy. Firstly, he was pitching in Petco Park which, while they have moved the fences, is still an incredibly pitcher friendly park (and the site of Timmy’s first no hitter back in 2013). Secondly, it’s early in the season meaning pitchers have the natural advantage. Hitters are seeing pitchers for the first time and have not yet had time to adjust. For evidence, look no further than the Giants (ONE RUN IN 21 INNINGS!!!) Finally, he was pitching against the Padres who, despite their offseason overhaul, are still the Padres. A team whose history of mediocrity is unmatched, and a team that Tim owns a career 2.41 ERA against.

Moreover, if you are a cynical grouch (like I am when it comes to baseball) you can find things not to love from Timmy’s start. He had five strikeouts: good, not great. More worrisomely, his velocity was way down. His fastball topped out in the 85-88 MPH range, a rather Zito-esque figure. Pitchers can dominate without overpowering fastballs. Greg Maddux made a Hall of Fame career out of it. But it is not the norm. When Timmy was winning Cy Youngs like it was nothing, his fastball could reach 97 MPH. He has been steadily losing speed (and games) as his career has waned in the past few seasons. Now, if Friday night was any example, he could learn to thrive as a Maddux-like control wizard. But  his velocity was down even from what its been in recent years. For every loss of velocity, he has to be that much closer to perfect with his command. And as of yet, I am not convinced he’s there.

But hey, I love Timmy. I loved him when he was The Next Great Pitching Prospect. I loved him when he was in his Cy Young prime. I loved him when he got cited for Marijuanna possession. I loved him when he led the Giants to their first World Series in 56 years. I loved him when he unselfishly took to the bullpen and thrived in the 2012 postseason. I love how graciously and honestly he has handled his regression as a pitcher. I love that I get to call him Timmy!

I want nothing more than to be able believe the old Timmy is back. And if he can duplicate his start from last night a few more times (and if the Giants can remember how to score runs) maybe I’ll start to come around.

Season Preview (for dummies!)

This piece was originally posted in my college’s newspaper, The Scarlet and Black. It was written for commoners, not the sabermetric experts whom I know follow this blog… 

Plus, if you’ve ever wanted to know the baseball opinions of a Religious Studies professor at a liberal arts college, this is the article for you! 

OK without further ado, 

“Opening day should be a national holiday!” Emilio Gomez ’15 said to me before our interview had even started.

And why not? If nothing else, Major League Baseball season opening day marks the end of winter and what better reason could there be for a national celebration. As the weather gets warmer and flowers begin to bloom, the annual spring debut of Major League Baseball is upon us. The season, which starts this Sunday, is sure to bring a huge amount of excitement and equal amounts of disappointment to the many baseball fans here on campus.

In 2014, the San Francisco Giants won the World Series for the third time in five years. However, with the worst record in Spring Training, expectations may need to be tempered in the City by the Bay, bringing hope for fans of every Major League team. Even fans of the Chicago Cubs, a team that has not won the World Series in 107 years, have reason to be hopeful. With a new manager in Joe Maddon, an ace starter in Jon Lester and a slew of top prospects, including last year’s Minor League Player of the Year Kris Bryant, hopes are high on Chicago’s Northside.

Grinnell baseball head coach Tim Hollibaugh, who grew up in Northern Indiana, is an avid Cubs fan and is cautiously optimistic about the upcoming season.

“I think the Cubs will do better than they’ve done in the past but you have to be realistic with your expectations when you have a new manager,” Hollibaugh said.

Hollibaugh predicts the Los Angeles Angels, led by Mike Trout and the Washington Nationals, led by Stephen Strasburg, to be the top teams in their respective leagues. Experts on websites such as ESPN and Bleacher Report are also including the St. Louis Cardinals and the Los Angeles Dodgers as World Series contenders.

Gomez is a supporter of the woebegone Houston Astros, who have the dismal reputation of being the worst team of the decade. While Gomez is far from an optimist, he does believe the Astros are on the right track.

“2017, mark my words, they’ll be in the playoffs,” Gomez said.

Perhaps because of his team’s futility, Gomez has become nostalgic for a time in baseball that most are eager to forget.

“The Steroid Era was so much fun, it really was. We dig the long balls,” Gomez said in reference to the period between the mid ’90s and early 2000s in which countless of Major League players took performance-enhancing drugs. The result was an era in baseball that saw an unprecedented number of homeruns hit by players like Barry Bonds and Sammy Sosa.

The Boston Red Sox have been pegged by many experts to have a highly successful season ahead of them. In a strange turn of events, the Red Sox have gone from worst to first to worst again in the past three seasons. The year they finished first, 2013, they won the World Series. The Red Sox are one of the most popular Major League teams, with millions of fans nationwide. One such fan happens to be Professor Tyler Roberts, chair of Grinnell’s Religious Studies Department. Roberts has been a Red Sox fan since he was seven years old and claims to be “obsessed” with his team. Roberts openly admits that “there are more emotional ups and downs” during the season than during the off-season.

Roberts concedes that following his East Coast team can be a little difficult in Iowa but with the Internet, this has become easier to do.

“I can read the Boston Globe every morning, which I really only do during the baseball season and only read the sports page,” Roberts said.

Aside from team accomplishments, the season is sure to bring more spectacular achievements from the two reigning Most Valuable Players. Last year’s American League MVP Mike Trout, of the Los Angeles Angles, is just 23 but has already cemented his status as the game’s best player. With a WAR (Wins Above Average Replacement) of 27, over the past three seasons Trout has compiled a historically good start to a career.

In the National League, Clayton Kershaw of the Los Angeles Dodgers gained the distinction of being the first pitcher since 1968 to win both the National Cy Young and MVP awards. With most experts predicting Kershaw to take home his fourth Cy Young award this season, the Dodger ace should be fun to watch as he continues his Hall of Fame-bound career and hopefully leads Los Angeles to a World Series title.

No matter what team you root for, this baseball season is sure to bring ample triumph and heartbreak. So get ready to celebrate the glorious upcoming faux-holiday that is opening day.

Musings From a Spoiled Giants Fan

The Giants had no right beating the Padres yesterday.

Not only did they play shorthanded (with Brandon Belt, Hunter Pence, Jake Peavey and Matt Cain all out with injuries), they didn’t play particularly well. They were held scoreless for eleven innings– never a recipe for success. Casey McGehee, their top offseason “prize,” played atrocious defense in the late innings. They left 19 runners on base, including a runner on third with nobody out in the ninth. Their starter Tim Hudson had an ugly 1-5 strikeout to walk ratio. And they grounded into four double plays.

On top of all this, centerfielder Angel Pagan called time late during an at bat, then offered his used gum as a peace offering to San Diego catcher Derek Norris. Pagan then seemed surprised when Norris didn’t appreciate the gesture. (A link to Pagan’s classy moment is here http://m.giants.mlb.com/news/article/117367512/giants-angel-pagan-padres-derek-norris-exchange-words-at-plate-in-ninth).

And yet, here we are discussing the Giants 1-0, 12-inning victory, which spoiled the fancy new Padres home opener.

But should we expect anything besides the Giants winnings games and series they have no right to win? In exactly zero of their Championship seasons have they been the best team to make the postseason. Last year they were the worst team to make the playoffs by almost every metric, including regular season record.

And yet, here we are discussing their third championship in five seasons. (Also for the record, I get it. Giants’ fans brag about this point ad nauseum. Get over it; you’d do it to if you were in our position.)

Intellectual fans are quick to discount grizzled sports terms such as “grit” “scrappiness” and “heart.” No one who thinks critically can honestly believe that heart can compete with more concrete concepts such as, say, talent. Just look at the Dodgers from last year, those billionaire heartless bastards won 94 games!

But on a more instinctive level, it is hard to ignore moments such as yesterday when Casey McGehee made two ghastly errors at third base, and the Giants relievers simply resigned themselves to getting four outs in those innings. In contrast, San Diego’s shortstop Clint Barmes dropped a Brandon Crawford pop-up for two bases in the twelfth inning and the Padres were unable to stop the Giants from scoring the winning run.

None of this is to say the Giants won yesterday or won their three championships by accident. In the Padres game, they played superb defense (aside form McGehee), their pitchers tossed a 12-inning shutout, and they capitalized on Padre mistakes. In terms of the “Championship Era,” they have a Hall of Fame-bound manager, arguably the greatest World Series pitcher of all time, the most consistent bullpen of this decade, and Buster Posey.

So should we expect the Giants to be the best team in baseball this year? Heavens, no. They probably shouldn’t deserve to be considered in the top 50%. But the Giants have made a habit of getting things they don’t deserve.