Saturday, August 20, 2011

The nadir

At some point, I keep telling myself, the Giants will "bottom out." Once they hit that bottom, I reason, they will start to climb out of the slump and start winning. I have decided to declare this evening's game "the nadir" so that the team will end its losing ways and rediscover its winning ways. After all, getting whipped by a bunch of rookies in Houston is pretty bad. Everyone OK with that?

The Atlanta Braves seem determined to lock up the wild card race as today's win over Arizona gives them an eight-game lead over the Giants. The D-backs have now lost four straight--that has taken a bit of the luster off their seven-game win streak. The Giants are fortunate to be only 2-1/2 back. The good news (I'm always looking for good news) is that even after the poor outing by Madison Bumgarner the team is still second in all of baseball in runs allowed with 450 (the Phillies are the best with 405), just a little better than the third-place Braves (464). The D-backs are fortunate to be where they are as well. They've allowed 556 runs on the season--20th on the list of MLB teams. By any measure--ERA+, FIP, xFIP, WHIP, WAR, QS, BAA, SO--they are a mediocre staff, despite the presence of some fine young talents like Ian Kennedy and Daniel Hudson. The NL West race is just starting to heat up. C'mon Giants, win some goddamn games and get these pretenders off the top spot!

--M.C.

1 comment:

Zo said...

Pretenders indeed. The Giants finish dropping the series to a team so bad that they could not finish at .500 even if they won every remaining game of the season, and we pick up a game on the dbacks. They really want somone else to take this division.