It was a rugby score last night, the Giants piling up 16 points with two unconverted tries and two drop-goals. The Reds managed a try of their own, but the conversion failed. I'm not sure how else to describe a game in which the bottom of the Giants lineup (Ross, Sandoval, Uribe, FSanchez) managed 11 hits and 10 runs scored. Fred-D Sanchez is doing his best to make a mockery of my new nickname for him with his second straight 4-hit game. OK, OK, I'll change it to Freddy-O. That's got a nice Irish ring to it and more suitable to a rugby squad anyway. I'm thinking Pablo Sandoval might be decent in a scrum.
It is an interesting development, this offense thing. Take a look at that bottom four again: Ross, Sandoval, Uribe, FSanchez. I was going crazy when FSanchez was in the two-spot, it was an idiotic use of a player with modest-at-best OBP skills and little or no power. Hitting 8th, however, he's a competent bat. The same goes for Juan Uribe. He hit fifth by default--the Giants didn't really have a choice. But he's not particularly suited to it despite his power because he's a hacker in the Bengie tradition. Pat Burrell might be too slow for left field, but his patience and plate discipline play really well in 4th spot behind the team's best hitters (Torres, Posey, Huff). Ideally, Sandoval would hit higher than 6th, but his free-swinging ways have really hurt his production. Lately, he seems to have found his stroke and I expect he'll be moving up as September looms. That brings me to the FNG, Cody Ross. Ross is clearly better to have around than Jose Guillen. He's younger, faster, and is a superior fielder. He's no great shakes as a hitter, but he's not bad, either. He's kind of like Aaron Rowand was supposed to be. Shuffling him and Uribe and Sandoval around in the 5-6-7 spots seems like a workable thing. It's not the Black Hole of Renteria-Rowand Death, and that bodes well for the stretch run.
Last night was one of those gaping-mouth affairs--I kept having to push my lower jaw back up after we scored yet again. There were plenty of highlights and accolades to go around, but my jaw-dropping moment was Buster's 3-run HR to dead center in the 5th off Mike Leake. Holy Posey, that was a bomb! And he has such an easy swing, it looks like he's trying to poke one to RF and it just flies off the bat and goes 420 feet! All I can say at this point is "more, More, MORE!!!"
--M.C.
1 comment:
That was a nice birthday gift, 16 runs.
Say what you will about FSanchez, anyone who can get 4 hits in back-to-back games has abilities.
Getting Pablo hot again is probably the key to the rest of what happens this year. It's like he has too much self confidence- he knows he can hit anything therefore he swings at anything. He just needs to translate that into an attitude where he can make the pitcher his bitch.
Maybe Ramon Martinez should be converted to an infielder. I like the way he fielded that grounder. Too bad he was in the bullpen at the time.
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