SF 9 ARI 2
Even with a lopsided win, this team still makes me feel like I wasted my evening watching them. The Diamondbacks, fresh off clinching a post season berth, played like it. All their stars had the day off and the rest of them had apparently partied all night. Four errors and a bunch of bad pitching later, the Giants had meaningless win #62. Yippee!
Cueto (8-8) gave the Giants another solid outing (game score 64, 6 innings, 5 hits, 2 runs, 7 K). He sure has had a hard time getting easy outs since coming back. I guess that is a small criticism...but his pitch counts have been crazy lately. Not sure that it means anything.
Our boys made a bit of noise with the bats tonight. They scored 5 runs in an inning for the first time in 5 weeks. Hundley had a big 4 RBI night, including the game breaking 3 run homer. Parker got three hits, including a couple doubles. He hit it hard to all fields and looked good doing it.
What a shame it meant not a thing. Only a few more meaningless games left! Thank Willie.
17 comments:
Only one more win needed so as to avoid losing in triple digits. I'm now at the juncture where I'm happy when the Giants win, of course, but also un-unhappy when they lose, securing one of the top spots in the 2018 draft. A big opportunity comes at the start of the draft, of course, but there must be an advantage, too, in having early second-round and even third-round picks.
On another note, I am sorry that MLB has not joined the NFL in recognizing the claims of those who protest during the National Anthem. For teams to play it before ball games has always seemed to me like huckster jingoism. The protests that call for the country to live up to the ideals implicit in the anthem, paradoxically, are the first responses that seem to me to insist that the anthem have meaning. (I except those individual times when some event in the world, a V-J Day, a presidential assassination, a 9/11, lends it meaning ab extra.)
I like wins and they make me happy!
I don't think we'll ever see a politicized MLB, it is too international (25% foreign-born compared to 5% NFL). Percentage-wise there are ten times as many African-Americans in football than baseball. Obviously racial justice issues are important to everyone, but these protests are primarily motivated by the African-American experience. Finally, Trump called out the NFL (mostly due to Colin Kaepernick), like everything it is personal with him, it's not surprising that NFL players have responded. Football is a bigger spectacle, the teams are larger, the buildup for each game greater due to having one-tenth as many contests as baseball, it is more suited to political expression. I'm willing to bet Congress exerts greater control over baseball policy and actions, just look at the steroid thing. No one gives a shit if NFL players take drugs, but it is a huge deal if baseball players do.
In all other Countries that I know of (other than Canada), they do not play the National Anthem before any old Game. They play National Anthems before Games involving National Teams. To me, that seems appropriate. I've always thought that the tradition of constantly playing the National Anthem is weird, time-consuming, & a potential cause for conflict.
Pro sports teams are given a lot of help from government entities. They are state-sanctioned monopolies that are protected from competition and the vagaries of the free market. Washington DC expects its ass to be kissed in return, hence the jingoism and flag-waving. The anthem used to be sung together by all in attendance (my mom remembers the words posted on the scoreboard at Fenway in the 40s and 50s), now it's just a chance for some local "America's Got Talent" wannabe to flash their vocal chops. I can appreciate a little ceremony before a contest, it's too bad it's become a political litmus test, like seemingly everything else in our country. I'm sure there will be some fallout for the protesters, people hate their sports "spoiled" by politics (unless its politics they agree with). Over time I expect the protests will be recognized for looking at a real problem, and the athletes accepted for their views, but in the short term I expect lots of negative response. Trump will keep fanning the flames, this kind of thing is his bread and butter.
Trump is doing this to arouse his base. He creates division on purpose. One should not be complaining about peaceful protest. That is the American way. If Trump wants a country where there is no peaceful protest, let him become the next leader of North Korea. Trump did not complain about the KKK protest in Virginia, he said there were many good people, and that protest was violent, as a women was killed and many injured. To me, this is clearly his way of dividing people along racial and ethnic lines. This is not what a President should be doing. He should be uniting us, not dividing us. Any way in just 216 AB, Martinez on Arizona, has as many RBI as Posey has for the entire season. The giants need a real RBI man in the lineup if they are going to compete in 2018.
Giants need a lot of hitters, that's for sure. Brandon Belt still leads the team in homers.
It's better this way:
https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2017/09/matt-cain-to-retire.html
Yeah I heard that on the broadcast today. I'm happy about that. He's given it his best shot and he's clearly done. Tim gave it another shot but that didn't work out too well. The main thing is I don't have to change the name of the blog!
Sad that Cain is retiring, and he does not have a W. L. above 500. Too good a pitcher to leave with a below 500 record. Up until 3 years ago his stats and Greinke's stats per season were almost identical. Their careers then took divergent paths. At least Cain should be financially secure. but he should look for some outside coaching to see if he can get back on track, he still throws 90 to 91 mph. His lack of control seems to be more of the problem.
Great career.
Class act all the way.
I'm psyched he spent his entire career as a Giant. The first since Jim Davenport.
Scott Garrelts.
Remember, there was once a chorus of "trade Matt Cain" going on. Not on this blog, of course. The theory was that you could get a good hitter or two in return. It never made sense to me, or apparently, Brian Sabean either who said, "Why would you want to trade a guy like that?" I mean, trade your best players and soon you are left with a lot of players that are not so good. Quantity, not quality. Matt's rings, I think, prove the point.
Robby Thompson also spent his whole career in orange-and-black.
I will of course work up an "Adios, Matty" post after his final start on Saturday. I intended to post for Samardzija's last start in AZ (in which he pitched well after that stinker in LA) but the ending was so hideous I could barely stand to think about it.
We are down to .333 again, having to win one in three chances to avoid 100 losses. Yikes. Maybe Cainer can lead the way!
Even if the Giants had not won the World Series three times the pitching nucleus nonetheless created the organizational turnaround. MadBum is the only one left of that vaunted core. That was a hell of a run of draft picks. Let's hope they can find that kind of talent again!
turn arounds in either direction can be quick.
And--Friday the 29th at 10:30 PM PDT--the Giants escaped a 100-loss season! They now can't draft lower than #3 in 2018, and with one more win from the Phillies, can't draft lower than 2nd. Matthew 20:16, "so the last shall be first," and I'm rather guessing that the (german-) silver medalist in 2017 disaster will do about as well in June 2018, draft time, as the (fool's-)gold one.
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