Friday, August 3, 2018

Game Wrap 8/3/2018: D'Backs 6 Giants 3

Baseball is a game of surprises.  You knew this was going to be a tough game for the Giants to win when you saw the starting pitchers.  Chris Stratton has been mostly bad since the first month of the season and Patrick Corbin is mostly good, especially against the Giants.  Unfortunately, there were no surprises in this game as Stratton was terrible for 3+ innings while the Giants offense was mostly quiet.  The game was never in serious doubt after the D'Backs scored 5 times in the bottom of the first inning.  Key Lines:

Buster Posey C- 2 for 2.  BA= .297.  The worst part of this loss might not have been the final score, but a possible concussion injury to Buster Posey who took a foul tip from Paul Goldschmidt off the facemask in the first inning and appeared stunned.  Buster stayed in the game and singled in the 3'rd inning but came out for a pinch runner after being checked on by the trainer and Manager Bruce Bochy.

Austin Slater 1B- 2 for 4.  BA= .333.  2 singles, 2 RBI's in Slater's first 2 AB's.  He keeps the line moving!

Chris Stratton RHP- 3 IP, 10 H, 6 R, 4 BB, 4 K's.  ERA= 5.52.  I guess the 4 K's show he had some kind of stuff, but my goodness!   Overall it was a very bad pitching performance.   Unfortunately, not much different than expected given the season he's had.  Probably time to him and Ty Blach to switch places and let Blach start a game or two while Stratton tries to work out the kinks in mop-up work.

Ty Blach LHP- 2.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K.  ERA= 4.28.  Blach pitched 2 innings in game 1 last night, but was a gamer and came in with a bases-loaded, no-out jam of Stratton's making in the 4'th inning.  He got out of it with a pop-up and GIDP and pitched another 1.1 IP.  Blach has a 1.53 ERA over his last 8 appearances since July 5 covering 12 IP.

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The Dodgers lost to the Astros 2-1, so the Giants remain 5 games behind the NL West leaders.  The D'Backs Win puts them back in a first place tie with the Dodgers.  The Rockies lost to the BrewCrew to remain 2.5 games behind the leaders.

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Andrew Suarez tries to get the Giants back on the winning track tomorrow night facing Clay Buchholz.

15 comments:

  1. Not only did Stratton lose the game like we all expected, he burned a pen that really needed the rest. Couldn't even wear it for 5 or 6 innings.

    Also , looks like we are back to free Henson

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  2. IF the Giants have an indispensable man, he is still Buster Posey, even if he never hits another homerun! His last HR was June 19th when the Giants were 36-38.
    As for the pen, only Blach and Melancon pitched in both games after a day off Wednesday.
    Plus Baggardly said Bochy said:
    "Giants will have 1 maybe 2 fresh arms here tomorrow."
    Because of Hanson's bad splits against LHP (.239/.260/.283) he's been used mostly against RH starters and as PH against RH relievers.

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  3. McCutchen leads the Giants with 107 games played. He’s also 6th with 1.0 WAR.
    Extending the WAR of some other “new” faces of the Giants to 107 games:
    Slater 3.0
    Duggar 2.8
    d’Arnaud 2.0
    Hanson 1.8
    Older faces:
    Williamson 1.9
    Hernandez 1.1
    Which sez, with SSS, you can conjure up some unrealistic results, like Ryder Jones, 1 game, 0.1 WAR, -> 16.2 for a “full” season!

    ReplyDelete
  4. #22 Chris Archer on trade to Pirates: I'll be #24, in Pittsburgh 22 belongs to Andrew McCutchen.
    Speaking of, although a loooonnnnggg shot like the Giants, the Pirates are seeming to do OK without Cutch.
    Go figure!

    ReplyDelete
  5. From McCoveyChron a few days ago:
    Bruce Bochy wants to have Pablo Sandoval play all 9 positions in a single game. Obviously, it can be done ...
    Oops!

    ReplyDelete
  6. it may force them to place dyson on waivers in order to free up some money to add some players to the 40-man roster. casey kelly wouldn't be the most attractive name to add but, he does have mlb experience

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It doesn't save any money, unless someone wants to do a waiver trade, and who wants him enough to give the Giants any meaningful relief?
      The players who would save "real" money either you don't want to lose them and/or no one wants for the amount of money they have guaranteed, for example Crawford/Belt/Bum (don't want to lose for nothing) or Samardzija/Melancon/Cueto/Longoria/Pence (nobody wants for anything).
      McCutchen was, is, and forever will be the biggest piece that even "might" be movable, but still who wants to spend millions on .254/.348/.406?
      The Giants are in a big hole and they will do nothing that turns off gate/paying customers.

      Delete
  7. When Cueto is moved to the 60-day roster, how about LHB slugger Chris Shaw? Might have some pop until they figure him out.
    John Bowker hit 3 in April -- back-to-back his very first 2 games with 7 RBIs, another in May.

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  8. Agree with you on Stratton, Bochy said his stuff is there, it's a matter of confidence, they should use him in mop up duty, and have Blach start.. The pitfalls of developing a young pitcher. Hope Posey doesn't have a concussion, all teams have injuries but the Giants have had more then their share of injuries.

    LG

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  9. Still in the NL West race with a SP rotation: Suarez, D-Rod, Holland, Bumgarner and ??? Radical thought - when Belt gets back you waiver wire McCutchen and put Slater at RF/leadoff - is Belt coming back soon? Maybe Shark comes back soon with that nice running left to right 2-seamer going again - just needs to be the #5 starter

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. August 2, 2018 8:01 pm
      Giants' Brandon Belt: Out for 8-to-10 more days
      by RotoWire Staff | RotoWire
      Belt (knee) will need another 8-to-10 days before returning from the disabled list, Alex Pavlovic of NBC Sports Bay Area reports.

      Delete
  10. Unable to watch the latest debacle and hold my dinner, I went down memory lane and looked at DrB's blogs and comments on the 3 major off-season acquisitions.

    As always, Doc was thorough and incisive.

    However, the read was, perhaps, more threatening to my stomach than the trouncing on the telly.

    I did come away with added respect for MosesZD (it was already pretty high) and a new understanding of the problems with patching patches on old worn out tires.

    If interested, these are Doc's posts and nearly 100 comments, and confirms the adage about highsight:

    Wednesday, December 20, 2017
    Hot Stove Update: Giants Trade for Evan Longoria

    Monday, January 15, 2018
    Hot Stove Update: Giants Land Cutch

    Monday, January 22, 2018
    Hot Stove Update: Bobby Evans Completes His Tour De Force

    Those were, my friends, heady days!

    It's not whether Doc or the comments are right or wrong, it's that baseball players are human beings not trading cards.

    Is there anyone who wishes the Giants had not made any of those trades, which all looked good at the time? Except to Moses, the existential critic who is condemned to live in St Louis, my birthplace.

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    Replies
    1. Look, the Giants season my yet collapse but up to this point they are a significantly better team than last year. With a little less horrible injury bad luck, I can easily envision them leading the NL West right now. Bobby Evans had a mandate from ownership to make the team competitive deep into the season while staying under the CBT threshold. Just my opinion, but he did that and did it spectacularly. So yeah, don't take back or second guess any of those articles.

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