Saturday, February 23, 2013

Spring Training Game Wrap 2/23/2013: Giants 4 Angels 1

The Giants picked right up where they left off in the fall as they smothered the Angels in the opening Cactus League game.  And yeah, we're still in Winter rather than Spring here at the game time temperature was 58 degrees.  Oh well, that's summer in San Francisco!  Key Lines:

Angel Pagan- 1 for 2, SB.
Pablo Sandoval- 1 for 2.
Jackson Williams- 1 for 2, 2B.
Ricky Oropesa- 1 for 1.
Gary Brown- 1 for 2, 2B.
Ryan Vogelsong- 2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K.
Chad Gaudin- 2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 1 K.
Affeldt, Romo, Proctor, Kontos, Machi- 1 scoreless IP each with Machi credited with the Save.

Some of the Giants young position prospects got a chance to shine today. Monell and Cole Gillespie each got a hit too. They should get more opportunities with the long spring training and many veterans off playing in the WBC.

9 comments:

  1. Cole Gillespie was a good pick-up. He's still young enough to have some upside and can help out with our OF depth. One of those under the radar ones that might pay off at some point

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    1. Gillespie has a good chance of making the team because of his RH bat.

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  2. halos sent the b team. which shows absolutely no respect. i was under the impression that they were gonna stretch vogey from day 1, as he is going to the wbc.

    monell and jackson need to shine during st. i see both in the bigs really soon, just not with the giants...which is a shame...but they should bring significant returns.

    thank god for baseball

    bacci

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    1. Vogie threw 30 pitches. He has a couple more starts before he goes to the WBC squad. Goal is to get him to 60 which is the limit for WBC pitchers.

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  3. A couple more thoughts:

    1. From the description of Pablo's scamper around the bases, scoring from first on Jackson Williams' double, maybe he doesn't have as far to go with his conditioning as it appeared? Must have been fun to watch!

    2. Zack Wheeler had a successful spring outing yesterday with the Mets pitching 2 scoreless IP with a hit, BB and 2 K's.

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    1. Watched Wheeler, it was fun. Mets announcers were extremely excited for him. High 90s easy delivery and hides the ball. He looked damn good. Go get em Wheels!

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  4. One more:

    Interesting piece by Tracy Ringolsby about Brian Sabean on sfgiants.com. I don't know what his sources are, but he lays the blame for the Rowand/Zito signings on Peter the Pink. Maybe it came from Baer?

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    1. Thanks for the tip. A recent clubhouse confidential poll had Sabean at #5 overall for GMs. Brian Kenny said Sabean was the most controversial, with Saber types skipping him out of the top ten and scouting types ranking him #1. He seemed eager to talk more about that, but his guest, one Jeff Sullivan of fangraphs, decided to punt, saying he was 11 or 12, and brought up... the Zito/Rowand signings as evidence! Nothing like 2007-8 signings baby! Surprised the AJ/Nathan trade wasn't used. Fangraphs can't rank the FO as bad as #27 as they had egg on their face (and a few of the regulars around here decided to bust chops after the world series, leading to a half assed mea culpa) so they will most likely move the Greybeards up to the low teens I suspect. Whether its a Wendy Thurm hatchet piece or Sullivan trying for humor, I'm gonna be there to bust chops if they aren't top 5.

      The problem as I see it is Saber types are obsessed with the process, not the results. The goal is to compete, and win. Not get the best WAR scores. The Giants under Sabean have been very good at competing. That article on sfgiants is nice, but I would have emphasized the 3 losing seasons with Barry Bonds before Sabean arrived to shake things up a bit more. That seems to be the big critique leveled at him all the time, not winning with a superstar. Well, we know now that corners were cut, and tough calls had to be made. No Vladdy, Michael Tucker, Torcato instead of Sabathia, a big chop of the scouting staff right when Sabean took over, the dictated signings of Zito, although I still can't buy Rowand because of the pursuit of Pierre/Lee/Hunter/Soriano/Matthews Jr. But the Giants had 4 winning seasons with Rowand on the payroll, including 2 championships. So who cares about dead weight? Gone baby gone.

      Sabean's biggest strength is ad hoc adjustments, he is best in the game at it. He's also very good at not giving up talent, although Wheeler might put a dent in that. Who cares, flags fly forever. He doesn't waste time stockpiling precious shiny prospects. I thought we had a good shot in 2011, Beltran pulled up lame. 2 games out of where the Cards finished. We're going for our 3rd flag in 4 years, Wheeler will get to the show sometime this year. I'll root for both.

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