Saturday, June 14, 2014

Game Wrap 6/14/2014: Rockies 5 Giants 4

Same song, second verse, could get better but it's gonna get worse.  It was Deja Vu all over again in the  9'th inning  with another Blown Save by Sergio Romo and another questionable OF play by Angel Pagan leading to the Giants 5'th loss in 6 games.  Key Lines:

Hunter Pence- 2 for 4, HR(9).  BA= .307.  Pence got the Giants on the board first with a HR to the deepest part of left-centerfield.  A fan reached over the field  above the wall to catch it.  The ball was clearly over the glove of Charlie Blackmon, but it looked like it may well have hit near the top of the wall instead of going over had the fan not caught it.  Is that replayable?

Buster Posey- 2 for 3, 2B, HR(9), SF.  BA= .269.  Buster broke out of his slump with a hard hit double into the LF corner and a 2-run HR into the LF bleachers to tie to game at 3.  Later he hit an off-balance fly that got deep enough to RF to score Pagan on a SF.  Hopefully this leads to one of his prolonged hot streaks.

Ryan Vogelsong- 5 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 1 BB, 2 K's.  ERA= 3.94.   Vogey battled it out for 5 innings.  He gave up a lot of hard hit balls but enough found gloves to keep the game close.  He allowed the leadoff batter to reach base in 3 of the 5 innings and a 1 out double to Morneau in another inning, so he was in the stretch for most of the 5 innings.

Sergio Romo- 1 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 0 BB, 0 K.  ERA= 5.08.  OK, here we go.  Romo got the first two outs quickly, although PH Troy Tulowitzki hit it deep to CF for the second out.  Dickerson then poked a liner to LF to keep the inning alive bringing up Barrett Barnes.  Barnes hit what looked like a soft liner to right-CF.  Pagan rushed toward the ball and seemed to have things under control until the ball suddenly appeared to accelerate and shoot right past his glove all the way to the CF wall.  By the time it was retrieved and thrown back in, Barnes had circled the bases for an inside-the-park HR that was ironically similar to Pagan's own inside-the-park walk-off against these same Rockies last year.  It looked like Pagan might have thought the ball was more softly hit than it was and took too aggressive of an approach, but I'm not sure.  It was very strange to watch because on the TV, it looked like a soft liner that would probably die once it hit the grass too.

As for Romo, he's not getting the strikeouts he's gotten in the past which is part of the reason he keeps getting BABIP'd.  It might be time for him to get rested for 2-3 days, definitely tomorrow.  If his struggles/bad luck continue after a couple of days off, Bochy might have to consider pulling him out of the line of fire.

That is part of what I don't like about the closer role in general.  It's just so dogmatic that the closer has to pitch every 9'th inning he can in a Save situation.  I know closer-by-committee seldom works, but in the Giants case, if they are facing 2 LH batters in a row in the 9'th inning, I would like Bochy to have the flexibility to use Lopez to face them rather than the knee-jerk that the closer has to pitch the entire 9'th inning with a 3 run lead or less and has to stay in there until the lead is lost.  It's become such an iconic role with large amounts of money to say nothing of pride at stake that it becomes this huge deal to change closers or play matchups in the 9'th inning when it really should not be.

The Dodgers are now 7 games back of the Giants and play tonight.  The 3'rd place Rockies gained a game to 9.5 back while the Padres won and are 13.5 back.  The D'Backs play the Dodgers tonight.

Madison Bumgarner tries to avert a series sweep tomorrow afternoon facing Juan Nicasio.

16 comments:

  1. That was rough to say the least. We're a good team who is a couple weeks away from getting Belt back. I think Pagan may be a little banged up, too. Blanco is enfeguo right now. I say let Colvin get some LF starts and rest Angel a bit.

    You mentioned trading Crick for Murphy or Zobrist yesterday and I never got around to responding. Heck to the no. I don't see Crick as untouchable, but he has a fairly high floor imo. Zobrist is past his 'peak years' and Murphy, while a great hitter, is a butcher defensively. I would take either and understand value cost value, but not at the price of our only lottery ticket. I'm not willing to trade Crick unless it is for an impact player that clearly puts us over the top. Even if he bust, I would have rather rolled the dice on him than received a good not great player for two years.

    I want to see what Panik can do! I don't buy this not ready bs. We brought up a mediocre Culberson as our savior in 2012 for jeebus sakes. His numbers in Fresno were much worse, and he was obviously outmatched from day 1. I get that we have a roster jam at the moment, but it makes sense to see what cards we already have.

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    1. Murphy has a positive UZR on defense and a 2.1 fWAR so far this year. He played pretty good D when the Mets faced the Giants from what I remember. I honestly believe that adding Murph at 2B is the one piece that would give the Giants the best chance of winning another championship.

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    2. Yeah even if Crick comes out to be a bust or not the top pitcher that everyone was expecting I still don't see why you would trade him for Murphy or Zobrist, when you could possibly get them for a much cheaper price (lets don't do a Bauer for Gregorius trade).

      I would rather have Murphy who seems to be entering his prime, if you look at the past 3 yrs, in every category his stats have been improving massively, on the other hand you have Zobrist who is complete the opposite for the past couple of yrs his stats have taking a hit, with the power outage being significant as well as speed. Not to mention the fact that Zobrist is 33 years old.

      What about this trade scenario: Panik & Hembree for Murphy?

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    3. Mets might go for Panik because he is basically a much younger, cheaper, less developed version of Murphy. It comes down to which team wants to win this year vs which team is building for the future. I could be a fit.

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    4. I wonder what Plan B for 2B was in the offseason - couldn't have been just Hicks (or Pre-Fresno, Post-Richmond Panik) for Plan B, given what happened to, though different injuries, F. Sanchez, not too long ago. What players were even available at that time?

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  2. Your comments about the closer, DrB, are right on, I think. I'm unsure, besides, if closer-by-committee seldom works because it's a bad idea or because teams that resort to it typically need to for lack of a good bullpen--none of their relievers is trustworthy enough to be a closer. Here, Romo's failure on the 13th forced Bochy to assert confidence in him as sovereign Closer on the 14th, and while he was being assured that the Boss wanted to keep him in the star position, the game on the 14th got lost. For a team like the Giants, with twoi or three or four men on staff who have proven strengths as closers for teams in the past, the single-closer fetish seems particularly unsuitable.

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    1. Not against a single closer. But it's a tough call as to when to take the guy off assignment. Is it a rough patch, injury, mental fatigue? From what we've seen from Romo, not just now, but even when he wasn't blowing up this year, he ain't pitching like he used to.

      For now, the way he's pitching, he has to be backed off the closer role until whatever is going on is corrected. ERA over 5...

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    2. Historically, teams with a single closer have performed better. There are situations that arise where I just wish the closer role was not such a big deal and the manager felt like he had more flexibility in the 9'th inning.

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  3. Chase Utley anyone? What would it take?

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    1. Let the Dodgers or Phillies pay Utley and his arthritic knees $25 M next season. Giants need to go after either Murphy or Zobrist.

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    2. Actually $15M for Utley, not $25M. But agreed, Utley would be a serious injury risk.

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    3. 15MM if he avoids 15 days on the DL, then 15MM vesting options based on 500 PAs the year before til 2018. Versus Jimmy Rollins 11MM one-time vesting option for 2015. I vote Jimmy!

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    4. You missed a troll cleanup DrB.

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  4. Its a given that Romo doesn't pitch tomorrow due to workload, but I hope that Bochy considers playing matchups instead of expecting Romo to pitch the 9th inning in future save situations against the Rockies. This is Romo's 3rd blown save against the Rocks and his ERA is 19 against them in 6 games vs 1.93 against the rest of the league.. That's ownage and Bochy needs to consider that next time.. Their RH batters are not afraid to hit those sliders on the outside corner to the opposite field. Don't think the pitch that Barnes hit for the HR was even a strike.. Don't understand why they weren't in a no doubles defense there.. Maybe the coaches should share in the blame too for this loss.. On the bright side, per Baggs this is the 1st 3rbi game for Buster since July 11 of last year! Does anyone else find that hard to believe..

    LG

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    1. Bochy is more human-psychology oriented.

      He will do it once it's decided, but until then, he will not skip Romo just to avoid the Rockies. You can say it's one of the pluses and also at the same time one of the minuses of that 'I have faith in you' approach.

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