Madison Bumgarner pitched his first game as a multi-millionaire and gave a Quality Start. The Giants continued to struggle with RISP, but managed to push across enough runs for the W. Key Lines:
Angel Pagan- 2 for 5, 3B(3). BA= .222. Pagan is on a pace to hit 40 triples. His BA is still low, but on the rise.
Pablo Sandoval- 2 for 4, 2B. BA= .341.
Buster Posey- 3 for 4, SB(1). BA= .375. Buster isn't hitting for much power, but he is hitting 'em where they ain't. His steal of 3B, probably ill-advised but successful when he somehow eluded Polanco's tag, helped the Giants get insurance runs.
Nate Schierholtz- 3 for 3, BB. BA= .360. Nate is forcing his way into a permanent starting role.
Brandon Crawford- 0 for 4. BA= .214. Crawford looked a bit lost at the plate tonight. He left 8 men on base. He also made an error, but made several other plays a lot of SS's don't make. He's still a work in progress, but please ignore the errors. He more than makes up for it with plays others don't make.
Madison Bumgarner- 6 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 1 BB, 2 K's, GO/AO= 9/2. ERA= 3.63. Fishface got him for a longball. Other than that, he was able to limit the damage by keeping it on the ground.
Santiago Casilla- 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K's, Save(1). ERA= 0.00. I dropped Wilson from my Savvy Vets fantasy team and added Casilla because I believe Casilla will get most of the Save opps in Bochy's committee. That move looked good tonight.
With the win, the Giants gained a game on the NL West leading Dodgers who lost to the BrewCrew on a 5-4 walkoff in Milwaukee. The Giants are now 4 games off the pace. The D'Backs also lost 5-4 to the Pirates, so they stay 2 games back of the Dodgers in second place. The Colorado Rockies also gained a game on the leaders and are tied with the Giants after beating the Pathetic Padres 5-3. The Pads fell 6.5 games behind the Dodgers.
Matt Cain goes up against Cliff Lee tomorrow night at AT&T Park.
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I think the G's need F Sanchez in the lineup so they can drop Crawford to the #8 hole..
ReplyDeleteLG
think craw still leads the team in doubles
ReplyDeletedont really think that we need knee jerk posts here
thank god for moyer
The last 3 spots in the lineup did look awfully weak last night. I mean, when Burriss really muscles up, the ball might get to an OF who is playing shallow. You can't do much about the pitcher spot, and they need Crawford for his D, so 2B is the logical place to upgrade.
DeleteMy favorite player was always Omar Vizqel and I was thrilled when the Giants signed the spry late 30's version of him a while back. One thing that remains the same for a lot of truly great defensive SS is that many of their "errors" come on plays where an average, replacement level SS would have never even put a glove on the ball. Now obviously an errant throw to 1B sometimes gives up another base, but the ability for Crawford to get to balls deep in the hole and throw with that cannon arm where most guys would just eat a ball, the errors are very deceiving. Unfortunately, casual fans know what an error is and don't give a rip about this explanation.
ReplyDeleteNow, Fat Sandoval has had some pretty nasty errors.
I think Crawford might still be bothered by this finger injury. Good on him to play through some pain. The season is just a straight up grind.
ReplyDeleteI really liked Hensley's inning. The change to Victorino was an absolute beaut. The ability to grab low cost guys like this is a huge strength.
Hopefully this is just a April adjustment period. The Giants need to tighten up their defense in a big way. My man Angel Pagan needs to figure out the park. He was breaking back on broken bat pops. Not good Angel. But nice triples you've been motoring.
Good to see Nate working. I think he's more of a 4th OF, but if he wants to make it a hard choice, good for him. Also glad to see Huff pulled late for Belt. Bochy did that to perfection during the 2010 stretch and got away from it last year. I like those moves.
If we can get Freddy back full strength by the middle of May that would be a huge win. That bottom of the order is looking pretty weak. The Giants need to bust out some clutch hits, they are trending towards last years futility. Great win, hope they can rock Uncle Cliffy tonight. Come on Brett Pill.
Got out to the park last night to see the win. Go Giants!!!
ReplyDeleteBig Crawdaddy supporter - only to see him make four errors (1 officially charged) last night. First, the kid is really in his first full season up from A+ ball. He is learning on the job, period. He will make mistakes. But the key is what kind of mistakes and how does he react, learn and grow into a consistent major league player. It is also important to compare him to what we saw the last two years at SS - Tejnada, OCab, Rent (except for one WS moment). It seems like most of Crawford's errors are "trying errors". He gets to balls (I would say 2-4 a game) that simply would be hits the last two years. He is willing to make the dive into the hole, the charge and bare hand grab, the back-to-the-outfield-over-the-shoulder-catch to cover for Huff's lack of range. Yes, he still makes some "easy errors", but really I think these are balanced out by the tough inning ending plays he makes. See last night's final out with the Phillies threatening - now that was a statement play after all the earlier misplays. This kid has the presence, confidence and athletic ability, to make game defining plays. The pitchers feel it, the fans see it, the opposing team gets it.
Forget the hitting for now. Let's see how he does this season in the field. The hitting will be a work in progress - lots of valleys with a few nice XB hits. The power and average will, I think, emerge later. The defense is already worth watching, every day.
Note Burriss not so much of the above.
Huff looked bad last night. He failed to move the runners along every time - even productive outs from Huff would have had the Giants up by 2 or more runs last night. I just can't accept his, "Well I took a whack at it" hitting approach. Yes, he is not 2011 Huff. But making productive outs (moving the runners up) has to be a key difference between the Giants offense 2012 and 2011. Melky gets it, hell even Burriss tries to do it. Huff in the 5th spot just chokes off rallies with his lack of hitting discipline.
MadBum is just a pleasure to watch. Love it when he gets pissed about a hit like Pence's HR and then comes back and drills him the next time up. I have this image that MadBum feels like he is just hog tying a few steers when he goes after batters. Mentally tough, he will not give in, though sometimes to his own detriment.
I enjoyed the inside pitches to Pence a bunch. couldn't agree more with you on Crawford and Burriss. And Huff.
DeleteHa! That reminds me of the story about MadBum in the minors. He plunked a guy and when he got back to the dugout, the manager asked him if it was on purpose. "yeah it was," he replied. "Why?" the manager asked. "Because he was swinging too hard." LOL!! Man, Bumgarner has a mean streak in him!
DeleteOh yeah, no doubt in my mind that Bumgarner hit Pence on purpose because of the HR earlier.
DeleteTechnically, Maddy (he apparently hates the Madbum nickname) was a multi-millionaire when he got his $2.0M bonus (though with immediate cuts for the agent and IRS, not so long). But I quibble.
ReplyDeleteGreat game by Madison, he really showed a lot of maturity and gumption that Dirty rarely ever displayed. Hence why he got the long extension and Dirty the one-way ticket to KC.
I like Nate and I think that he could be a starter, and perhaps even a star, if he could ever put together one season without an injury and subsequent attempt to come back too early and suck hitting. However, injuries and him seem to be a given. But when he is on, he's batting with a very high OPS, 900+, for long stretches of time, like a month, he is white-hot, so he could be a difference maker if he could ever, again, put together a healthy season with no major injury. But he's getting a bit too old to get many more chances, at least with the Giants.
The only good thing for him is that there has not been many OF's looking like they are charging up to the majors and taking a starting spot, mainly Gary Brown, as even Peguero still have question marks and Kieschnick is just rebuilding his prospect status. So he might continue to get more chances just by default.
Oh and Crawford's OPS is not that far from the league average while providing above average defense, so I'm not too worried about him, young guys will get the yips early on sometimes, he should be fine once he gets settled and feel like he belongs. Most importantly, his contact rate is right there for good hitters (85%) so his batting line should improve over time.
DeleteNate not so much. Yes, when he is hot he looks "all world" good and I love his arm in RF. But to my eye he is not a tough out for pitchers. He and Belt seem to have similar inside holes in their swings. Pitchers can pound them in to get ahead, and then finish them with off-speed stuff down and in or hit the outside edge. Until then can either lay-off the inside pitch (better pitch recognition) or protect against it (Bonds owned this approach), they will be easy outs against good control pitchers.
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