Marco Scutaro- 3 for 5. BA= .315. Scooter's hit parade continues!
Pablo Sandoval- 1 for 5, HR(7). BA= .316. Flummoxed by the knuckler, Pablo hit a 3 run dinger off a conventional pitcher in the 9'th to make the final score a lot closer than the game actually was.
Hunter Pence- 2 for 3, 2B, BB. BA= .288. Hunter Pence is not my idea of a guy who is going to do well against the knuckleball, but he did in this one.
Brandon Belt- 2 for 3, 2B, HR(5), BB. BA= .244. Attaboy, Brandon! This is the kind of line we've been waiting for, the kind he used to put up in the minors on an almost daily basis. Hopefully this is the start of something really good. Belt has a 5 game hit streak in which he is 7 for 15 with 2 HR plus 2 BB.
Barry Zito- 5.2 IP, 12 H, 8 R, 5 ER, 2 BB, 2 K. ERA= 3.40. Zito deserved a much better fate as he was not only victimized by the BABIP gods in the first inning, but his teammates made at least 4 atrocious defensive plays behind him. He should have been out of that inning with far less damage. He deserves a lot of credit for hanging in there and sparing the bullpen to fight another day.
Melky Cabrera(Blue Jays)- 4 for 5, 2B. BA= .278. Melky got his WS ring before the game, then put on a show for his ex-teammates which brought back memories of the Melkmen days.
The Giants will remain in first place by at least 1.5 games despite the Loss. The Padres topped the Orioles 3-2, but the rest of the teams in the division are still playing.
Ryan Vogelsong takes the mound facing journeyman Ramon Ortiz in the finale of the 2 game series tomorrow.
You get a game like this once in a while. Hopefully we won't see another game like it again for a long, long time.
ReplyDeleteCan Bonser be the next Vogelsong?
As I recalled, Boof dominated at where we used to play before Augusta (can't remember the name of the city now).
Boof has a long ways to go to be the next Vogelsong. Stories like Vogie's don't come around too often.
DeleteLong indeed, but discounting the PCL effect, it's only 3/4 as long as it seems right now.
DeleteThis is Zito we are talking about, of course there will be another. :^) As well, there will be the good starts too. And we've seen these types of starts from our other starters as well, there is no way to escape these blow-outs, you just lick your wounds and magically you have another game soon and can forget about lousy game.
DeleteVogelsong is probably one of the most unique cases ever in the history of baseball, like DrB noted. One season of dominance, maybe, but he did it for two seasons, almost, before he started struggling. And really, he's not struggling per se, his sabermetrics still looks good, he's just not executing at the right moments as much as before. So I expect his to revert to his prior goodness at some point.
And to expect Bonser to be the next Vogelsong? I wouldn't put that on anyone. It's like hoping the next Rule 5 draft pick is the next Johan Santana or Josh Hamilton, the odds are totally against it, it will happen when it happens, there is no way to anticipate the next one nor any reason to place that label on any player.
I would rather ask whether Boof can be a decent mid-to-back rotation guy. That's the type who can replace Zito when his time is up, and that would save us a lot of money if he can do that, money we can use to shore up other areas on the team. To hope for anything more is folly, I think.
Was it Savannah?
ReplyDeleteGoogle is your friend:
DeleteHagerstown
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=bonser001joh