Santiago Casilla turned a stirring Giants comeback win into a crushing defeat with what might have been the worst Blown Save of his career, and that is saying something. Key Lines:
Denard Span- 2 for 5. BA= .251. Span got a couple of hits and scored a run. Kuip, who was doing color commentary for this game, as much as said Span is not 100% physically.
Angel Pagan- 3 for 5, HR(5). BA= .289. Pagan's 2-run dinger got the Giants back into this game. The carry on the ball to RF foreshadowed more HR's to come. Have I said Pagan is a dynamic player when he's healthy?
Buster Posey- 3 for 5, 2B, HR(12). BA= .293. With Brandon Belt in a mini-slump, Buster picked up the slack. I am not sure the HR pitch was even in the strike zone. Buster reached out and took a high-outside pitch the other way and it carried into the second section of the RF bleachers for the first HR in extra innings of his career to give the Giants a 6-5 lead, much to the delirious delight of the young blonde woman sitting with her parents behind the Giants dugout. They did not show her reaction to Casilla's Blown Save a few minutes later.
Mac Williamson- 1 for 1, HR(4). BA= .225. Mac has 4 dingers in 80 PA's which projects to 30 in 600.
Ramiro Pena- 2 for 5, 2B, HR(1). BA= .364. I'm not that surprised Pena is hitting .364, but more that he's hitting with the authority he has shown. The Iso is .181 with 7 XBH's in 20 hits.
Jeff Samardzija- 5 IP, 5 H, 5 R, 4 ER, 4 BB, 4 K's. ERA= 4.05. Jeff Samardzija on the mound on a day there is carry to RF? No bueno!
Albert Suarez- 1.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 1 K. ERA= 3.55. Suarez ate up 5 outs and Josh Osich got him out of a jam in the 7'th with a soft groundout to 2B off a RH batter.
Hunter Strickland- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K. ERA= 2.94. Is Strickland ready to take over the 8'th inning role? He's had his moments himself this year.
Sergio Romo- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K's. ERA= 1.35. Is Romo ready to take over the Closer role, or do the Giants need to make a trade? Who would they trade for?
Santiago Casilla- 0.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 0 BB, 0 K, BS(5). ERA= 3.38. Oh my! It is hard to describe how bad this was. Casilla, who in fairness had not pitched for a week, came out and threw 2 pitches to leadoff batter Chris Dickerson that were nowhere close to the strike zone. He then threw a get-it-over pitch that Dickerson lined over Crawford's head for a single. That brought up Derek Norris, who Kuip reminded us hit a HR off Casilla in 2012 when he was with the A's that knocked Casilla out of the Closer's role in favor of Sergio Romo and the rest is history. Casilla couldn't find the strike zone against Norris either and he singled to right-center sending Dickerson to 3'rd. Norris then stole 2B without a throw to put the winning run at 2B, still with 0 outs. Casilla seemed to settle down against Adam Rosales and got to 0-2, but then couldn't get him to chase and then pitched to contact with Rosales hitting a seeing-eye single through the left side to drive in the tying run with Norris going to 3B. By this time, the die was probably already cast, but on the first pitch to Alexei Ramirez, who I thought should have been given an intentional walk to load the bases and create a force at all bases, Casilla stumbled off the rubber and threw awkwardly to the plate on a bounce. It was a balk and the winning run scored.
I've heard of games being won on a walk-off balk, but had never seen one. Twitterverse is calling it a balk-off! I will say this: If what Carter Capps does is not a balk, then I'm not sure why Casilla's stumble was.
*********************************************************************************
The Loss did not hurt as much as it could have as Kenley Jansen, who is supposed to be an elite closer, blew his 4'th Save of the season and the Dodgers lost to he D'Backs in extra-innings 2-1. The Giants remain 5.5 games ahead of he Bad Guys in the NL West.
*********************************************************************************
Johnny Cueto tries to stave of an embarrassing sweep today facing Edwin Jackson. Yes, THAT Edwin Jackson!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Ah, Casilla. What can I say about his performance competency at this point that I haven't been saying since 2014...? So, instead of ranting I have a couple of questions. Do you think he could be packaged for a closer upgrade? And, if so, what would we give up and for whom would the Giants trade?
ReplyDelete"Yes, THAT Edwin Jackson!" Hey, at least he's in the record books... Though I'm sure he'd rather not be...
The Giants aren't going to trade Casilla. He remains the Closer for now. I think it's possible that if he has another meltdown in the next few games, they could go back to 2012 and flip Romo and Casilla, or they could trade prospects for a reliever or two at the deadline.
DeleteBesides, how many Closers are available who you are sure are better than Casilla? I mean, Kenley Jansen has just 1 fewer Blown Save. This list pretty much starts and ends with a couple of Yankees who may or may not be available and will have many bidders if they do.
DeleteI expect closers to blow saves. Problem with Casilla is he blows too many. He's blown 19% this year. He blew 15% last year. He blew 17% in 2014.
DeleteOf the Top-20 in saves this year, he's 19th in save percentage. Of the Top-20 from last year, 19th again. If he'd have made the Top-20 in 2014, he'd have been 19th. Again. He's like a broken record. And his performance, YTD, is about the same quality of results that got Romo moved to the 8th inning back in 2014.
Which is why I asked.
i was really hoping that the giants would not have to give up one of their elite farm hands for pen help, but its looking more and more like that everyday
ReplyDeletemight be able to get away with pen issues in winning the division and going to the post...but cant go deep in the post without a solid pen
bacci
Is Jeremy Jeffress for real or is this a one-off year? Before 2016 he had 7 BS in 8 opportunities. Both his walks and K's are down this year but his hits are up. Appears to be a fluke but stranger things have happened.
ReplyDeleteSeems like Giants need to so something or is blowing 1 of 5 opportunities (roughly his career numbers) unpleasant but acceptable? It's not all that different from 2014.
Was at the game last night and as a side note, the Padres players seem very small next to the Giants. Several seemed under 5'10" with Ameristi looking to be maybe 5'6". Giants on the other hand were all tall and athletic looking. I guess in the end the score is the only thing that mattered but just an observation
ReplyDeleteI don't know what the hell is going on with Cassilla but I hope he figures it out! You can't make this stuff up!!!!' What the hell????
ReplyDelete