It was Hunter Strickland's turn to have a bullpen meltdown to ruin another QS by Madison Bumgarner. Key Lines:
Kelby Tomlinson 2B- 1 for 3, BB, SB(9). BA= .261. Kelby scored 1 of the Giants 2 runs and ran his hit streak to 7 games.
Buster Posey C- 2 for 3, 2B, HBP. BA= .321. Buster wasn't happy with Hector Neris who apparently decided to mimic Hunter Strickland, except Strickland was holding a grudge from 4 years ago. Nobody could remember any reason for Neris to hold a grudge at all. Buster's take was Neris must have thought he couldn't get Buster out. When told of Buster's comments, Neris said something to the effect of "any idiot could see I wasn't trying to hit him," except it sure looked like a purpose pitch to everybody but him. Since he's a reliever, he probably doesn't have to worry about standing in the batters box against a Giants pitcher, but some Giants hitters might decide to work on hitting the ball up the middle when they are facing him the next few times.
Madison Bumgarner LHP- 6 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 7 K's. ERA= 2.87. That's a nice looking line except for the 111 pitches in 6 innings part.
Mark Melancon RHP- 1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K's. ERA= 3.65. I would say Melancon is not quite ready to move back into the Closer role.
Hunter Strickland RHP- 1 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 0 BB, 2 K. ERA- 2.79. Overall, Strickland has pitched well. It's just that when he doesn't, he tends to do it in dramatic fashion. The fans were not diggin' it either. Wonder if Strick will be back next year? The Giants tend to listen to their fans, for better or worse.
*********************************************************************************
The Giants go right into another series tomorrow with Chris Stratton trying to build on his last terrific start facing Zach Davies and the BrewCrew.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Looking at Strickland's game log, if he had that as a closer, he would be better than Casilla which wasn't good enough but would it be what IS good enough?
ReplyDeleteWhat exactly IS good enough? 95%, sure. 90%?
In Strickland's 37 appearances when he pitched 1 or more innings, he allowed 3 runs twice, 2 runs twice, and 1 run 3 times (once it was unearned). If they all had been save situations, he would have 30 saves and at least 2 blown saves and 5 that could go either way depending on the lead. Twice he gave up the margin of difference, but if that had been the 9th or later, they would be losses in non-save situations. Two of the other 3 were in blow out losses.
Optimistically, say 3 saves and 2 BS making 33 saves and 4 BS, 89%, probably not so good.
Interesting how everybody noticed how Posey stayed behind when Strickland hit Harper, I haven't seen a peep from anyone about no support (once again) when Posey is the victim. Is he not the captain of the team or the face of the franchise? Apparently you can drill him with a baseball or an illegal slide and nobody wearing SF on their hat gives a crap. Say what you want about Strickland, other than Bumgarner and maybe a wild and crazy Samardzija, who else shows heart? BTW, if it was Bumgarner drilling Harper for his shenanigans everybody writing for SF would wet their pants. This team needs a heart transplant. Has needed it for a while IMO. Or else, somebody poured something in the mix of the much trumpeted chemistry we hear about when this team wins. This doesn't look like a "together" team and hasn't for a while. I suspect we won't hear the "real" story for years, after some of the factions, if there be any, are scattered to other teams. For now, a painful team to watch. Not much going for it and you can almost see,feel some of the stuff working against it. JMO.
ReplyDelete