Well Dear Reader, the G-men have plummeted back down to earth in the second half. Though we are 58-41 and in first place in the NL West, that lead has shrunk from six and a half to just two and a half games after the 1-8 stretch since the All-Star Break.
Optimism is hard to find, but I have faith in Bochy and the staff because I know we faced weird difficulties each of the previous times we won it:
- Chase the D-Backs all year and take it from them the last weekend in 2010
- Lose our best bat Melky Cabrera, one of the best hitters in baseball, in 2012
- Forced into a committee of closers, having to send MadBum on short rest out to finish the job against the darlings of the nation at Kauffman in 2014
Maybe it’s par for the course. There has to be struggle for the championship to mean something. Maybe there aren’t going to be 100-game winners that often anymore. Maybe there is just so much parity in the long season of baseball, so much Law of Averages, that from now on there will never be a consecutive World Series Champion or end-to-end first place finishers.
I don’t know, but here’s GBC Reader Issue Ten, filled with doom and gloom.
- Hank Schulman wrote an excellent break down of the pursuit for a reliever
- AlPav talked to Skip about WTH happened on the road trip.
- Baggs turned his blog over to Carl Steward, a joyful fellow who titled his piece cheerfully: “The Skid Continues, the Postseason Could be in Jeopardy, and the Trade Options Look Sketchy at Best.”
- Brisbee is depressed, and not nearly as fun, but he humanizes when he is depressed which is nice.
- And just so we end on a positive note, Berman showed up again to write about how cool Mac Williamson is.
And speaking of Mac Williamson, for me the biggest excuse is we’ve had three of our major bats out: Pence, Panik and Duffy – lotsa situational hitting, power, RBI’s, average on the DL there.
- [UPDATE: This just in … groug discusses the rookies in detail a propos of trying to decide which one goes down when Joe Panik returns]
To their credit the rookies have worked hard and done pretty well filling in. One can’t expect them to produce like those three guys. I am glad they got experience here in July and it isn’t like last year when all the injuries hit us during the stretch.
I Still Believe.
Let’s Go Giants!
Love,
MTK