28 Monday Nov 2022
Posted in 2022, Amsterdam, art, Commentary, history, Letter From MTK, philosophy
Tags
17th, acknowledgement, Amsterdam, baruch, c., century, colonialism, Dekker, Douwes, dutch, Edouard, enlightenment, Era, Francisco, Frans, giants, golden, Hals, Karthik, m.t., master, masters, mtk, Multatuli, painters, painting, philosophy, post, post-colonialism, racism, Rembrandt, rijks, Rijksmuseum, San, sf, slavery, spinoza
I am writing something and these are my initial thoughts
16 Sunday Oct 2022
Posted in 2022, performance, S.F., sport, sports
10 Sunday Jul 2022
19 Thursday May 2022
Posted in 2022, Coastal Cali, mollusks, S.F.
14 Monday Aug 2017
Posted in Final Post
Tags
archive, baseball, corner, final, Francisco, gbc, giants, Karthik, League, major, mlb, mtk, National, post, San, sf, sfgiants
The Giants are having an historically terrible year. So it seems a good time to end this project and call it an archive.
Thank you for reading Giants Baseball Corner and engaging with me these seven years from August 2010 to August 2017. It has been a lot of fun.
This site‘s now my archive of the San Francisco Giants during their historic run to three World Series Championships in five years. It was an incredible time to be a Giant fan – filled with relief and joyous wonderment.
Every word, image or thought herein was produced by M.T. Karthik, your MC and host.
Go Giants!
Love,
MTK
21 Sunday May 2017
Posted in Book Review, reviews
Tags
book, Cixin, Dark, Earth's, fiction, forest, Karthik, Liu, m.t., mtk, novel, Past, Remembrance, review, sci-fi, science, sf, trilogy, two
My mind has been expanded significantly by the first two books of Cixin Liu’s Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy. The scale and scope of the undertaking is truly on par with the greatest science fiction I’ve ever read. Hard science and theoretical ideas run deep, but remain very human and rational.
It’s a syncretic hyper-extension of the way we think and behave pushed into a highly orchestrated future that requires deep conceptualization to imagine.
Comparisons to Asimov are apt.
Cixin Liu boldly describes human culture and philosophy facing impending first contact with an alien race that has advanced technology with a richness of supposition and detail that captures a wide range of human emotion and response. He does this with very few characters and an elaborate, all-encompassing style. The details are exceptionally well thought-out.
The setup incorporates the vast distances in space and a nuanced portrayal of human society dealing with an enemy about whom little is known and who will not arrive to attack for hundreds of years.
I am continually taken aback at the breadth of this work. Liu’s narrative is centuries long. It’s on the scale of James Blish (Cities in Flight) or, as has been noted, Frank Herbert (Dune).
While humans invent cryogenic hibernation and a space armada and other standard responses of sci-fi to deal with this situation, there are unique circumstances.
The sophons, a pan-dimensional use of protons that travel across space, arriving at Earth to unfold and manipulate our reality, was a mind-blowing central concept of The Three-Body Problem. In Book Two, Liu posits Wallfacers and their companion Wallbreakers as a complex reaction to this tactic of the Trisolarans.
Since the Trisolarans can see, read and influence human behavior, the only safe space to shield anything from them is within the human mind. The Wallfacers are created and tasked with never writing anything down, never explaining what they do or why they do it to anyone. They embark on their plans to resist the Trisolarans independent of social and military planners. Wallfacers become the central pre-occupation of The Dark Forest. It is conceptually impressive and flourishes into a great plot.
The Trisolarans do not make any significant appearance until the climactic battle at the end of this volume and are peripheral players throughout. This allows Liu to explore humanity through the behavior – and responses to the behavior – of the Wallfacers in a way that is totally original.
So now Liu has to describe humanity’s initial response – filled with variety: those who give up, those who would fight, those who would defect to the enemy – and to posit the extension of all these reactions 200 years into the future.
It’s galactic in scale and all just a little hard to swallow by the time you get to the division of this book between Earth of the late-20th/early 21st century and human culture of the year 2200. But to Liu’s credit The Dark Forest is more human and relationships are deeper, more sensitive and believable.
Cixin Liu grew significantly as a writer between the two works. He takes on the psychology of humanity faced with the cosmic situation he has created and works through abstract philosophical responses to create a range of believable, if summarized, cultural changes in us.
I liked The Dark Forest better than The Three-Body Problem because Liu goes further to extrapolate his visions of how humanity behaves in the face of the complex circumstance he has created. He includes and fills-out more intimate reactions and attempts to create a broad image of us and how we react – intelligently but oh, so human.
The Wallfacer Project is the primary mechanism for this. That the story advances 200 years in a leap of human culture is the second. Without giving too much away, allow me to say that many of the characters manage to hibernate and emerge hundreds of years later which results in a fascinating conceit:
Liu convincingly describes near-future humans who have survived post-Trisolaran contact. They’ve endured The Great Ravine – an epic depression of global scale that reduced human population by billions – and an era that forced most cities underground. Their tech is smart.
But this future human society is confronted daily by waking up hibernators, characters we know and appreciate from our time, awakened on schedule to proceed with the ultimate plan of Earth’s defense. It creates a truly original relationship between us and our future selves.
In some ways Liu’s future human relationships are a near-perfect emulation of contemporary generational relationships between the Digital Generation and anybody over 40. The clunky 21st-century hibernators call them “kids” though they’re a highly advanced civilization.
The Dark Forest is considerably more about philosophy, politics and social and military strategy than The Three-Body Problem, which was more computing and science. But it’s pretty heady stuff.
All of it is headed toward first contact and when the 2000-spacecraft-strong armada of Earth finally meets the first craft from Trisolaris, the story doesn’t disappoint. So many previous steps have led to this moment in our narrative, they unfold like the petals of a blooming flower as the action explodes. The battle is a brilliant sequence.
We come now to a principle failing of this work. The conclusion of volume two is meant to bring a suspension at last to first contact, but the solution that achieves this was, to me, a disappointment. When it finally happens, I wondered why it hadn’t come sooner to us to approach the problem this way.
I’m obviously trying to critique here without giving anything away, so I’ll conclude with a metaphor from another saga.
I used to love trolling fans of The Lord of the Rings by saying, “Put the ring in a box. Give it to the Eagles. Tell them to drop it in the fires of Mordor. End of story in 20 minutes.” After all, the Eagles easily defeat the winged Fellbeasts of the Nazgul in the great war of Middle Earth, they’d have no problem getting by them to rid the world of the ring.
Sometimes a simple plot hole can take away the power of a saga, so you have to avoid it to go on, and to enjoy the ride.
I hate to say it, but when the final philosophical and cosmological play is made in the battle between Earth and Trisolaris – elaborate and complex as it is – I saw it coming.
I really, really want to elaborate with anyone who has read these two.
Off to read Book Three, Death’s End!
mtk
18 Thursday May 2017
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
archive, baseball, compendium, corner, Francisco, gbc, giants, League, links, major, National, reader, review, San, sf, sfgiants, stories
The last ten days have been promising for the G-men. We took 3 of 4 from the Nemesis at the Yard! It was great. Kershaw beat us and Cueto got a little hot under the collar, resulting in a bench-clearing kerfuffle, but it was great to #BeatLA again.
We had a 17-inning game that ended on a Buster Posey walkoff HR! Around the Foghorn’s Vince Cestone ruminates it could be the game that turns things around.
Stat Man Doug Bruzzone has two pieces on our pitchers and our hitting that are interesting.
Barry Bonds is Finally Getting a Plaque on the Giants Wall of Fame
Brisbee’s take has a complete list of those honored and this gem: “If you’re agitated by the Belt Wars, you have no idea what it was like to live through the Great Snow Conflicts.”
While Haft has some nice, clean history and stats of the greatest power hitter to ever play the game (the GPHOAT) up on the Giants site.
Pence went on the DL and the Giants called Mac Williamson up. But he hasn’t done much yet. Christian Arroyo has been the star of May thus far. The rookie was called up and immediately brought fireworks and a clutch bat that seemed to juice the team. He needs a nickname and I prefer Spanky, case he looks like Spanky from Our Gang, but I am old, so it looks like the memory-less Millennials are gonna settle on The Kid or Boss Baby.
18 Thursday May 2017
Posted in Book Review, reviews
Tags
Body, book, Cixin, Karthik, Ken, Liu, m.t., mtk, novel, problem, review, sci-fi, sf, three, three-body
I embarked on The Three-Body Problem because a colleague considered it a cultural touchstone that occupies the moment between China and the Western world. I traveled in Chinese-speaking countries for many years, and know a little of the Chinese having studied there, but this is the first Chinese novel – sci-fi or otherwise – I’ve ever read, so I was curious how it would be.
The Three-Body Problem is Book One of Remembrance of Earth’s Past, a trilogy being marketed as a global phenomenon: the first major sci-fi novel out of China by “China’s most beloved science fiction author, Liu Cixin.” It received the Chinese Science Fiction Galaxy Award in 2006 and Three-Body Problem has been immensely popular among hundreds of millions of Chinese and a comparatively small, committed group of sci-fi readers internationally. It was originally published serially.
The English translation by Ken Liu (Tor, 2014) was nominated for a Nebula and Hugo Award for best novel – becoming the first translated novel to be nominated for a major SF award since Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities in 1976. Three-Body Problem won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2015.
Translations of Books Two and Three were released in 2015 and ’16 and the Three-Body Problem movie is expected later this year.
The novel takes the late-1960’s, early-70’s as a launching point for a fictional narrative that bounces forward 40 years to look back upon it as history. The context for beginning requires some understanding of the temperament of China, then. I took footnotes seriously and in real-time. I kept my cell-phone or computer handy and spent a few minutes googling and reading about historical events and figures as I went along to aid the translation. It helps.
The main characters are mostly scientists – theoretical physicists, astrophysicists, a nanomaterials guy – or military strategists. This is highly intellectual hard science and military thinking. You have to know a thing or two about the state of contemporary knowledge in many disciplines or be willing to learn as you go. I think this would have been more enjoyable in the serial form. I got regular headaches trying to read and follow all this in massive novel form.
Keeping Google handy helps a lot with both the Chinese history and the science. Complex scientific theories and ideas are referenced liberally throughout. It’s apparent Cixin Liu, an engineer by trade, has an expansive and comprehensive understanding of many disciplines. His knowledge of computing, theoretical physics, astronomy and chemistry has bloomed into the books of Remembrance of Earth’s Past. I got headaches, but I learned a lot.
The Setup
During the Cultural Revolution in China, a young woman, Ye Winjie, sees her father, a prominent scientist, killed before her eyes. Ye Winjie is profoundly affected by this and the brutal ignorance of the state and its ferverous minions. She grows up to be a scientist, herself, and is assigned to a remote radar telescope facility for a top secret project. She discovers scientists have revealed an alien culture in the vicinity of Earth’s next-nearest star, Alpha Centauri. A warning from the alien culture not to reveal Earth’s location for fear of invasion is unequivocal.
Ye Wenjie decides life under humanity is worse than worthless, headed for self-destruction, and, skillfully masking her intentions to gain the access necessary, she uses a massive radar dish and the power of the sun as an amplifier, to send a message across space, unilaterally inviting the aliens to come to Earth and take over. And so begins the saga between Earth and Trisolaris that will last hundreds of years.
Now two groups of people exist on Earth who know about the aliens, those who want to prevent them from coming and those who would aid them. We are are led in the narrative of those who would prevent them by a naive but inquisitive scientist and his gruff but lovable foil, an earthy cop who balances out the eggheads and help them push on.
Ye Winjie is a confined leader of those who would aid the aliens – called Trisolarans because they live on a planet with three suns. Yet she manages to connect with a disgruntled hippie who believes imperialist capitalists are carelessly destroying the world. He in turn inherits billions from his industrialist father, and together they create a small, committed force to help the aliens come to Earth to take over.
Meanwhile, the chapters concerning the Trisolarans are fast and heady. The unique structure of their system – a planet with three suns – results in rapid-fire changes described expertly in socio-philosophical and biological terms. It’s smart, interesting theoretical evolution.
The Three-Body Problem is a huge story with bold strokes, and lots of technical and philosophical ideas emerge from high concepts and hard science. A solid understanding of computing, physics, astrophysics, chemistry and theory is brilliantly at play here as the Trisolarans develop and indeed outdevelop us.
There are fascinating conceits:
While science makes this novel complex, by the time it all gets unraveled, including the complicated rationale of the humans who choose to collude with the aliens in their effort to take over the Earth, we are left with a basic story and simple characters executing a complex, tumbling plan toward Human and Trisolaran interaction. It’s a contact story that spans hundreds of years.
I was reminded of the devices of other sci-fi novels – the aliens use a video game to communicate with humans like in Ender’s Game, the rapid evolution of the Trisolarans reminded me of a story I read in the 80’s about life that forms on a pulsar.
The science and technology elevate this work more than the philosophy. There are clunky philosophical problems I associate as typically sci-fi that are exposed by the science, but it feels inhuman.
It’s sad and simplistic to accept a sane, highly educated person could give up on humanity unilaterally and gain access to the means to execute their betrayal. Isn’t it? It may sound sexist, but I couldn’t imagine a woman being the one to do it.
Once she commits the greatest universal act of betrayal in human history, Ye Winjie finds a community of supporters from cultures all over the world. Have we given up on ourselves so completely? It’s depressing.
This strikes me as a cultural question. Maybe it’s a collision of my mindset with contemporary Chinese or SF. The Chinese and the Trisolarans are foreigners to me here and Sci-Fi is my means of comprehending each, only abstrusely.
Conveniently, the Trisolarans live only four and a half light years away, so communications require just eight years between planets. Presumably in the next volume … we meet.
I finish what I start so I’ll review The Dark Forest, Volume Two of Cixin Liu’s Remembrance of Earth’s Past, next.
01 Monday May 2017
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
arroyo, baseball, Blach, Bochy, Bruce, Christian, compendium, corner, gbc, giants, Karthik, League, m.t., major, mark, Melancon, mlb, mtk, National, reader, sf, sfgiants, sports, Ty
The first month of the season was turbulent, chaotic and unpredictable.
MadBum ripped two home runs on Opening Day, the only pitcher in history to achieve such a feat, and we lost. We scored a bunch of runs in the next several games and lost, then we lost Skip for a coupla games and a buncha guys for more and we lost, and then we didn’t score many runs and lost.
That adds up to 17 losses and a 9-17 month of April good for dead last in the National League West. There was always some weird issue in addition to the ones we were expecting – namely LF and the bullpen – and it’s apparent nobody’s comfortable except Johnny Cueto.
BASG sighting! SB’s take on the off-field difficulties stacking up for the G-men is a good read and very relevant.
Here’s AlPav’s Slideshow of Takeaways from the Giants opening month.
Daniel Sperry at Around the Foghorn calls the Giants’ April “Bad, Really Bad” but he includes some positives.
While his colleague Justin Rodgers asks and tries to answer what it will take to turn the season around.
Christian Arroyo is the star of the week: here’s Kaila Cruz at AtF on the kid. Everybody’s looking for a nickname and I am cool with #BossBaby.
BASG also chimed in loudly in favor of the Arroyo call up and brought up how the Boss Baby and Michael Morse have brought back the fun, reminding us of some of our fun times in the recent past.
On cue, here’s Michael Morse talking to Giants baseball bats to get hits out of ’em.
Ty Blach had another great start, pointed out by Michael Wagaman.
This is a team in transition from the World Series Championship Era (2010-2014), an era that’s deceptively long because Madison Bumgarner was almost single-handedly responsible for the last Championship, winning the WC play-in game and game seven at Kaufmann Stadium for us. The Nemesis has won the division four straight years while the Giants have just managed to stay in the playoffs twice via wildcard and #MadBum.
Our attempts to stay in it while re-organizing have been a war of attrition. Since the last Championship team, we’ve lost: Pablo Sandoval and Matt Duffy at 3B; Affeldt, Casilla, Lopez, Romo and Petit from the ‘pen; Vogelsong, Zito, Lincecum, Hudson, Peavy from the starters (and Cain has been absent).
ESPN Sr. Writer David Schoenfeld expands on this thought very effectively in his piece from a couple of days ago, Spring Setbacks Thwart NL Contenders and thankfully he includes the woes of the nemesis for some pain relief.
The nemesis and the Rockies and D-Backs have been tooling to win and it’s unrealistic in the modern game to expect to just fall back into the lead. It’s almost impossible to repeat as a champion these days. (There hasn’t yet been a back-to-back WS Champ in the 21st Century).
That said, when they’re rolling we have a pretty great starting rotation. Matt Cain has looked considerably better lately and though Samardzija is struggling now, I feel it is sort of his m.o. to pick it up as the season goes on. Bum, Cueto and Moore are legit playoff starters.
Brandon Crawford, Joe Panik, Hunter Pence and Buster Posey are all playing well. Though the bats with RISP are still just so bad.
Eduardo Nuñez and Denard Span have good at-bats and the platoon of LF are trying to find an identity. The addition of Morse is a real shot-in-the-arm.
The bullpen is a hot mess, but Mark Melancon is an elite closer and he has the capacity to anchor this squad and hopefully they can pull it together.
I am just blathering because we just don’t look very good right now … I don’t know what else to say, so I will just say
Go Giants!
love,
MTK
18 Tuesday Apr 2017
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
alex, baseball, blackburn, Bumgarner, Buster, cain, chris, Clayton, de la rosa, frandy, gbc, giants, hundley, Jake, jarrett, Jeff, Karthik, League, m.t. karthik, Madison, major, marrero, mastroianni, matt, mlb, Moore, mtk, National, nick, olney, Parker, pavlovic, Posey, reader, samardzija, sf
Well the first fourteen games (four series) of the season are behind us and a couple of things are already clear.
Though we’re 5-9 and tied for last in the division with the Padres, we’re only four back because everyone in the NL West is actively beating up on each other. I have a strong feeling that’s how it’s going to be all year.
To get the Negative Nelly out of the way first, Grant Cohn of the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat is convinced after just 14 games that the Giants “dynasty is over,” and that we are not going to make the playoffs.
Me, I am not so sure. There’s a lot of baseball left to play.
Pluses and Minuses
Johnny Cueto is 3-0 while Madison Bumgarner has yet to win in three starts. Once again a Cy Young campaign for MadBum’s hamstrung early. sigh.
Our Gold Glovers Joe Panik and Brandon Crawford look awesome, but we lost Buster Posey to a fastball to the head. John Shea wrote this excellent piece on the after effects of getting hit in the head by a 90+mph baseball. It is reported that Posey may play in the series against Kansas City that starts tonight.
Nick Hundley has been really good in Posey’s absence, a stable veteran behind the plate who instills confidence in the position of backup C.
Nuñez ABs are fun to watch and he is a demon on the bases, but his play at third has been up and down. Let’s hope it’s early season stuff. I really like the guy.
Brandon Belt and Hunter Pence are looking good at the plate.
Matt Moore looks good for about 78- 85 pitches and then the drop off seems a little crazy. The fact Bochy doesn’t feel he can trust our ‘pen hurts in Moore’s starts.
But Mark Melancon turned around after his weak opening day showing and has looked considerably better.
Jeff Samardzija, like last year, is probably going to take a few starts to get going.
Matt Cain got a win! (Olney comments below)
LF has been a problem and it was compounded when Jarrett Parker made a great play only to crash into the wall and destroy his clavicle – gone eight to ten weeks.
On to the Reader
With Parker going down Chris Marrero could be seeing more time in left field. Kaila Cruz thinks that’s a good thing.
We traded Clayton Blackburn to the Rangers for a 21-year-old unproven utility infielder named Frandy De La Rosa – Brisbee explains why.
Jake Mastroianni has a closer look at the pitching and offense two weeks into the season.
Buster Olney had this to say about Matt The Big Horse and his win.
The Giants’ Matt Cain is facing a similar transition to the one that CC Sabathia has had to go through — adjusting to the reality that he cannot throw as hard as he used to and learning to mix his pitches differently. In Cain’s most recent start against Arizona, he did what catchers and pitchers refer to as pitching backward — by throwing breaking balls in counts in which pitchers typically throw fastballs and using his off-speed stuff to set up the less frequent use of his fastball. Cain allowed one run in five innings. Sabathia recalled an at-bat in which he pitched to Russell Martin a couple of years ago, when the left-hander had it in his mind that he would bust a fastball past his former teammate — but the best he could do was 90 mph, which Martin clubbed for a homer. Sabathia says now that he wishes he had started altering speeds with his pitches earlier in his career.
- Buster Olney on ESPN
If you haven’t yet read the sweet, sweet quotes in AlPav’s look back at Madison Bumgarner’s relief appearance in Game seven of the 2014 WS in KC, do it now.
Love,
MTK
30 Friday Sep 2016
Posted in PreGame GBCs
The second half has been very much like a root canal but at last, the playoffs are around the corner and the Giants have just a little more work to do to ensure we’re once again in the postseason in an even year this decade.
All Giants fans are of course confident that if we just get in we can go on an epic tear with our postseason roster, as we have done in each of the last even years this decade.
That confidence resides within all of us but was best phrased in all caps by Grant Brisbee in 2012 before the World Series vs. the Tigers. (You can’t spell Brisbee without S-E-E-R).
But today and this weekend the pathway is clear:
Beat LA and Seize The Division.
It is a pleasure to beat the nemesis, but certainly it means the most when there’s the postseason on the line and we handle business. I really hope we show some force this weekend and seize the wild card – a sweep would be sweet.
I still believe we can do this despite not having a closer, or even a bullpen I trust. Because I believe we do have Champions Blood. When the chips are down, we got as good a chance as anyone.
If we end up playing the Mets, as I think is likely now, I am starting to wonder whether we should start Cueto rather than Bumgarner … which seems crazy to type, but there it is.
Samardzija out of the ‘pen might be a thing we see this weekend and in the postseason, which also seems crazy.
But we gotta win one at a time, so for right tonight, I am dressed. Let’s get it on!
Beat LA
Seize The Division
Let’s Go Giants!
Love,
MTK
12 Monday Sep 2016
Posted in Commentary, Uncategorized
Tags
AT&T, baseball, Bumgarner, Cueto, Francisco, giants, johnny, Karthik, League, Madison, major, mlb, mtk, National, park, run, San, series, sf, stretch, win
And so it comes to this.
The best first half in the majors and the second-worst second half in the majors sums to the most important home stand of the year with twenty games to play.
Seven games: three against the Padres and four against the Cardinals who are outside looking in and trying, with the Mets, to pry us from atop the National League Wild Card standings.
The difference between eking out the Wild Card and seizing the division from the nemesis lies in these next seven games. We have to take five.
We were happy in June. This team looked built to make the run. The pieces all made sense and our record was the result of beautiful play. We were happy because we won without Pence, Panik, Duffy and Romo. If anything we were enthused because we knew we’d have them all back healthy for the stretch run. The pain of last year when all the injuries hit in August was fresh in our minds. (To be honest we’ve been pretty lucky in that regard).
Johnny Cueto tore it up and started the All-Star Game. We voted Belt into the summer classic with vigor. Cain and Peavy were mostly bad, but it didn’t seem to matter. Until he went down Romo was a great set-up man for Casilla who collected the majority of his 31 saves and looked like he could be the closer. (That team still exists).
Then this epic collapse of hitting and failures in the bullpen in the second half necessitated re-engineering the rotation, forced us to deal beloved Duffy.
I for one fully support what I think was swift and bold decision-making by Bobby Evans, Brian Sabean, Larry Baer, Bruce Bochy and staff. We had to do something quick and if we didn’t pick up Matt Moore, I am not sure we would even have a chance right now. Add to that the success Eduardo Núñez has had at third and at the plate, and I’m more than pleased we made the deal.
If we have to play the Mets or Nats in the play-in game I am confident we can send out MadBum and have a great chance to win. But thanks to the trade, I now also feel, with Cueto starting against the Cubs, then Samardzija/Moore and back to Bumgarner, we actually have a shot to beat the league leaders, to win the NLCS.
and today, David Schoenfeld, the SweetSpot Blogger on ESPN says,
“Consider:
Which brings us to the biggest home stand of the year.
Our biggest concern is a big one: the bullpen is a mess. Our second biggest concern is an ongoing lack of timely hitting, a situational slump at the plate particularly with runners in scoring position that has made #RISPsigh a thing now.
But on the positive side we got what we asked for, all the pieces we need and we are healthy. Hunter Pence just decided to turn it up several notches. Brandon Crawford and Buster Posey know the stretch.
Panik has to follow Núñez who has also been making it happen. Span and Pagan gotta get hot at the same time and Belt … I need you Brandon, I need some power from you. More aggressiveness at the plate. I love the walks and the on-base percentage, but take a chance and rock that thing.
The sharpness is returning to the starters. I like that. And the bullpen? Well I know this, they can’t do it without our support. I can’t be there, but the yard better be rocking.
Let’s Go Giants! Take ’em one day at a time and win ’em all.
25 Guys One Common Goal
Win Today!!!
Love,
MTK
05 Monday Sep 2016
Posted in Commentary
September is a funny time for baseball fans whose teams are in the running. My nails are all chewed down to the cuticle. My hair gets a little greyer each year in September. There is agony and joy wrapped up in this beautiful game that confounds and delights us.
I can remember my son’s first SF Giants game like it was yesterday. It was a September 17th game against the division-leading Rockies. This was 2009 and my kid was seven years old. It was Randy Johnson Poster night and he still has his orange My First Ballgame certificate from the Giants and his poster celebrating The Big Unit’s 300th Win, which came that year with Johnson in a Giants uniform.
The Giants trailed the Rox by just two games and Matt Cain was on the mound facing Jorge de la Rosa. We had watched and listened to the Giants all summer and I bought tickets to that game because I figured it might be the one that either got us into a playoff chase or ended our run at the Rockies.
In the ninth, down 4-3, the Giants had runners on 2nd and 3rd with two outs, and we were standing and yelling our guts out when Edgar Renteria grounded out to end the game. The Rockies took a three-game lead with them out of town and we never got closer to the playoffs that year.
The following September of course was our epic run-down of the Snakes that culminated in us stealing the division on the last day and eventually the 2010 World Series Championship And since then, like clockwork, we’ve had a good September every other year and taken it all the way to the World Series, winning twice more. Amazing.
Our runs and collapses in perfect order these last six years have added a powerful, albeit false, pressure to this year.
We ought to be realistic about the incredible run we have just made and see it as unprecedented in quality. We ought to acknowledge we may be fading now not because we cannot do it, not because we don’t have the talent, but rather because we may just finally be out of steam from what has been an exceptional amount of success.
Changes to the team are at the heart of this: the loss of pitchers Petit, Vogelsong and Hudson and the fading of Lincecum and Cain have weakened our formidable staff. Even Javier Lopez doesn’t look as dominant as he has these past few years (not to mention he can’t be spelled by Affeldt anymore either).
Our attempts to just plug in Cueto and Samardzija and Matt Moore and a slew of relievers cannot be expected to align with our every-other-year success. It’s a different team.
In terms of hitting, we lost Pablo and I know how much you all love Matt Duffy (I do, too), but the Panda was a special part of our Championship years. We’ve had four third basemen since Sandoval left … just two years ago. We squeezed out much of the last talent from other hitters: Pat Burrell, Aubrey Huff (THE BUNT ON NOVEMBER 1ST!), Cody Ross, Marco Scutaro, Ryan Theriot, a doping Melky Cabrera. And despite Posey, Pence, Panik, Pagan and Crawford hitting well, hitting remains a problem whether we win or not, which is why winning the World Series the way we have has been even more amazing.
Point is, I don’t want to get all wound up and agonized if we don’t manage to find success all the way to the World Series again. I think the expectation we should is inflated, unrealistic and for some solely predicated on the fact it’s an even year – which is meaningless.
This September may be the end of an amazing dream. If so, I would rather celebrate how successful these last six years have been and lose with the grace of a winner.
I am not giving up. I am in this fight daily and rooting for our boys to do it again. It would be unreal if they did it again. I mean, what a dream – a dream that just keeps not ending? Wow. I want it. I believe we can do it … because we have.
But to expect it isn’t cool.
So let’s turn that even year expectation down a bit, yeah?
16 Tuesday Aug 2016
Posted in Commentary
Tags
baseball, Brandon, Bumgarner, Casilla, corner, Francisco, giants, Karthik, Madison, mlb, National, pagan, pence, Romo, San, Sandoval, sf, sfg, win
We have endured the East Coast and LA bias from national networks for so long they’re irrelevant to us. In fact sometimes it feels better to ride the role of underdog, knowing we have the most experienced, smartest and most tightly knit coaching staff in all the majors.
The mainstream sports media and the hulking brutes of NYC and Chicago always count us out. They have no comprehension of the nuances of the game or teamwork.
They counted us out when we were chasing the D-Backs in ’10 and again vs. the then-Champion Phillies and again in the World Series – even after seeing what MadBum, Timmy and the Beard could do. Not to mention the quietly peerless Buster Posey.
They counted us out when Melky went down for PED use, and we all agreed WE wouldn’t allow him back for the playoffs – though we could have – but rather try to soldier on. This one is always my favorite of the three, because of Pablo’s 3HR, with two off Verlander (him saying “wow,” watching the second one go out – best bad ball hitter ever: Pablo Sandoval). How Romo dismissed Cabrera is maybe my favorite SFGiants WS moment ever.
Then in 2014, they counted us out as a wild card has-been! and we just Madbummed the shit out of them. They counted us out against the Darlings of the Nation and we sent MadBum out to finish them off in their house.
So we are USED to being the ones counted OUT.
But what we know is different. We know we have Rags, Skip, Bam-Bam and Wotus in place. We know that losing Flan for the more conservative Kelly is really just an adjustment, not a loss. We have a Hall of Fame manager who has been through it all.
We know these guys know how to win with their backs against the wall. We know if we just get in to the playoffs, we have as a good a chance as any and a better chance than most because we have CHAMPIONS BLOOD.
I for one, believe that the moves we made are good moves. It hurts so much to have lost Vogey and Petit and Duffy. It hurts a LOT.
But I understand what Evans and Sabean are trying to do and I approve. These are aggressive and expensive moves – Samardzija and Cueto were $90million! We’ve never paid that kinda money for two players before. Duffy was just awesome in Panda’s place for a critical WS series year and more. But I get the trade. Getting the right puzzle pieces is hella expensive.
Here’s what I know: they can’t win if we don’t believe.
and I do.
I believe in this team of managers, coaches and players. I think the new guys need to tune in to a culture of winning and realize that petty losses should be dumped immediately. This is a tightrope walk, not whack-a-mole.
I know Posey, Pence, Bcraw, Belt, Panik, Pagan, D-Span, Nunez and our pitchers that rake can get out of this slump and start producing like the machine they were earlier in the season. It’s all about getting hot at the right time and we have the machine that can do that.
We dispensed with injuries to Pence and Panik and Pagan early so they are ready and playing well.
We dealt for better – read more experienced – pitching help for the bullpen and starters. We’re doing all the right things.
(EXCEPT I STILL REALLY THINK WE OUGHTA BAT THE SP IN THE 8 SPOT AND LET PAGAN AND D-SPAN BECOME BACK-TO-BACK LEADOFF HITTERS).
Anyway, all that is left is:
for us to believe and
for the guys to never quit.
We believe.
so, guys? …. Never Quit.
Love,
MTK
12 Friday Aug 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
12, AT&T, baseball, corner, dugout, Francisco, gbc, giants, issue, mlb, mtk, number, park, reader, San, series, sf, sign, twelve
With 48 games left to play, the San Francisco Giants hold a one game lead over the nemesis in the NL West and have returned home to the confines of AT&T nee´ Pac-Bell Park for a much needed ten game home stand.
Hunter Pence came home with a black eye. Buster Posey’s face was all busted up. We lost a 1-0 CG by Bumgarner and we pounced on and beat Strasbourg. Brandon Crawford had a seven-hit game! We won a 1-0 game for Samardzija. It was a crazy trip.
But now we are home and we’re up a game and there are four dozen left to play. Here at Giants Baseball Corner we changed the avatar of the Twitter account to the one we have used for the stretch run since 2012, our photo of the dugout sign that was featured in the Emmy-award winning Episode 7 of SFG Productions Orange October.
I only have one wish left and that’s to see Bruce Bochy vs. Joe Maddon in the NLCS.
But I must be patient, be filled with fear and hope. I must focus on today. Win today.
ON TO THE GBC READER NUMBER 12:
Brisbee posted a really nice analysis of the way we swing the bat. What we hit, what we miss and how. I encourage you to read it ’cause there are silver linings galore.
Brandon Crawford had SEVEN HITS in a game! It was insane. He went 7 for 8! His batting average increased by 13 points in one night. It was boss. Doing what they do best, which is archiving, CSNBA and AlPav did a really cool bit covering two men to have seven hits in a game. While in Miami, they found the previous and they got them together. Was awesome.
Berman even wrote about Crawford’s wonder.
Baggs has a nice piece on a turning point for the bullpen. Stricky looking better, with more pitches and some command. Casilla coming back with a vengeance from the humiliation of the balk. Derek Law putting up numbers.
48 to play. Let’s get this done.
Win Today.
Have fun.
love,
MTK
04 Thursday Aug 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
archive, baseball, corner, current, Francisco, gbc, giants, gigantes, League, link, links, los, major, mlb, National, reader, readers, San, sf
Welcome gentle reader to The Giants Baseball Corner Reader, Issue 11, a compendium of links to stories and stuff about the Giants since the last GBC Reader.
BTW, You can always read all the Readers as a summation of the season to this point by clicking on the GBC Reader Category link to the right, and they all come up.
Steve Berman, Bay Area Sports Guy, hasn’t been writing much about the G-men this season, but the trade deadline brought this very nice analysis of what he figures the Giants did and why. Good piece.
AlPav has a nice get-to-know-ya with Will Smith, the Giants’ newest left-handed reliever. I am already on the record that anyone who makes an OBVIOUS pun about his name and the Hollywood actor who shares it, is boring me.
Brisbee still isn’t over the loss of Matt Duffy, which is kinda good because it inspired him to do one of his cool retro-looks at awesome Matt Duffy plays from his tenure with los Gigantes.
and the Rays decided to move Duffy to SS when he comes back up and their current SS was none to pleased to hear that news according to Baggs.
Oh! and in a crazy move in Philly, Balkin’ Bob Davidson threw out a drunk fan for yelling at him from behind the backstop. weirdness.
wild.
Let’s Go Giants!
bust the slump.
love,
MTK
02 Tuesday Aug 2016
Posted in Commentary, SFG Off Day Posts
Tags
3B, baseball, baseman, best, Bochy, Bruce, cain, Casey, coach, coaching, Cody, deadline, duffy, Francisco, giants, Hudson, hunter, Jake, marco, matt, McGehee, mlb, Moore, Pabl, Peavy, pence, pitchers, Romo, Ross, Ryan, San, Sandoval, scutaro, Sergio, sf, smith, staff, theriot, third, Tim, trade, Will
A lot of fans were emotional yesterday upon hearing the news the SF Giants had traded Matt Duffy, but I was surprised long-time fan Grant Brisbee was among them – he practically wept. I figured old guys like us were used to the business of baseball and would leap to the evaluation of the statistics of the swap – which he did of course, through his tears.
Me, I found the trade an excellent use of a system we’ve developed with great effort and the right balance of stats and human evaluation in the near-decade since Barry Lamar stalked off into the sunset of post-Giants life.
Sure, I’ll miss Matt Duffy, but he only played for us for two years. It was an intense and impressive couple of years because he had to step into Pablo Sandoval’s big shoes, but I don’t grow that attached to players that fast no matter who they are. It takes me a while to want to make someone “untouchable,” as Posey and Bumgarner are.
Actually, I can remember when fans – terrified about the absence of Panda and failure of McGehee – wanted to trade Matt Duffy for a “real third baseman,” in his rookie year.
And speaking of Panda – a home grown third baseman who was with us through three World Series wins and instrumental in at least one – I do and will miss the Pablo we all loved: an incredible Giant, with huge personality, beloved for his simple, crazy humanity.
Besides, I know Matt Duffy has a long career ahead of him and will excel wherever he plays. I will be watching this guy for a few years to come and heck, he could end up back with us with the way the business of baseball works.
We have done what we set out to do. We have grown our talent at home and added missing pieces to create championship teams, not once, but thrice in the last six years. It has been a stunning achievement, and I think a lot of fans have taken the subtle moves for granted.
It was inevitable that at least one or two or even some of all this home grown talent would have to be used as chips to gain the missing pieces needed. In this case we gave up a lot to get the specific missing elements of our pitching staff, and I for one, am glad we had the guts and aggressiveness to go all-in.
I do not know if Matt Moore and Will Smith are the answer, but I DO know that once they get in Buster Posey’s capable hands for the month of August they’re likely to be much better prepared for a championship run than they have ever been in their lives.
What the Giants have done these last six years is almost unheard of in the modern era. We have kept our coaching staff intact, core players aboard in Posey, Bumgarner, Cain, Lopez and Romo. Turned homegrown talent such as The Brandons, Crawford and Belt, into All-Stars and snagged and locked-up Hunter Pence.
We managed Angel Pagan and Gregor Blanco in balance with rotating OFs. We squeezed the last bits of greatness from Cody Ross, Marco Scutaro, Ryan Theriot, Jake Peavy and Tim Hudson.
We’ve had great coaching at farm club levels resulting in consistently good play from rookies and newcomers to the team. Bruce Bochy is a first-ballot Hall of Fame Manager at this point, and his staff, again mostly intact (MISS YOU, FLAN!) are an amazing group.
If we had rested on our laurels and not made a trade for the essential relief and starting pitching support we needed, I’m not sure we could beat this year’s Cubs. Now I feel we have a legitimate shot not only to achieve that in Bochy vs. Maddon I, but go on to win it all.
Matt, you were a great Giant and that is what made you valuable and in-demand. We will miss you and I wish you all the best in Tampa. I am confident you will excel. I hear you are returning to SS and it must be cool to be with your Dirtbag mentor, Evan Longoria. Enjoy yourself and knock ’em dead.
Meanwhile, turning back to August …
Welcome aboard Matt Moore and Will Smith. Get your gear from Murph, perk up and pay attention. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND LISTENING TO BUSTER POSEY.
Let’s all pull it together and go out there and Even-Year-the-Shit-Outta-This-Thing.
Go Giants,
Love,
MTK
22 Friday Jul 2016
Posted in history, World Series
Tags
1962, baseball, bobby, Francisco, game, giants, last, McCovey, mlb, out, richardson, San, series, seven, sf, Willie, world, yankees
We’re playing in New York City against the Yankees this week, and immediately my thoughts turn to Willie McCovey whose line drive that could have won the first World Series in San Francisco was caught by Bobby Richardson in Game 7, beginning a 27-year World Series appearance drought for the G-men.
Hence my two new hashtags:
#BeatTheYanksForMcCovey
#SweepTheYanksForMcCovey
Many long time fans associate the Game Seven loss with intense feelings not only because of the drought that followed, but because the drought implied we couldn’t win it all in San Francisco. The implication that we were somehow cursed not to win in SF grew for another 26 years and it’s the basis for the intense feeling of relief we all felt when at last we won in 2010.
The history of the ’62 Series fascinates decades later because of the incredible talent on both sides, but among fans I have interviewed about it, there lingers a feeling that the Giants let this one get away. So many of us ache for Willie McCovey.
Rather than share my interest in it, which would just be more historical slather, here are links to three from the net that might interest you:
From Wiki:
“This World Series, which was closely matched in every game, is remembered for its then-record length of 13 days, caused by rain in both cities, and its appropriately dramatic conclusion. The Yankees took the Series in seven games for the 20th championship in team history. The Yankees had won their first World Series in 1923; of the 40 Series played between 1923 and 1962, the Yankees won half.
The Giants had a higher cumulative batting average and lower earned-run average, hit more home runs, triples, and doubles, yet lost the Series.”
And here is the MLB’s one-hour World Series Film about the entire 1962 World Series
FUN!
Go Giants!
mtk
16 Saturday Jul 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
So the second half begins with the G-men in first place in the NL West holding the best record in baseball, which is why we lost last night naturally to the Padres for the first time this year and once again because we couldn’t provide enough run support for MadBum.
(I rewrote Take Me Out To The Ballgame last week so now I sing, “If They Don’t Win We Got Cained” instead of “If they don’t win it’s a shame”).
That said, the next few weeks should see the return of Hunter Pence, Matt Duffy and Joe Panik to our depleted lineup, so hopefully the hits start cranking up again.
It has been great to see Sergio Romo back and really taking care of business, but personally, I want to add Aroldis Chapman to this lineup. Not so much because I distrust Casilla, but because I think a combo pack of Casilla and Chapman could be really devastating.
Once again, I didn’t watch the All-Star Game or the Home Run Derby. I really have ZERO INTEREST in the whole affair. I think my favorite part of the All Star Game was that Brandon Crawford got well-deserved rest despite being the best short stop in the National League.
OK on to The Reader:
Here is Brisbee on the Giants’ schedule in the second half, but he tempers optimism by noting how easy the Nemesis has it during this ride.
AlPav and the CSNBA crew covered rehab games of Pence and Cain and Panik
Before we leave the first half behind we HAVE to talk about that incredible outing by MadBum that ended our first half. He was utterly dominant in that start and the 14Ks were just … wow. I like Baggs on MadBum’s badass outing.
Steve Berman sighting! He weighed in on the Giants first half success.
Well that’s all I got this week. Let’s Go Giants!
Love,
MTK
03 Sunday Jul 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
First off, Madison Bumgarner was the first pitcher in 40 years to intentionally bat in an American League park as future HoF manager Bruce Bochy elected to refuse the DH in Oakland versus the A’s. It was rad … and it continues #TheLegendofMadBum
Here’s Brisbee’s tempered opinion on that game.
And here’s Andy Baggs waxing prosaic.
While AlPav’s take includes legends Kruk and Kuip chatting the coolness.
Obviously the injuries to arguably better, or at least day-to-day bats like Pence and Panik and Tomlinson made this decision possible and for me it is an excellent compromise to the insane lunatics who were asking MadBum to hit in the Home Run Derby – which I hope never happens.
Berman dropped in to write about the G-men during the hot streak. And indeed it felt to a lot of us like June Swoon was out of the picture until those pesky Swingin’ A’s came to town.
I haven’t been writing much but I did go on radio to talk Giants with Adam the Bull.
I also went to an American League game for the first time since 2012 (A’s vs. Mariners then) and got to see Big Papi’s likely last hit in Texas as the Red Sox came to Dallas.
The Rangers beat the Crimson Hose in both games I went to, and they looked really good doing it. Shin-Soo Choo was very impressive. And a lot of the Rangers can hit. I saw Prince rip one down the line for a homer that was an awesome display of power.
all right more when I get a chance.
Go Giants!
Love,
MTK
10 Friday Jun 2016
Wrote this ten days ago but didn’t have internet access to upload it.
June 1st, 2016
Giants Baseball Corner
I owe Jake Peavy an apology.
Jake, on your 35th birthday you were a badass.
I don’t know anyone who can say they dominated a Major League Baseball team from the mound and, being that it’s the NL, scored the winning run on their 35th birthday. That was awesome.
An aside: on my 35th birthday, my girl was three months pregnant with our son. I was shuttling back and forth between SF and LA working on projects. My girl was working for a major magazine down in LA. We were Giants fans in LA the year we we’d go to the WS and lose to the Angels. T’was rough.
As a former BoSox pitcher you must have seen the type of fan I am before … pining for years for victory, way too focused on irrelevant details. Quick to anger and panicky. Man, I am dumb.
That now 13-year-old boy and I got to see you pitch live for the first time this year, on Opening Day at the Yard. It was a rough start for you and in the subsequent weeks, I was critical of your performance and said some things I shouldn’t have. I apologize.
Sometimes, I’m the worst kind of fan – the one who vests too much into things that don’t matter, driven by my anxety and love for the team’s success.
Your game yesterday and the start before it put me in my place. I appreciate what all you have done for this team. The great starts are great and I will try harder to understand how difficult the game must be during the poor ones.
Well done, Jake, Happy Birthday.
Thanks for your efforts and let’s get Johnny a second ring!
MTK
10 Tuesday May 2016
Posted in pitchers, Relief Pitching
Tags
AT&T, baseball, cain, corner, Francisco, giants, League, Lincecum, matt, mlb, mtk, National, park, San, series, sf, Tim
It’s been an up and down couple of weeks for the Giants – with Bumgarner, Cueto and Samardzija providing the ups and Peavy, Cain and the batting lineup bringing us down.
And of course last Friday brought the highly anticipated Tim Lincecum Showcase, made glaringly significant by the failure of Cain and Peavy. I watched the Lincecum showcase on the ‘net and my opinion is:
1. CSNBayArea still sucks. Their cameraman was an idiot who set himself up in the wrong position (directly behind the plate) and kept fiddling with the zoom button – making it practically impossible to fairly judge what Timmy was doing. And they had no gun.
So basically, CSNBayArea capitalized on the interest to make us all watch it on their site and, typically, gave us a crap product to watch. CSNBayArea remains so transparently interested in their own bottom line and drawing in non-baseball fans – being the soccer mom’s channel for watching baseball. When it comes to anything that matters, they can’t even film it right.
2. I’m glad John Shea (@SheaHeyKid) was there because he is reasonable and sound of judgement, but also because he provided some of his own footage from an angle that made it easier to see what was happening.
3. That said, to me, Timmy looked a little off-balance at first, most likely a bit of nerves, and then settled down by using a really good-looking breaking ball, which seems to have impressed everyone else, too. He also worked location on the fastball, which was average. If, as everyone says, he touched 92 and averaged 90-91mph, then the location on those fastballs was not bad. I think against a real batter, and with a real ump it would be much easier to judge.
4. And so in conclusion, 41 pitches, facing no batter in front of a handful of scouts is no way to judge if Tim Lincecum is ready to be a starting pitcher in the major leagues again.
However, Jake-Ed and Matty are pitching really, really, poorly right now. Nobody is afraid to just jack them, seemingly at will. They have cost us every single week and are hampering the starting three SPs and the rhythm of the team.
I could easily see offering Tim Lincecum a deal where he gets to work himself up to being a starter and gets his shot, as long as he is willing to return to the ‘pen as long relief if it goes poorly. I would be content with that. Tim Lincecum is beloved in the Bay Area. I would be proud to have him back.
We can’t deal Matt Cain because we owe him too much money, but we could deal Jake-Ed, who has two rings with two teams in the last three years and thus has trade value as a veteran with experience.
Conclusion: Promote Heston and sign Timmy. Keep looking for an SP before trade deadline, when we rid ourselves of Peavy.
25 Monday Apr 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
AT&T, Barry, baseball, Bonds, Brisbee, chronicle, chronicles, coach, eight, eighth, giants, Grant, hits, hitting, infield, John, Lamar, less, marlins, McCovey, miami, mlb, park, pitcher, return, sf, Shea, shift, slot, spot
Giants got a couple back against the Marlins, but the last one we should have won … and let get away. Josh Osich may just need a second after the week he had. Consecutive beanings of the same DBacks player the second of which led to a bench-clearing, followed by giving up the dinger that cost us the last game. Ouch.
Just a quick Reader this week to feature, as usual, a few good bits you may have missed. In the parlance of our times ICYMI:
John Shea has an excellent piece on early returns from the experiment of using the Starting Pitcher in the 8-spot (which we of course love so much here at GBC). It’s too early to say anything definitive, but I LOVE that Bochy is committed to a serious sample size. This early data will be immensely useful down the road.
Brisbee has data about the infield shift and how the G-men aren’t doing it as much that is pretty interesting.
And with Barry Lamar back in town with the Marlins, Gutierrez at ESPN wrote about it, thusly, but I really loved this moment: Bonds seems so relieved of bad and idiotic and rude and hateful press. It is nice to see him laugh … and to hear him brag about himself again!
15 Friday Apr 2016
Posted in Series Recaps
Tags
baseball, Brandon, cain, colorado, Francisco, giants, Jake, loss, mlb, Peavy, rockies, San, series, sf
Game One
It is easy to forget the lone victory in our three games in Colorado, but it is important not to do so. Jeff Samardzija looked as good as he has yet looked in a Giants uniform and the Giants took Game One of this series 7-2, behind a stellar performance by The Shark.
Samardzija went seven strong innings, gave up just two runs and six hits, striking out four. He had two walks, but managed the game well and was in control of a tough Rockies lineup throughout.
The Giants continued their Home Run hit streak throughout the series and rookie C Trevor Brown had two in that first game, bringing his total to three for the year – his first three hits in the majors are all home runs! Hunter Pence added another two-out, two-run homer in support and the Giants were looking good.
Then the wheels fell off …
Game Two
Jake Peavy is going to be a problem unless he can right himself quickly. His opening day start at the yard in which he put us in a 0-5 hole in the first four innings, was calamitous and in Colorado his second start was worse. He was shellacked by the Rockies early and often.
Jake Peavy gave up a NY/SF Giants franchise-high 10 Extra Base Hits in this one – the most allowed by a pitcher since Curt Schilling gave up 10 for Boston on Aug. 10, 2006, against Kansas City. It was seriously ugly.
Arenado homered twice, Peavy was a total meltdown. The Rockies ended the day with 12 XBH and a blowout, defeating the Giants 10-6. Brandon Belt did homer in this one to keep the Giants Home Run streak alive at nine games.
Game Three
Matt Cain came into the rubber match as a question mark, as usual. Which Matt Cain would we see? Well, for four innings the answer was AWESOME MATT CAIN.
Cain was precise, throwing 92- and 93-mph fast balls to great success. It was a thing of beauty long-forgotten since we hadn’t seen him this sharp in a while. It was pretty exciting for a few innings there.
Then all of a sudden in the fifth, Cain gave up a dinger, then a double and then found himself in a chippy battle with Craig Wolters, who finally just barely got the best of Matty with a bloop flare over the head of Matt Duffy. That was the beginning of a collapse that ended in embarrassment as the Giants gave up 9 runs in the 5th inning.
In this one, Matty had struck out Arenado twice and was to face him in the fifth with the bases loaded, but Boch decided Matt was done after a 35+pitch inning that had him on the hook for those three base-runners. He brought in Chris Heston who was pitching on consecutive days for the first time in his young career. Hesto gave up a double to Arenado and the run-parade began.
Meanwhile, Jorge de La Rosa pitched a great game and managed the Giants bats well. This was a tough loss. Belt managed to homer again though – a bright spot is our ten game homer streak.
But at the end of the day, the Giants gave up 31 hits in the last two games to these Rockies at altitude, prompting a lot of fans on twitter to express their hatred for Coors Field once again.
Some injury news, Romo is out temporarily with an elbow thing. Brandon Crawford had to leave with a flexor flare, and Posey who was held out a couple of games to help heal his toe, came back and caught well for Cain during his comeback 4 innings.
Glad to be out of Colorado and on to face the Nemesis in Chavez Ravine with MadBum v. Kershaw II tonight at 7:10pm.
11 Monday Apr 2016
Posted in Series Recaps, Uncategorized
In case you haven’t been paying attention to baseball yet because you’re wrapped up in Warriors or Sharks or The Masters coverage, our San Francisco Giants are looking really good at the plate. Yes, that’s right, THE GIANTS ARE HITTING!
We had 36 hits over the series and with 14 home runs we stand second behind the altitude-assisted Colorado Rockies (17) in homers.
With 64 hits, we stand second behind the Nemesis (76) in hits (they had a breakout opening weekend at the plate).
Those stats are for the MAJORS, both leagues – we are second in hits and homers in all of baseball.
But first things first, from Opening Day at AT&T park here’s GBC’s footage of Your 2016 San Francisco Giants lineup.
The home opening weekend series against the Nemesis was just about perfect (except for George Kontos and a few other reasons we couldn’t hold on to Game 3 to sweep – Brisbee has those here).
While pitching is taking a little while to get on track, our lineup is covering for the starters. The three wins were all come-from-behind victories and once the hits and runs start, with these guys, they seem to pour out.
It’s infectious, situational contact hitting – bunts, singles, doubles, sacs and homers on the regs from Span, Duffy, Panik, BCraw, Pence and Posey surrounded Trevor Brown’s first major-league homer over the weekend. Move ’em along and hit ’em out seems to be the philosophy of this group and it is pretty thrilling stuff.
Many have remarked – and it doesn’t take long to notice if you watch the Giants – that there’s really no weakness in the lineup – everybody is a threat to do something with the bat. We are bunting and moving ’em over and sacrificing and getting ’em over and hitting balls out of the park with startling regularity.
Most importantly, the hitting has been timely.
and of course, at last, we are batting the pitcher in the 8-spot AND IT IS WORKING.
Angel Pagan seems to be healthy at last and looks way better than last year. Pagan is showing the form he had in the Championship seasons. With pitchers who rake, like MadBum and Peavy, and with Pagan in the 9 and Span at the top of the order, the Giants are turning what used to be dead innings into run-producing opportunities.
A sweep would have been truly perfect, but Madison Bumgarner’s second homer off Kershaw in the lone loss made it palatable, and honestly, with the Division lead and the way we are hitting, I couldn’t be happier.
Go Giants!
Love,
MTK
27 Sunday Mar 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
Welcome to the Giants Baseball Corner link archive, a reader of contemporary SF Giants stories of interest to us:
Andrew Baggarly has a nice longform piece here wherein he talks closely with Posey about his relationship with the new pitchers and with Samrdzija about his approach. Posey is such a valuable member of the San Francisco Giants – here Baggs has him actually sitting down and watching film with Cueto and Samardzija, functioning like an on-field player-coach. We are so blessed to have MVPosey.
Cool thing is, it may well have worked already, ’cause Samardzija had his best outing yet as we beat the Cubs 5-2. Duffy homered and drive in two – here’s AlPav and CSNBA on that game
Chris Haft has an up-to-date piece on who might make the Giants bench and remarks that versatility is going to be in high demand.
Brisbee on the value of the SF Giants being Two and a Quarter Billion Dollars.
BASEBALL SEASON IS JUST A WEEK AWAY!!!!!!!!!
love,
MTK
22 Tuesday Mar 2016
Posted in GBC Readers
Tags
8, baseball, corner, gbc, giants, hitting, League, lineup, major, mlb, National, nl, order, pitcher, position, reader, samardzija, sf, slot, spot
I’m nothing if not petty about being hungry for acknowledgment from our community when I’m out ahead of something – it’s a terrible result of my insecurity. So like a petulant child I’ve been YELLING on Twitter that all last July and August I was calling for the Starting Pitcher to hit in the 8-slot.
I was tweeting we should do it well before Maddon did so successfully when the Cubs swept us out of Wrigley, taking four games last August on their way to the DS.
I mention this to say that our flavor here at GBC is basically avant-garde.
We propose all kinds of things, some of which aren’t popular (like when we wanted to start Peavy against Pittsburgh in ’14, for fear of not being able to use MadBum twice or even thrice in the division series) and some of which become implemented to success (like in 2010 when we pushed Bochy to let the new guy Javier Lopez share some of Affeldt’s outings), and some of which get implemented to failure …
but generally we are looking ahead.
So I LOVE this move by Bochy and am thrilled we’re starting the season with this as a protocol, from which to develop the concept against competition all year long. I hope we stick with it long enough to get a decent sample-size.
I am SUPER-FREAKING-EXCITED to finally see Madison Bumgarner hit in the 8-slot on Opening Day and to see Peavy in that position in the opener against The Nemesis at the yard this year! Peavy moves over runners against Kershaw? Yes, please.
The Giants play a day/night double today with Peavy on the mound taking on Mat Latos (now throwing for the White Sox) in the day game and Ty Blach, a 6’2″ and 200lb, 25-year old, pitching the night game against De La Rosa of the Snakes. But let’s get to the Reader:
Brisbee projects his starting lineups for Opening Day with the recent round of departures for various layers of the organization
Brandon Belt went 4-4, homered and drove in four runs against the Rockies!
Here’s AlPav on the game March 18, when the Giants had it all working … from his piece:
“With every starting position player on the field for the first time this spring, the Giants beat the Padres 15-6 and scored 10 runs in the first two innings. When manager Bruce Bochy started pulling starters in the top of the fifth the Giants had 12 runs on 13 hits.
“There’s always some electricity the first time everybody gets out there together,” Buster Posey said. “It was nice to score some runs like we did. Hopefully it’s a sign of good things.””
Jeff Samardzija is riding out the idea that Cactus League is for working shit out. It definitely worries me a little, but it’s true these games don’t mean anything. Anyway, Here’s Haft on the Shark’s attitude given his poor outings in terms of results.
Go Giants.
Love,
MTK
16 Wednesday Mar 2016
Posted in GBC Readers, Uncategorized
Tags
archive, baseball, collective, Francisco, gbc, giants, link, links, media, mlb, mtk, reader, San, sf
Hey everyone, excited for the season and I’m going to try a new type of post this year that I’m calling The GBC Reader, which I hope will serve as a link archive of current stories and topics of interest, because I feel like there’s a TON of coverage already of our Giants that’s a little redundant.
So instead of just repeating what Marty or Hank or Haft or Brisbee or AlPav or Baggs or KNBR or CSNBayArea has already, I’m going to drop these every three or four days or every week or ten days …let’s just say “as necessary,” to collect interesting pieces in one place – hence, a reader … like these:
All righty, that’s GBC Reader No. 1, for ya then … don’t all rush to read it at once.
Love,
MTK
05 Saturday Mar 2016
Posted in Cactus League, Uncategorized
Tags
adrianza, Bumgarner, cactus, cincinatti, ehire, franciisco, game, giants, League, Madison, Reds, San, sf, three, win
Madison Bumgarner’s first start was apparently similar to years past: gave up a dinger and then settled into his usual self, striking out the side to end his outing. Chris Heston then came in and handled the Reds for two scoreless innings. Ehire Adrianza drove in two and the Giants won 4-3.
Today there is a full slate of action with two separate Giants squads taking on Texas and Cleveland. Cueto has been scratched so we will see Romero.
Cactus League! Baseball! Woo Hoo!
03 Thursday Mar 2016
Posted in Cactus League
Since we are back up and running it’s probably a good idea to drop a post every day or two to keep us all connected. The Giants won game one out in Scottsdale by the score of 4-1 over the Angels. Samardzija started and Posey played and Tomlinson and Lollis and Arroyo all looked good.
I’m not going to write a lot because, honestly, every single second is being chronicled in triplicate by Schulman, Pavlovic and Baggs, and analyzed ad nauseum by the clowns at Comcast and KNBR, so it’s unnecessary to repeat what everyone already knows.
Here is a link to Haft’s Nice Wrap of our first Spring Training Game though.
Excited for the season. I have concerns about Angel Pagan and it looks like we will get to see him play today – and Matt Duffy, whom Jake Peavy called his favorite Giant in a twitter chat hosted by the Giants earlier this morning.
It was pretty cool to hear the likely Opening Day Starter’s thoughts on all kinds of things. I am looking forward to seeing him pitch in Game One at the yard on April 7th.
M.T. Karthik 