Christian Arroyo smacked a leadoff HR in the bottom of the 8'th inning to break a 3-3 tie and Mark Melancon shut it down in the top of the 9'th as the Giants took the first game of the weekend series agains the Pesky Padres. Key Lines:
Joe Panik 2B- 2 for 4. BA= .320. I love Panik in the leadoff spot! He's a basehit machine with a strong OBP. Don't care about SB's. Gotta get on base! He also made a sensational diving catch going away on a pop up in shallow CF in the 9'th inning that prevented a leadoff single.
Brandon Belt LF- 3 for 3, 2B, BB. BA= .265. Talk about machines! Belt raised his OBP to .390. He and Panik reached base 6 out of 8 times in this game. They have OBP's of .367 and .390 at the top of the order and now the Giants are cooking with gas up there! This was also Belt's second consecutive game in LF with Michael Morse getting the start at 1B and against a RHP. That is interesting. Belt had one ball skip under his glove and go to the wall then didn't seem to quite know what to do as he kind of jogged after it allowing Cory Spangenberg to reach 3B right after Ryan Schimpf's 2-run dinger. Spangenberg scored on a Sac Fly to tie the game in a 3-run 5'th inning.
Christian Arroyo SS- 1 for 4, HR(2). BA= .250. Arroyo was sitting on a first pitch FB from Ryan Buchter leading off the 8'th inning and timed it perfectly to pull it into the LF seats. He also reached base on a throwing error by Padres SS Erick Aybar which kept the first inning alive. The BA may not impress you but it comes with a .550 SLG%. Since going 0 for 4 in his first game, Arroyo is 5 for 16 with 2 dingers which comes to a BA of .3125.
Jeff Samardzija RHP- 7 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 5 K's. ERA- 6.32. Shark sailed into the 5'th inning with a no-no, but he started the inning with an HBP and Schimpf followed with a 2-run blast to CF. Then Belt did his thing in LF to turn a Spangenberg's single into a triple and Samardzija was in a tie ballgame. He pitched 2 more scoreless innings for the QS.
Mark Melancon RHP- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, Save(5). BA= 2.08. Melancon is not a strikout pitcher and BIPs can do weird things. Panik prevented the leadoff batter from reaching base with his tremendous effort in shallow CF and the next two were easy.
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The Win got the Giants out of the NL West cellar by 0.5 games over the Pesky Padres. The Rockies topped the D'Backs 3-1 to move back into first place by 0.5 games over the Snakes. The Giants trail the division leaders by 6 games. The Dodgers beat the Phillies 5-3 to even their record at .500 and sit in 3'rd place, 3 games out of the lead.
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Matt Cain is set to test his hammy tonight facing Jhoulys Chacin.
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Arroyo. Wow. He's only 21 and he's got some years to go before he hits his physical peak. Yet he's already showing out at the MLB level. And I expect it will take him weeks, if not months, to fully adjust to the majors. I have to say I'm pretty happy they called him up.
ReplyDeleteIf it comes to the point Hundley is not doing the job is there a viable replacement?
ReplyDeleteHe has the distinction of having a lower OBP than BA while striking out at a near 25% rate. He seems to block the pitches pretty well but he doesn't do well catching stealers.
7 of his 10 hits have been doubles. Backup catcher is probably the least of the Giants worries right now. There is Tim Fedorowicz down at AAA, but Hundley does not have to look over his shoulder.
DeleteI did a little reading up on 'hamstring strain' and it seems these tendons/muscles don't do much in ordinary walking/sedentary mode so you would hope Matt Cain is doing some kind of exercise to (stretch?)this area especially since this seems to be a reoccurring issue for him?
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