The Hunt for Orange October: Bleak Outlook for the SF Giants

What a roller coaster ride this season has been for the defending World Series Champions. First couple months of the season, the SF Giants were Kings of winning close games. Their stellar pitching from last year (3.36 ERA in 2010), hard as it may be to believe has been even better this year (3.13 ERA till end of August 2011). That was followed by an average month of July and then an abysmal August; a month that had futility of historic proportions.

So, why the hiccup? Why are their playoff hopes as defending Champions hanging off a cliff entering the last month of the regular season? The short and easy answer: abysmally weak offense.

Digging a little deeper though, I think the reason for their downfall could be a mixture of three different (yet related) factors:

1. Injuries

Yes. Every team is affected by injuries some time or the other and it is lame, borderline hypocritical and totally unfair to other teams that also have injury issues.

But as the cliche goes, IT IS WHAT IT IS! Its no secret that the Giants offense has been too top heavy with Buster Posey, Aubrey Huff and Freddy Sanchez (and Pablo Sandoval this season) as the core, surrounded by streaky role players. If you lose two of the three most important guys from last year, it's definitely a deep hole to recover from. Not to mention that the other one has been in a season long "slump".

A Giant Celebration!

The SF Giants might have only won the NLDS. Still miles to go if they were to achieve the ultimate goal in baseball. Yet, for this team of farm grown young guns, veteran cast-aways and the playoff deprived Giants fans, it means a lot just to be in the NLCS.

One reason this team, unlike the 2003 team that got here (and went on to the World Series), is very likable to everyone. The cool heads of veterans that have been there before: Burrell, Renteria, Rowand and Uribe. The excited veterans having their first playoff run: Freddy Sanchez, Huff and Ross. The exciting rookie crop: Mad Bumgarner and Buster Posey. The utility guys: Ishikawa, Scheiroltz, the Panda (his off-year has made him just a utility guy), Torres. And the awesome pitching staff: Timmy, Matt, Jonathan Sanchez, the Beardman Wilson and the bullpen.

These diverse types of persona in the club house have gelled together very well indeed. The chemistry in the club house is real loose and self-less. The guys are just happy to pick each other up. And that is the big reason why they can never be counted out against anyone. And of course, that awesome pitching has something to do with it. It's fun to watch these guys celebrate here after their NLDS win over the Atlanta Braves:



And the Giants fans have been unbelievable. Here's a video by a fan that has gone viral of late. It is a must watch and...... “Don’t Stop Believin'!!!!!!"



Game on Phillies!! ....its time you "Fear the Beard!"

Bleeding Orange yet?

I know I am!

The San Francisco Giants are on the verge of clinching the NL West Division. It will be their first playoff appearance since 2003. As they say, it has been a marathon and looks like the Giants are going to have that strong sprint to finish it with style.

The Giants' season has had its ups and downs. Right after spring training, the make-up of the team was way different than it is now. The starting pitching rotation has been the only constant, except for Mad Bumgarner cementing the No.5 pitcher spot. The plan on offense was to have the lineup work around Pablo Sandoval, Mark Derosa, Bengie Molina and Freddy Sanchez, with some help from veterans Aaron Rowand and Juan Uribe, hoping that Travis Ishikawa and/or Nate Scheiroltz will have a break out season to help steady the ship.

The plan kept changing as the Giants kept adapting to what felt right all the way through, riding all the hot hands and streaks right through September. Aubrey Huff was their best signing of the off season, and the Buster Posey call-up was a godsend, right away upgrading the Bengie Molina spot in the batting order. Posey has also been an excellent catcher. the highlight of which being, calling 18 games in a row, where the Giants pitchers gave up 3 runs or less in each, a major league record since the 1920s. It would be a travesty if he doesn't win the Rookie of the Year award. I know its hard to imagine this kid is just a rookie.

Stealth Panda

The Kung Fu Panda celebrates Edgar Renteria during the post-game. Edgar hit a lead changing Grand Slam to bury the Rockies Sunday (08/30/2009).

Here's Edgar getting pied:


Go Giants!!

Live Blogging from AT&T Park

I'm gonna give a shot at LIVE blogging from AT&T park from the Giants Vs Rockies game. We'll see how it works out. :)

Pre-game:
The Giants are 7 games behind the dodgers and 3 games behind the Rockies in the wild card race. Good opportunity for the Giants to catch up on the Rockies especially when they have Lincecum and Cain slated to start for games 1 and 3. Lincecum aka "the freak" has been pitching great. But it doesn't seem to show up in his wins column this last month. That's bound to change for the better and hope it starts tonight. But he has a worthy opponent in Jimenez. We witnessed this same match up in a showdown last Sunday which went down the wire to end with a 2 run rockies win. The Giants would love to return the favor riding on their ace tonight. There are a few injury concerns for the giants though: Molina and Sandoval are questionable for tonight. Hopefully they are ready to start come game time.

7.50 pm: got here at the top of the 2nd. Its still scoreless after 2. But the giants had chances to knock in a run or 2 both innings. But to no vail. Timmy is pitchin good though. So fingers crossed. Injury update: sandoval is playin today...so there's bound to be some offense.

8.10 pm: end of the 4th and its still scoreless. Feels like its gonna be a long night. Rockies had a couple of hits, but no damage so far.

9.05 pm: its the end of the 6th and the giants are up 2-0. The kung fu panda (Sandavol) took Jiminez deep for a HR in the 5th. Velez had a 2 out hit in the 6th to make 2-0. Lincecum has about 100 pitches through 6. Let's see how long he stays in.

9.20pm: Lincecum just pitched his 8th. That's shut out 8 innings. And Uribe just got a lead off triple. but giants fail to score. Its top of the 9th with 2-0 lead and Wilson is out to try get a save.

9.40pm: and that's the ball game :). Brian Wilson got the save without much drama. That's the 17th shutout of the season for the Giants. and Timmy "the freak" has his 13th win of the season...finally. The giants are now 2 games down on the wild card and gained a game over the dodgers. Hopefully they can keep this going and run down the rockies and who knows maybe the dodgers.

A Giant hunt for Red October

Go Gigantes!!

Its end of August and the SF Giants are still in the playoff race. Not just the wild card..... they are still not out of the NL West pennant race (Standings: NL West, NL Wild Card). As of today, they are 3 games behind the Rockies in the Wild Card race and 6 and half games behind the Dodgers in the Division Standings. With over 35 more games to be played in the regular season, they are at least bound to keep it interesting till the end of September.

Today, the Giants are completing their 11 game road trip. They went 5-5 after the first 10 games and could head home with a winning record if they beat the Rockies at Coors Field tonight (they are up 1-0 as of now). Could they have done better on this trip? Yes, but if you had told me they would come back home 5-6 or 6-5 after such a long road trip, I would have taken it right away. The frustrating part is that they could have easily had atleast 2-3 more wins, which they gave away this road trip. So has been the story of the Giants this season so far: They have lost more games that they should have won than they have won games they should have lost. Yet they are still in it and it is hard to believe but there is hope!

Its no secret that the strength of this team has been its pitching. Lincecum (above) and Cain have been lights out for the most part (especially the first half of the season) in spite of the sub-par run support from the offense. They have been going late into ball games keeping the bull pen fresh for the relatively shorter starts by Zito, Sanchez and the fifth starter position. And I cannot overstate how good the bull pen has been (of course I am discounting this last road trip which has been a nightmare for the bull pen and hope its just an anomaly). Defense has been average. Some nice plays thrown in with some sporadic mind-numbing errors, combine that with some bad breaks from mediocre umpiring, defense should get a B. Its the anemic offense that is the clear Achilles heel for this team. The addition of Freddy Sanchez and Ryan Garko definitely was an upgrade, but not even close to make them a contender. They clearly lack a decent clean-up hitter. Molina hitting clean-up is an indication of the offensive shortfall this team has. He should be hitting 7 or 8 in a line-up of a potential contender.

Despite that why do I have an optimistic outlook? Here is why: Of late, the Giants have been loosing starts by Lincecum and Cain. This is surely not going to continue for long. They are both too good to let this continue. I hope that turn for the good will take place at the coming home-stand. Also, Zito has been having a good run after the All-Star break, which he is historically known to do. If he keeps that up we will get back to having 3 front-line starters. After that if Sanchez and Joe Martinez even pitch .500 baseball, winning every other game they pitch, we should be well placed for a final push in mid-September. I also thing it is a good thing the giants cooled off now. The best chance they have if and when they make the playoffs to go deep is if they are hot at that time. Nothing says a playoff team is hot more than a good streak of play closing the regular season. So hopefully by mid September the giants can hang on keeping the dodgers and Rockies withing eyesight, remain healthy on offense (hello Freddy Sanchez), and make that final run at the wild card (or the pennant too if it is within reach). I am sure we would rather have a hot team on a streak make the playoffs than a team limping in to get blown out. Also, the Rockies have been hot since July, it does not bode well for them if they stay this hot till mid -September. They are bound to cool off sometime and I hope that happens just before the playoffs, when the playoff pressure would add to the slump. This is true with the Dodgers too. But they have a fairly easy schedule the rest of the way making it harder to think they may falter. But hey, you never know when you have about 35 games left. That's why the games are played and not decided on paper.

Bye Bye Basketball (and Hockey)

Its finally summer. In the annual sporting seasonal cycle, it indicates the end of the hockey and basketball seasons. What a couple of post-seasons its been for both the sports.

I'm actually glad basketball is over. It kinda sucks that my team (the lowly warriors) didn't make the playoffs (....not even close). An my second favorite team the Bulls made their exit after the first round after a valiant performance against the reigning champs. So my interest in the postseason ended right there. Its been a loooong post season, to put it in perspective, the regular season ended in mid April and the finals got over just yesterday ...mid June..... two grueling months of postseason basketball .... overkill anybody? I really do think it is especially for someone without a horse in the race. It probably was a great show of basketball quality-wise, but the two months of all the hype is overrated. If only I got a nickel for every time I heard "Kobe can (or cannot) do it without Shaq." or "Lebron is the second coming of MJ" or about how Houston are better without T-Mac (which is BS). Dont get me started on the never-ending barrage of Kobe-Lebron puppet adds ....it was kinda funny in the beginning ...but please ...enough is enough. I really am happy to see the end of the NBA season. Although I probably have a couple more weeks about all the Laker gloating,the "Kobe is one of the greatest" hype and the "Will Phil Jackson be back next year?" debate to put up with.

The hockey post-season was not all that great for me either. My beloved San Jose sharks had one of the greatest regular seasons ever. But ended up doing a dramatic choke job in the first round of the playoffs. Granted the ducks were probably a better team than their 8th seed indicated and also riding a hot streak over the month entering the playoffs. But you don't tank if you are supposedly the best team in the league ....and sharks ended up doing just that....that's right ...Patrick Marleau... (choke!! choke!!) ......Joe Thornton...(choke!! choke!!)......and of course Evgeni Nabakov .... how could you be a brick wall during the regular season and then just be a miserable goaltender during the playoffs? ....do i hear "choke!! choke!!". Hopefully, there will be some overhaul in the off-season and they will comeback strong next year.

So overall disappointing ending to the NBA and NHL seasons for me. But I have a pleasant surprise in the form of the SF Giants. Before the baseball season started, even the most optimistic homer for the giants would not have predicted this. As of now they are a whopping 6 games above .500. Do I smell playoffs??? I should probably keep my hopes lower because we hardly are past the 40% stage of the season and leading the NL wild card standings (albeit by 1 game) probably doesn't mean a lot. Will have a better idea in a month I think, when they face tougher opponents than they have been in the past month or so.

The pitching has been terrific. Tim "the freak" Lincecum has been great after a rather rough first 2 games (after all expectations are high for the reigning NL Cy Young champ). Matt "the caner" Cain has become the Timmy of this year (do I hear All- Star starter???). He was prabaly this good last year except that he had to cover for the infamous lack of run support. The Big Unit has been alright for his age. The biggest surprise to me has been Zito. He has been pretty good on the mound more often than not. No way does he explain the big bucks contract he has, but at least he is above average. Jonathan Sanchez has been a dissapointment though. At times he displays electric stuff...but then suddenly blows all and looks lost on the mound. If he can put together a few good games he could be a good trading pawn to get a bat. And the Giants definitely do need a bat or two. It says a lot of Bengie Molina is your best hitter (no offense to "Big Money" Molina .....but wouldnt it be great if he was hitting 7 or 8 instead of cleanup??). Pablo "the Panda" Sandavol has been good of late and Rowand has been in a hot streak too. So they are not in a crisis situation in terms of offense. But to remain in contention, they will have to add a little pop to the line-up sonner or later. Lets wait and watch what happens ...... Go Giants!!