Brandon Crawford hit a solo HR in the 4'th inning. Jeff Samardzija had a scoreless start in how long, and the bullpen made it stand up. Key Lines:
Brandon Crawford- 2 for 4, HR(11). BA= .277. Crawford almost singlehandedly won this series for the Giants with his huge 7-hit game on Monday and his dinger producing the only run of this game. Hard to believe, but Crawford is still getting better. Here is the progression of his fWAR's since his rookie season: 2.0, 2.3, 3.1, 4.7. He's already to 4.4 this season with about 1/4 of the season left to play. He probably won't come close to last year's HR total of 21, but he's sporting an improved BA and OBP and he's taken his D at SS to yet another level. By fWAR, he is currently the 10'th most valuable player in all of baseball. Translated to dollar value, at his current pace, he will earn over half the value of his 6 year/$75 M contract in the first year! We've been blessed as Giants fans to root for a lot of great players for this franchise, and Crawford is quickly taking his place as one of the greats of all time.
Jeff Samardzija- 5.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K's. ERA= 4.23. Samardzija showed signs of coming out of his funk in his last start. He made more progress today giving the Giants shutout ball and a 1-0 lead into the 6'th inning. Bochy wisely took the ball from him with 2 runners on and a lefty hitter coming up. Getting Shark back on track would be huge for the stretch run!
Will Smith- 0.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K's. ERA= 4.74. Bochy showed some faith in Smith after a not-so great last appearance. Don Mattingly countered with RH PH Chris Johnson instead of the LH hitting Derek Dietrich and Smith struck him out. He stayed in to strike out the LH hitting Ichiro to start the 7'th inning.
Hunter Strickland- 0.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K. ERA= 2.53. Strickland is unscored upon in his last 9 appearances covering 9.1 IP.
Derek Law- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K. ERA= 2.05. How about Derek Law? He is unscored upon in his last 17 appearances. On the season he has 43 K's in 44 IP, with just 6 BB's and a strong groundball tendency. We just might be looking at the Giants next closer here except Santiago Casilla may have something to say about that.
Santiago Casilla- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K's, Save(26). ERA= 2.78. Casilla has suddenly regained his dominance as a closer allowing 0 runs in his last 6 appearances while looking dominant in the process. He allowed a 2-out double to Ichiro on a ball Baggs thought Blanco should have had a play on. That would have spelled trouble 3 weeks ago, but Casilla calmly wiped out TJ Realmuto on 3 pitches. Game over!
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The Giants regain sole possession of first place in the NL West by 1 game over the Dodgers who lost to the Phillies. The Giants finish the 9 game roadie 4-5. If you looked over the schedule at the beginning of the season and were told the Giants would go 4-5, you might not be ecstatic, but you couldn't feel too unhappy.
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The Giants get to day off to travel home before starting a 10 game homestand and 3 game series against the Orioles with Matt Cain facing Dylan Bundy.
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You know what was great -- Law being called in relief in the 8th inning in a one-run game with the division lead on the line and Bochy leaving him in against Yelich who is hitting .329 against right handers. That's usually where Lopez gets the call. So that's some trust and the acknowledgement that Law has a pair of big-boy pants by Bochy.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm really thrilled. I really, really wanted him on the club in 2014. But he didn't get the slot, then the TJ and a so-so 2015 (which wasn't actually as bad as it looked)...
Anyway, I'm thrilled. I love his weird delivery and that he has good stuff to go with it.
In case you haven't noticed, I'm thrilled. I get totally stoked when some human-interest/nobody expects him to make it underdog I like makes it. :) I just hope his bubble doesn't burst.
Law is a great story, alright. His numbers coming up through the minors and now in the majors are very reminiscent of Sergio Romo albeit with a very different pitching style.
DeleteThe thing Bochy said about Law that makes me think he might be the Closer of the Future is he used all 4 of his pitches including a changeup that allows him to attack LH batters. That is something Strickland could still develop, but hasn't quite yet.
Law reminds me that i have average to bad scouting skills. saw Crick early on and was sure he was on the fast track to a slot in the rotation. wrong. Law was different because of TJ surgery but he seemed like many other pitchers in the system: good but not quite good enough. i read your down on the farm report every day trying to read the tea leaves but realize i have no clue who among the many players i read about will stick in the bigs. it's humbling.
ReplyDeleteI think a lot of us were pretty excited about Derek Law at the end of the 2013 season. He put up outrageous numbers after a promotion to San Jose, then posted a 0.00 ERA with double digit K/9 in the Arizona Fall League. At the same time there were videos going around of his funky delivery and the tremendous movement he got on his pitches. The Giants seemed to be really high on him too and he came to spring training in 2014 with a lot of anticipation. Alas, things just didn't seem to be right. He struggled in AA and underwent TJ shortly after the season started. Now it's looking like he's regained the form that got everybody excited when he was in San Jose and the AFL. Great story for us prospect watchers!
DeleteHey we took the season series from the Marlins. Who would have thought? Hopefully this drought with Cueto and Bum stops and they can dig some traction.
ReplyDeleteDerek Law is really stepping up, its good to see.
Pence and Panik will hopefully shake the rust off soon, the offense could get going. Craw is definitely a franchise treasure.