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M.T. Karthik

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M.T. Karthik

Tag Archives: sfgiants

Final GBC Reader – Thanks for Following

14 Monday Aug 2017

Posted by mtk in Final Post

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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

GBC Reader Vol.2, Issue 5: Fights and Flights

09 Friday Jun 2017

Posted by mtk in GBC Readers

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baseball, compendium, corner, Francisco, gbc, giants, Karthik, League, m.t., major, mtk, National, reader, San, sfgiants, stories

SFGiants (25-37), 4th in NL West

14 games back of Colorado, 3-7 in last ten games, road trip ended in Milwaukee with an extra innings win last night and home stand starts today against the surprising Minnesota Twins.

Since we last left you dear reader, Hunter Strickland decided to unilaterally employ the unwritten rules – on a two and a half year old personal grudge – and hit Bryce Harper square in the hip with a 98mph fastball in a two-run game we could have won.

A lot was written and said about it, but this piece by Jamal Collier at MLB is pretty succinct and without bias.

I was disappointed in Hunter, but since it happened I’ve cooled off. Maybe it was done at the exact right time – a ‘meaningless’ game in June with exacting precision to the hip – even Harper called the right way to do it.

I find the unwritten rules cool only when the whole team seems into it. I was with Buster on this one and I cannot believe the people who suggested he should have intervened. The guy just came back from a heater to the head!

But then last night, in a game that really felt like a turnaround game, Strickland came in for the first time since the incident and was scary and dominant. Made me wonder if maybe we need a guy like that.

  • The Giants picked up Sam Dyson from the Rangers, and while Brisbee’s not crazy about him, he details the thinking behind picking him up.
  • Austin Slater got the call up and crushed a massive homer.
  • MadBum is scheduled to resume throwing today!
  • Ty Blach is preparing to enter the starting lineup full time and Carson Mason writes that Skip has long-term confidence in the young man.

There are a few pieces on how Samardzija is having an epic year but getting Cained hard. It’s a bummer.

 

 

Love ya fam

 

 

 

MTK

 

GBC Reader Vol. 2, Issue 4 – Slowly Improving Giants with Six Game Win Streak in May

18 Thursday May 2017

Posted by mtk in GBC Readers

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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.

GBC Reader Vol. 2, Issue 3: Thankful to Turn the Calendar Page

01 Monday May 2017

Posted by mtk in GBC Readers

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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

 

 

GBC Reader Volume 2, Issue 1: Torture While All Hail Madison Bumgarner

03 Monday Apr 2017

Posted by mtk in GBC Readers, Opening Day, pitchers

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baseball, corner, Francisco, gbc, giants, Karthik, League, m.t., major, mlb, mtk, National, reader, San, sfgiants

Opening day in Phoenix was a massive, thick-beamed wood rollercoaster ride built by Madison Bumgarner that went off the rails in such a familiar manner it felt sickening – or for the less dramatic and more experienced fans, like typical Giants baseball.

During the frustration, I got into a Twitter discussion over the use of the word ‘torture’ to describe Giants baseball.

We all fell in love with Mike Krukow’s term in 2010 because it felt like a pure assessment of the near-misses that made it up: the earthquake, the 100 win season fail, the Angels in ’02, Pudge in front of the plate.

But personally, the torture I felt for 30 years was washed away by the immense wave of relief I felt on November 1, 2010 when we finally won it all for the first time in SF.

Giants fan Ted G, 57, disagrees. For him, SF Giants baseball is uniquely agonizing across decades win or lose. He thinks Krukow’s phrase, “Giants Baseball … Torture,” is emblematic of our pathos as an organization and the struggles we eternally endure.

“The term torture has nothing to do with not winning. Totally about how they go about creating situations that are torture.” – Ted G, @TedSFGman

I can see that, but whatever remnants of the feeling of torture that may have remained for me were certainly washed away by winning the way we did in 2012 – my favorite of the championships. We had to retire Melky Cabrera. Pablo hit 3Hrs – two off Verlander – and Romo dared and won with an incredible fastball to end it with Miggy looking.

Madison going out there in 2014 and ripping it away from the Royals cemented my feeling that we have earned well-deserved titles, establishing a kind of dynasty in an era when the back-to-back World Series championship has disappeared.

There hasn’t been a back-to-back World Series Champion in the 21st century. So for me, this ain’t torture any more, it’s working the details.

But enough about torture, lets get to

The first GBC Reader of the year:

It was a rough game because of the blown saves, but being opening day on the road, it really shouldn’t matter that much in the face of what Madison Bumgarner accomplished: the first pitcher in the 140 years of this game to hit two home runs on opening day put himself in position to win twice before the bullpen’s struggles came to bear. It was epic and #TheLegendofMadBum continues to grow.

Ashley Verala, the West Coast Fan Girl @wcoastfangirl has a sweet piece she calls Last True Renaissance Man of Major League Baseball about our Mad Bum.

Brisbee noted that Bumgarner was also the first Giant to hit two dingers on Opening Day since Barry Lamar. And Grant’s coverage of the debacle it became is actually considerably temperate – I think fatherhood is mellowing him out.

Hank is back in his seat for another long season and here’s his takeaways.

MLB dot com Columnist Joe Posnanski has some really excellent things to say about Madison’s performance, really putting the scale of MadBum’s audacity in nice perspective. He includes Statcast data regarding the speed of these HRs that if you haven’t checked out yet, you gotta see.

Haft chose to focus on MadBum’s dominance on the mound. Man, did he look good.

I like AlPav’s headline for his pretty close-up view of the guts of this one. Ruthian Game For the Ages from Bumgarner pretty much sums it up.

Baggs however seems to have felt more like I did. His piece drips with the wretched agony of cheating MadBum of the win.

But Mark Simon and Sarah Langs at ESPN were enthralled by our heroic pitcher.

I didn’t really have time to make this great, but hey, it’s the first one of the year. I’ll add some links later if I find more content.

I also apologized on Twitter for rage tweeting the value of Mark Melancon’s contract excessively yesterday. I am sorry. It was petty lashing out at the collapse and an irrelevant memory of last year that fueled my rage.

Which brings us to Jake Mastroianni’s piece about everyone who overreacted to the opening day loss.

Happy New Year everyone.

Love ya,

MTK

Beat LA and Seize The Division

30 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by mtk in PreGame GBCs

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Tags

baseball, corner, Francisco, giants, League, mlb, mtk, National, San, sf, sfg, sfgiants

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!

img_20160916_164548

 

Beat LA

Seize The Division

Let’s Go Giants!

 

Love,

 

MTK

 

Colorado Goes Yard on Vogey, Giants; Rockies Win 8 – 2

22 Tuesday Apr 2014

Posted by mtk in Post Game Blasts

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Tags

sfg, sfgiants

Vogelsong yanked after 1 and a third – giving up three homers and five runs. Huff gets out of 2nd with a DP but then gets injured legging out his first major league hit. Petit saves the day with long relief, but the Giants give up two more homers.

Pagan thrown out for arguing a called third strike.

ugh.

 

Last Game vs. Chicago – Go Timmy!

14 Sunday Apr 2013

Posted by mtk in PreGame GBCs

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Tags

chicago, cubs, giants, Lincecum, milan, ocean, sf, sfgiants, Tim, wrigley

Hunter Pence Goes Yard, Romo Gets 4th Save

09 Tuesday Apr 2013

Posted by mtk in Post Game Blasts

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Tags

AT&T, Big, Bumgarner, fly, Francisco, giants, homer, hr, hunter, Lincecum, Madison, park, pence, rockies, Romo, San, Sergio, sf, sfgiants, Tim, win

Not much time to write before we play again, but just to take note of Hunter Pence’s Big Fly – which I understand was deep to left-center. I hope we see more of that this year. If we could get Hunter batting .300 along with Panda, Posey and Pagan; get Crawford up to .270 and get some timely hits from Blanco we should win the division outright.

Another strong outing from Madison Bumgarner whose mastery of the Rockies continues. Here’s hoping Timmy keeps it rolling tonight with a little better command and less walks.

Sergio Romo tweeted that his goal was 50 saves and he is well on his way with four in as many appearances. Rock on Sergio! That’s What’s Up!

Go Giants!

Tim Lincecum Analysis Articles Collected in One post

03 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by mtk in pitchers

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about, angeles, baseball, debut, dodgers, Francisco, giants, important, ink, Lincecum, los, media, mlb, press, San, sf, sfgiants, start, Tim, writing

POSTSCRIPT:

Tim Kawakami added this after Timmy’s start, but it’s a good read

PREGAME:

Tim Lincecum’s season debut evokes ink including national press like Senior Baseball Columnist Scott Miller at CBS and ESPN’s David Schoenfield calls it an important start. but Bay City Ball’s excellent two pieces analyzing Lincecum’s numbers over the past few years are best

about what to look for tonight

and

about fastball speed’s decay

Alex Pavlovic’s take in the Merc is here,

McCovey Chronicles post by Bisbee is here and some guy called Dylan Kruse adds drama with Tim Lincecum a Giant Question … in that rag the Examiner

I’ll add links to this post as they appear.

But for now, #RallyTimmy Go Giants! #BeatLA

Bumgarner Platinum, Romo Gold

03 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by mtk in pitchers

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10-0, 2011, 4-1, 5, Bumgarner, Caldwell, Caldwell South, champion, county, five, Fletcher, Hudson, Jeff, Jeff Fletcher, nc, north carolina, Parham, platinum, program, pull, quote, sfg, sfgiants, south, stadium, strikeouts, struck out 12

From the program displayed in the video above, as per J. Fletcher quoting Madison Bumgarner’s  high school coach, Jeff Parham at Caldwell South, regarding his second attempt to win the State Championships:”Playing the series at Five County Stadium (AA Mudcats), Bumgarner struck out 12 in a 4-1 victory in Game 1. He capped the championship_clinching win in game 2 with an inside-the-park homer, which ended the game 10-0 by the mercy rule.”

The MAN is a BEAST on the mound and grows strong.

Romo gold.

Right Up to the Moment Renteria’s Pelota Leaves the Park

01 Monday Nov 2010

Posted by mtk in full games

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2010, arlington, baseball, center, champion, civic, Francisco, giants, mlb, moment, mtk, park, pelota, renteria, right, San, series, sfgiants, up, world

and the battery died.

and we won.

and wept and hollered and whooped it up in SF.

at last.

Karthik

Right Up to the Moment Renteria's Pelota Leaves the Park

01 Monday Nov 2010

Posted by mtk in full games

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Tags

2010, arlington, baseball, center, champion, civic, Francisco, giants, mlb, moment, mtk, park, pelota, renteria, right, San, series, sfgiants, up, world

and the battery died.

and we won.

and wept and hollered and whooped it up in SF.

at last.

Karthik

M.T. Karthik

This blog archives early work of M.T. Karthik, who took every photograph and shot all the video here unless otherwise credited.

Performances and installations are posted by date of execution.

Writing appears in whatever form it was originally or, as in the case of poems or journal entries, retyped faithfully from print.

all of it is © M.T. Karthik

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