Game Wrap 10/5/2022: Giants 8 Padres 1

 David Villar DH hit 2 HR's to lead the Giants offense in a battle of bullpen games to send his stock into the stratosphere going into the offseason.  

Villar finished the season with a very respectable .231/.331/.455 slash line with 9 HR's, but it was really the tale of two callups.  In his first MLB experience which lasted from July 4- Aug 4, he batted just .175 with 1 HR.  He was sent back to AAA with some things to work on.  He must have taken that to heart because his second callup starting from Sept 2 went spectacularly better:  By my calculations his Sept/Oct slash line is .269/.327/.656 with 8 HR.  He combined for a total of 37 HR's between AAA and MLB.  Casual reminder that he slashed .275/.404/.617 with 20 HR's last season at AA Richmond.  Villar has to be penciled in for everyday PA's at some position or combination of positions for next season. 

Here are a few other selected lines from today's season finale:

Lamonte Wade Jr LF- 3 for 5, SB(1).  BA= .207.  Wonder what Wade Jr would have done had he not missed close to half a season with a bad knee and probably was never 100%.  Can the knee get to 100% with an offseason of healing?  

Mike Yastrzemski RF- 2 for 3, 2B, BB, SF.  BA= .214.  After a decent April and a terrific May, YtY's season absolutely tanked for the next 3 months with a BA well below the Mendoza Line.  Sept/Oct have been much better with respective slashes of .261/.320/.511 and .222/.286/.444 with 5 HR's. Way too little, too late for this season but will it buy him a ticket to next year's roster?

Austin Slater CF/LF- 2 for 5, HR(7), SB(12).  BA= .264.  Slater's ability to play CF and bat from the R side would seem to put him in a strong position to stay for next season.

Yunior Marte RHP- 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K's.  ERA= 5.44.  Marte has top of the line raw talent.  It's been a roller-coaster ride but put up a 2.16 ERA over his last 7 appearances.  I really want to see if he can take it to the next level.  

Alex Young LHP- 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K's.  ERA= 2.36.  Young and Scott Alexander LHP stabilized the left side of the Giants bullpen after an on-the-fly late-season rebuild.  Alexander is a free agent but Young should definitely be back.

Andrew Vasquez LHP- 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K's.  ERA= 6.23.  This was Vasquez' only appearance of the season with the Giants.  He put up an 8.10 ERA in 6.2 IP for the Blue Jays earlier in the season.

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No game tomorrow or the next day or the day after that. The Giants 2022 season is in the books.  They finish at exactly .500 for the first time in franchise history going all the way back to New York era.  I just want to thank everybody for coming here, reading and commenting for the 13'th season of Game Wraps since When The Giants Come To Town started before the historic 2010 season.

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Great news out of the Arizona Fall League where Luis Matos homered for the second straight game and is batting .357 with a 2B, 3B, 2 HR's over his the first 3 games.