Madison Bumgarner threw a typical Madison Bumgarner type game today: 8 IP, 105 pitches, 8 K, 5 hits, 1 run and 2 BB. He was as strong in the last inning as he was in the first. The only problem was, to win a game, you have to score at least 1 run. The Giants could not. The Pirates broke the Giants' win streak with a 1 - 0 victory.
Jeff Locke does not have nearly the gaudy numbers that Madbum does, but you'd have to say that he outpitched him. In 6 2/3 innings, he gave up 5 hits, but no runs. No walks, 3 K. No more than 1 Giant was on the bases at any time. Relievers were adequate to hold the line at 0, Brandon Belt got a hit in the 9th off of the Pirates' closer Mark Melancon, but he was erased on a double play because he assumed Buster Posey's shot to the corner was a hit when it was run down by Gregory Polanco.
It was nearly a scoreless game into the 9th. The Pirates solo run came in the 5th when Eric Kratz hit a fly ball near the left field line. Angel Pagan lept, snagged the ball over the fence and then dropped it as he came down. The guys on tv seemed to imply that the play was about Angel dropping the ball, I think that it would have been an absolutely stunning play for him to pull it back for an out. But still, it's not like the Giants scored. Jon may have jinxed it.
7 comments:
Note, too that Strasburg was scratched. Way to go, Jon.
Yeah, I really can't disagree. I swear to Willie that I never thought we were going to win. I just knew the streak was coming to a close. Once I found out the Pirates got into town at 3am after being swept by the Cubs and losing 10 of 11, I knew we didn't have a chance. That is just the way baseball gods roll. Besides the woeful Giants performance rather well matched my shitty day, so , yes I take full responsibility for this one. Just a loser day.
But tomorrow is a new day and I have no predictions. Just the hope that JohnnyC continues to weave his spell of entertaining and winning baseball. Let's start a new win streak!
How many times this year have the Giants won the first game of a series when they played elsewhere the day before, so as have two games sandwiching an interstate travel on successive days? Even with a relatively well-pitched game, let alone a brilliantly pitched game such as they squandered today, the hitters seem not to hit and the less adroit baserunners (BB9, e.g.) prove dangerously maladroit. Maybe they need a fleet of helicopters to arrive at the park to get them to a private airstrip where their charter is waiting, or some other, similar means of making it less exhausting for them to get from A to B.
The Giants do travel more than any other team, mileage-wise. Well, maybe Seattle. Still, you'd think they'd be used to it by now!
Sometimes you just have to give the other guys credit. They won the game. Get 'em back the next day.
Bumgarner in June: 29-2/3 IP, 4 RA, 3 on solo HR.
Give the other guys credit? Abner Doubleday forfend! (Exception made for Kershaw.) When we win, we win because we're relentless, gritty, dominating, . . . Pick one or more well-worn adjectives. When we lose, we produce the loss ourselves because of injuries, too much travel, temporary slump, June swoon (not this year, please), or brain farts. That is why the best writers call the Jeff Lockes of the world "pedestrian" or "journeyman," or pointedly note how mediocre his pitching was this year before the Giants limped wearily into town, no?
Thus Schulman today calls the Giants "lifeless" against the Pirates, calls them "a depleted team" because of the injuries, and details the poor 2016 record of Jeff Locke. Bumgarner, on the other hand, is praised for his great pitching, even though he was facing a badly slumping team. When we win, it's because we're good; when the other team wins, it's because we're bad, understandably or culpably bad, but rarely because the other guys are good. This isn't always the pattern, but much more often than not.
In my initial comment, autocorrect changed my "beat writers" to "best writers."
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