Posts Tagged ‘San Francisco Giants’

Kruk warns against wearing SF colors at Dodger stadium

I’m headed down tomorrow to go watch Timmy take on Satan’s helpers, your LA Dodgers. Tbox called this morning to say Kuiper is warning against wearing SFG gear at Chavez Ravine. C’mon, this is a gentlemen’s game. Here it here in yesterday’s podcast along with a great recap of where the Giants are to date. Kuiper podcast 4/15/10

Phils lose, Giants now tied for best record in MLB

Is it too early to be watching standings, records and win percentages? I think not.

The Nationals have just beaten the Phillies, who the Giants will contend with for the NLCS this year. The Nationals did it on home runs by Adam Dunn and Ryan Zimmerman in the 8th inning, both off of Baez, the Phils reliever who got mercilessly booed after the effort.

Anyway, I’m listening to Dick Enberg call the Friars’ game against the Braves. They are in their throwback uniforms. I hope they make sure to change their undershorts before the Giants come to town on Monday.

What a place to retire, Dick.

Giants hitters rake Bucs while Sanchez dazzles…

Jonathan Sanchez threw 11 K’s and pitched a shutty today in a Giants 6-0 victory today against the Pittsburgh Pirates. If you’ve watched Sanchez pitch his last few starts you know that like last year, he’s either on it or off it. Today he was on it – capped by striking out the side in the 4th by asking Milledge, Jones and Doumit to politely take their seats. Despite some bases loaded trouble in the top of the 6th, Sanchez was nothing short of an inhospitable filth pig today. What a rude man.

On the other side of the house, I had to stick my foot in my mouth after Eli “Silverfox” Whiteside hit a three run homer in the bottom of the 2nd, driving in Bowker and Uribe after their singles. I still think Posey needs to get up here but I guess I’ll save that post for one more day.

And, how about your boy Aubrey “Ring of Fire” Huff? After a deep ass, triple’s alley triple last night which would have been a HR in any other park, he does the same shit today but with different results. I don’t remember the count but with no outs he launches one toward the 421 mark and the carom sends it way past McCutchen into the inner part of the outfield. Bananas. Flannery waves dude home and we’ve got our 4th in the parker of all time at AT&T. I’m sure Huff was thinking “WTF” when he finally caught his breath. Actually, you can tell he thought it was funny but later in the game, when he launched almost as far but a little more to the right and it bounced off the top rail, you could tell that he was sort of annoyed. After all, hitters get paper for launching the long ball and it’s long been a sticking point when we try to get real hitters to come play for us. Maybe this is grounds for a second post. Anyway, you’re here Huff so suck it up!

Finally, nice to Rowand finally go yard today and get something done with a 2R HR in the 5th. Love him or hate him you gotta respect the effort which half of this game called life.

Tbox and I will be coming at you from Chavez Ravine for Saturday’s day game against the Dodgers followed by Monday’s game from Petco Park against the Friars. We’re 7-2 — keep ‘em rolling boys.

Giants fumbling with Freddy Sanchez…

I had a chance to talk to Andrew Baggarly, SJ Mercury News Giants beat writer, tonight at the park and asked him about Freddy Sanchez. He said he talked to Bruce Bochy today who speculated that May 1st might be the day we see him in the lineup for the first time in 2010. Baggs didn’t sound too confident that this would come to fruition, speculating that the Organization is getting embarrassed over the whole ordeal. I’ve heard Sanchez went through a series of 4 MRI’s before we signed him last year – you think more than one would be a Giant red flag.

By the way, if Baggs’ blog “Extra Baggs” isn’t in your regular Giants reading rotation, it should be. Great stuff. Also check out his daily You Tube reports he did from Scottsdale.

DeRosa walks…

Simply put: the 2009 Giants’ lineup was riddled with a lack of plate discipline that made the lineup look like 7 year olds at tee ball practice.  Pre All Star break, the Giants ranked dead last in walks and second to last in OBP in the NL. 2009 wasn’t new – we were also dead last in both categories for the 2008 season. Carney Lansford was fired and everyone from Damon Bruce to Joe from Stockton to your mom couldn’t shut up about our offensive woes.

When the trade deadline came along and everyone, including myself, clamored for that One Big Bat thinking Barry part deux was the solution. Winding up with a wounded Sanchez and a shackled Ryan Garko the situation only improved slightly after the All Start Break. Still we were anxious at the plate and getting mocked by opposing pitchers.

2010 off season – enter Mark DeRosa: the most important move we made in the offseason (besides the Timmy signing). While Aubrey Huff hits for more power (34/108/.313 at his peak), it’s DeRosa whose patience has contributed more runs to each of his teams’ efforts. A simple comparison: in 505 AB with the Cubs in 2008, DeRosa managed to score 103 runs compared to Huff’s career high of 96, also in 2008 (on 93 more AB’s). Another measure: that same year, DeRosa’s OBP of .376 was still higher than Huff’s career best to date of .367 (with 131 more AB’s – 636 in 2003).

After seeing the team in action this weekend (all 13 innings Friday!), it’s clear there has been a shift in how we approach the plate. While we have a lot of work ahead of us (the Braves’ Hudson and Kawakami each averaged 10 around 10 pitches per inning) we’re improving in this area, finally. Both Bowker and DeRosa took walks on Friday after being down 0-2. Huff’s walk ended up scoring the tying run Friday and despite our loss on Saturday, we cajoled Derek Lowe into a career high 7 BB’s. DeRosa is contributing much more than his .212 average would leave you to believe. He’s reminding his teammates that there are a lot of fish in the sea and not to get suckered by the first thing that worms its way into McCovey Cove.

The Giants are 3rd in the NL in OBP and 5th in BB’s and on to something with a 6-1 start.

An Old Newbie Opines

Since I was a small kid, I’ve been fairly indifferent about baseball. Sure, I played Little League and actually had some success as a 10 year old pitcher, blue bell bottom cords and all. But then I turned 11 and then 12: the kids got bigger, I remained thinner than a #2 Dixon Ticonderoga pencil, and before long I was that kid in the outfield, throwing my glove up in the air, bored out of my skull. As a teenager, I got interested in a bunch of other things and to me, organized sports were no longer cool.

Fast forward to college and somehow I re-locate my competitive spirit and find myself watching, dare say, following organized sports – first my beloved Utah Runnin’ Utes men’s basketball team and later expanding my interest into local teams depending on where I was living at the time. And, this included baseball. I’m ashamed to admit that I hopped the Yankees bandwagon while living in Brooklyn and even made the 7 train slog to Yankee and Shea Stadiums. But this was a fading interest: the snow had melted and I had nothing better to do so I did what everyone who doesn’t know any better does: I followed the Yankees.

In 2005, I moved to San Francisco and got a job as an ad sales rep for a large media company who supplied me with a virtually unlimited expense account, which I used liberally. Many of my clients wanted to go watch Barry chase the HR record so off to AT&T Park we went, I, with varying levels of interest. It wasn’t until last year that someone who knows far more about this sport than I, sat me down to show me the ropes. For instance:

- the importance of pitch counts
- why popping open the opposing team’s bullpen, early in a series, was a good thing
- that a good AB need not result in a hit

A whole world opened up for me. Finally I was able to watch baseball on TV or go to a game and get hyped on a 1-0 final score. I started paying attention to the game within the game and, gainfully unemployed, made 34 visits to AT&T park in what I like to call my baseball re-birth.

Why am rambling on and on about how I got to become a fan and begin to learn the subtleties of the game? Do I think you care? Probably not. I say this to caveat everything I will post on this blog this year: I will get a lot of things wrong; I won’t have ‘good knowledge’ and I might have to have the relevance of many a stat explained to me. But, I’ve got the bug. To wit: the attached photo – an ESPN Sportscenter higlight – of me getting insane last year when Barry Zito struck out Todd Helton (goatee) for the third time in a game against the Colorado Rockies, which at the time, had a bit of significance in the Wild Card race of 2009.

So far, I like what I see this year. I said all summer that if the Giants could do better in 2010 than not be DEAD LAST in all offensive categories, that we’d have a good year and could win the division. Sure, we played the ‘Stros and it’s the first series of the year but dammit, we’re number 1 in total bases and top third of the pack in walk! WALKS!

So, as a guy who’s been around baseball forever but never really ‘got it’, I’m looking forward to a fun season – my 2nd full season in a life of 38 years.

"Sit Down!"

Giants Galore!