The Giants, once again, failed to back a Quality Start by their ace, Madison Bumgarner, generating just 1 run on 4 hits of Padres starter Luis Perdomo and the Padres bullpen. Key Lines:
Madison Bumgarner- 6.2 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 2 BB, 5 K's. ERA= 2.66. Not his best effort, but it should have been good enough against Perdomo who came out of the game with a 5.68 ERA after giving up just 1 run in 6.1 IP, himself. The 4 hits the Giants managed were all singles. Hunter Pence stole a base but other than that it was station-to-station baseball and meager at that. Yep, hang this one of the offense!
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The Dodgers topped the Yankees in the rubber game of their series to take a 5 game lead over the Giants in the NL West. The Cardinals and Mets both lost, so the Giants maintain 0.5 and 1 game leads over them in the Wild Card race.
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The Giants now start a 4 game series against the Cardinals which could determine which team makes the playoffs with Johnny Cueto starting game 1 against Adam Wainwright.
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The offense and bullpen seem to be the weakness of this team. There is no premiere bat in the lineup anymore due to Buster Posey's decline as a hitter. The wear and tear of being a catcher must have worn him out, because pitchers are pitching to him. He is 5th in batting average and SLG percentage among catchers. 5 catchers have hit more homeruns. Yet he is the best bat in the Giants lineup? Because it certainly isn't Belt. Belt is 10th in batting average and 12th in SLG percentage among 1st baseman. The only reason his OPS is so high is because he walks a lot, so his OBP is higher than most. That's cool but a high OBP is great for a leadoff hitter or a #2 hitter. The Giants need more pop from him. He also has 134 strikeouts so far, which is 134 unproductive , not advancing or bringing the runner in outs. Also with the exception of Will Myers, the only other 1B with more KO's than Belt have 30 plus homeruns. I know its harder to hit a homerun in AT&T park, but it doesn't seem to be that hard for the opposing teams. Nunez's numbers since being a Giant are .252 BA, .318 OBP and a paltry .417 SLG. Most playoff teams have a good hitter at 3B ( Matt Williams where are you?), the Giants have someone that is the equivalent of a weak hitting shortstop on other teams. The Giants need a big power hitting bat ( And a closer.), because this keep the chain moving nonsense that they are using to construct their lineup doesn't work unless everyone is hitting on all cylinders and that is almost impossible to do over the course of a full season. Plus its a myth that this type of lineup works better at AT&T. The Giants hit basically the same as their opponents at AT&T Park. At home they only have 9 more extra base hits and 14 fewer homeruns. At home they have a .268 BA to opponents .253, a .344 OBP to opponents .313, a .410 SLG to opponents .392 and a .753 OPS to opponents .705. This is a playoff caliber team that plays mostly against teams that are not playoff caliber, and with some rebuilding and just horrible, and their offensive output at home is basically the same. That ain't so good. They need more power ( At 3B and LF) in the lineup ( And a closer.).
ReplyDeleteAgree on Belt, relentlessly, endlessly working walks. Out of the 134 K's, I wonder how many are looking, watching a borderline pitch on 3-2 count. The guy does not want to swing. I'm not necessarily against the Belt signing except that blocks Posey playing more and more 1B. (And, maybe, maybe the emergence of Shaw)
DeleteI hope that Belt realizes his potential, but it is also possible that he becomes James Loney.
I don't know Erik, that seems like pretty good separation at Home OPS .753 to Visiting .705. Especially if you consider the playing hurt and massive slumps the Giants have generally been in for much of the season.
DeleteSpeaking of playing hurt, the speculation is there for Buster. I think you can put some blame on the catcher position for the injury and failure to recover, but I don't think he is just "worn out" from the wear and tear. I wish they could have sat him for a week, or even DL, but they traded Susac and then probably felt big time pressure to run their best hitter out there as much as they could to stop the second-half slide; so there just wasn't an opportunity to rest him.
An out is an out. And a strike out isn't a double-play.
DeleteAt .343 his BABIP is 5th of 1st basemen.
At 15.6% his walk rate is 3rd of 1st basemen.
His defense is 'off' a bit this year, he's only 7th in MLB.
AT 22.9%, his SO rate is 10th. His .272 average is 11th.
At 3.6 fWAR he's 6th.
He may not be the perfect 1B, but whining about him is just... Ugh...
Kennv. Out of the 71 games played at home, 45 were played against teams with losing records. So there should be a bigger separation between the Giants and the visitors OPS. Plus every team has been hit by the injury bug or has had players slump. If the lineup was more potent then it wouldn't falter so bad if one or two starters were hurt ( Pence, Panik) or in either a power slump (Posey) or a slump-slump ( Belt). My point was that they don't have a true homerun hitter, and need way more production, especially power, from the 3B and LF positions if Posey and Belt are going to only be around 20 homerun guys. Especially now that the talent level of contenders has improved in the NL with the Cubs, Nationals, and even the team I hate more than even the Dallas Cowboys that reside in LA.
DeleteI'll add my 2 cents here: 1. Belt's second half slump is part of the problem, but overall he his not the problem. 2. The Giants do need more HR power from somewhere. The perfect addition to this team would be a LF who can hit HR's like Pat Burrell or Michael Morse but who can also play close to league average D.
DeleteI don't know why so many people on this blog want to pin Belt as the cause of the Giants' woes. His slugging % may not be the highest, but it is not poor, either. Believe it or not, it is higher than Will Myers' and only 25 points below Goldschmidts'. He has the 4th highest OBP in the MAJORS this year. According to advance stats, his wRC+ is 8th in MLB and his fWAR is 6th.
ReplyDeleteI think the real problem that so many fans have with Belt is they were led to believe he'd be a 30 HR, .300/.400/.500 1B. In this current offensive context, those are superstar numbers.
After 5 seasons in the majors, however, Belt hasn't be the superstar he was projected (rightly or wrongly) to be. Instead, he has been one of the top 10 overall 1B in the majors. Yeah, he doesn't have the HR numbers of Goldschmidt or Rizzo, but his overall numbers are way above average.
Also, he isn't even close to as bad as James Loney. Loeny's career slash line is .284/.336/.409. Belt's is .271/.356/.457.
If we are looking to for reasons for the team's offense problems, we need only look at 3B and the OF, especially LF.
As Doc notes, Belt is a divisive topic. Advanced stats appreciate the guy.
DeleteI don't know how to quantify the useless of working a two-out walk while hitting 5th or 6th on the Giants during the 2nd half of this season. The stats say a walk is a walk. But in that circumstance, the Giants need a hack. A shot at a HR or double. How many times does a Giant scoreless inning end with men on 1st and 3rd, the result of a walk followed by a single?
And I'm not saying Belt IS Loney. I'm saying, while we hope for movement in the superstar direction, he could easily regress. (Heck, Loney wasn't always Loney. In his first two years (over 144 games) Loney slashed 321/372/573.)
I think you are being charitable to Loney. His first two years he had a total of 446 ABs, which isn't even a full year's worth of ABs. Once he got his first full year, his best slugging % was .434. And he had several years where is slugging % was less than .400.
DeleteI realized long ago that Belt is what we currently have: a solid OBP and .450ish slugging percentage. I don't think there is much more potential for him to reach. Realistically, I don't think the Giants have any better 1B options besides Belt, at least nothing they couldn't obtain without having to give up major talent or $$$. Moving Posey to 1B just loses the Giants value at catcher.
If the Giants are to improve the offense, it needs to happen in the OF and 3B.
Although a lot of stats people disagree, I do think the context of players who tend to draw a lot of walks is a factor. It just does not do a lot of good for the 6'th hitter in the lineup to draw a walk if the 7'th and 8'th hitters are significantly weaker. All drawing the walk does is get you left on base. Seems to me that the 2-hole might be the ideal spot in the order for Brandon Belt.
Delete@DB -- I was thinking about that (or even lead-off) this morning. Sure, you'd lose a few runs because of the odd solo home run, but just putting him on base consistently would probably make up for it in the long run.
DeleteAnd, despite the crazy-making complaints, the fact is that Belt is a good hitter in a park that hates him. He has the second highest wRC+, slugging and OBP on the team over the past three years (1,000 minimum PA) while sporting the highest ISO and BABIP. And, yes, he does strike out. I'm well aware of that. But I'd rather have a K than a DP.
Yet despite being one of the best defensive 1B in the majors, and being the second best hitter over the past three years, he's constantly getting the finger pointed at him as if he's the problem. I just don't get it. I think Blanco's regression as a hitter this year is a bigger problem. I think Pagan's lack of offensive production is a bigger problem. I think Pence's recent spate of injuries is more of a problem.
But before those problems, the bullpen is my main issue. That they're melting down on a routine basis is really hurting our chances. Even with the second half collapse on offense, we should have at least 4, maybe 5, wins if our bullpen was performing adequately and be in the thick of it with Dodgers, not trying to hold off the Mets and Cardinals.
It's a bit off topic but I'm totally tired of going to the official Giants message board, you would think whoever moderates that board would kick lots of those poster off as it's not even fun to look at anymore, I'm glad Dr.B does a good job of screening posters, it's just a much better place to view actual Giants fans.
ReplyDeleteThank you. 80% of the reason I started this blog is I was bullied off of the Giants website Message Board.
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