Sunday, September 30, 2018

9th inning: 5-13

1st inning: 7-11
2nd inning: 12-6
3rd inning: 6-12
4th inning: 10-8
5th inning: 11-7
6th inning: 8-10
7th inning: 8-10
8th inning: 6-12
9th inning: 5-13

Today was a sad day to be a Giants fan. Some team in Giants uniforms showed up to play, but they delivered a listless, desultory performance that had some in attendance--with good reason--streaming for the exits in the early innings despite Fan Appreciation Day giveaways. If Dodgers fans won most of the prizes, good on them. Today was an embarrassment and it capped a month of the worst baseball we've seen in a long time, perhaps ever. The Giants go 6-21 5-21 for September: a .222  .192 win percentage. I don't want to know where that rates in the History of the Franchise, but I'm sure someone will tweet it before the end of the day.

Should be interesting this November!

--M.C.

14 comments:

M.C. O'Connor said...

Khris Davis finishes the season hitting .247, he also hit .247 in 2015, 2016, and 2017. (He hit .244 in 2014.) That has to be the most extraordinary statistical result in the history baseball. NO ONE is that "consistent." No one. It's almost impossible to believe, but it has actually happened, so one has to believe it.

Zo said...

5 - 13. Boo.

Just to top it off, before today the Giants were tied with LA at 9 wins each. Coming into the series, they had a 9 - 7 lead. Seems fitting, somehow.

Zo said...

I'm seeing only 5 wins for September, a .192 average. Am I missing one?

nomisnala said...

not too long ago we were tied with the rockies for third place. Then the Rockies went on to win a lot, and the giants went on to lose at a record pace for this club.

nomisnala said...

I did forget to mention that McCutchen led the team in RBI.

M.C. O'Connor said...

@Zo: fixed, thanks.

M.C. O'Connor said...

Mike Sciosia stepped down as the Angels manager, his 10-year contract was up. At some point it will happen to Bochy. I suspect it will be after 2019, when his contract is up. They have to let him walk away, they can't boot him, not after the three titles. But the new GM will have to have his/her way and I suspect it will be a complete makeover of the coaching among other things. Perhaps Giants coaches like Bam-Bam will get job offers in other places this winter and the Giants will encourage them to move on. That way they can maintain their "everyone is happy" vibe and still have a makeover.

Ron said...

This Season has been an embarrassment & has gone a long way toward showing that the Giants are a failing organization, unable to keep up w/ the times. Their total mismanagement of personnel moves in recent years, their failure to leverage the attraction of both the Team & the City itself to make in-roads in the Foreign Player market (both Asia, the Caribbean, & Latin America), their inability to face facts regarding the decline of current players, new players, & management - on so many levels, 2018 actually feels even worse than 2017. At least we got a really good draft pick out of 2017. Enough w/ thinking like:

- 'Let Bochy's contract run out, then turn him loose'. Give the guy a great Front Office job, honor his past success, but face the fact that whatever he's doing on the field now isn't working. And, that his health is perilously in decline.

- 'Sure Posey's coming back from the worst imaginable surgery a Catcher can have, but he wants to be our Catcher, when he's back, so there you go.' I'm worried that the guy will never play effectively again. I am certainly realistic enough to know that we should have forced him to play more 1B (or 3B) years ago. If he gets back to anything approaching his previous form, we should definitely tell him to get over himself - he should only catch 80 or less games per Season.

- 'One of these days Brandon Belt is going to put it all together.' The guys plays the position that virtually demands consistent offensive production. I don't care that he plays (half of his games) in a tough HR park for left-handed hitters. He hasn't come close to a 'great season'. As much as I like him & his defense & his BB's, he's not too much better than a league average offensive 1B. Being 30 years old & having cracked the 80 RBI plateau once (& never the 20 HR mark) is pathetic. Now, he's injured all of the time, too.

- Clowns like Hunter Strickland should be sent packing immediately. This guy belongs in some Independent League, where he can brawl & whiff guys & give up the long ball & be a 'character'. In the ML's, he is a clown.

They have, once again, backed themselves into a untenable corner. They need to do something big & important, but they have no salary flexibility. Every long-term Contract that they've formulated, particularly for Pitchers, has been a total disaster.

I'll repeat this for about the fourth or fifth time: Their only real option is to seriously get involved in signing young-ish foreign players, most likely from Asia or Cuba. So, that's exactly what they should do.

Zo said...

The Giants we're .500 against the NL West. 11 - 8 against both Arizona and San Diego, 9 - 10 against LA and 7 - 12 against Colorado.

Ron said...

I could cherry-pick a bunch of stats to illustrate how we were garbage this year. Here's one: If Denard Span had been on the Giants this Season, he would have led the Team in RBI's w/ 58.

M.C. O'Connor said...

I've never understood why the Giants have had such trouble recruiting talent in much of Latin America. Venezuela seems to be the exception, but I'm guessing it is a free-for-all down there and all the teams compete on fairly level ground in terms of signing teenagers. But now that country is a disaster, a failed state, a humanitarian crisis, and we've no idea what's going to happen going forward. So I don't expect much in that regard. I hope that country can dig its way out of its mess.

Somehow the Giants haven't made the strides in the Dominican and Puerto Rico and of course the Asian markets like it seems they should given their history. The Giants had some of the very first Caribbean and Asian ballplayers in NL history! What went wrong?


M.C. O'Connor said...

Interesting read from FanGraphs.

International signings are perhaps coming under Federal scrutiny.

nomisnala said...

Not time to panic so to speak. the division leaders were not even at 560. Injuries hurt this team severely. Even with the loss of Samardizjah, a healthy Cueto, Posey and Belt, would have made us competitive. By the way, if Cutch stayed with the team he would have beat out Span for the RBI title. To me the biggest disappoint was Longoria, and he would have been a disappointment at half the price. I like the speed and althleticism that Avelino and Hanson bring to the team. With some returning health, the addition of Machado for third, and getting a seriously decent outfielder who can hit 30 dingers, and bat 300, with a decent OBP could give us a lineup that can win games with our current pitching staff. Melancon has to be looked at in Spring training, and if he has not returned to his pre-giants form he will need to be traded or dropped. Having the speed of Avelino and Hanson should be assets to this team. Seems as if Tomlinson, has worn out his welcome. Bochy needs to use his relievers more optimally.

Ron said...

I don't believe in remaining in denial about the chronic problems of the SF Giants. You've identified some things that I consider real problems - those same items apparently alleviate your stress. Here's my detailed take:

- Every Team has plenty of injuries every Season. We were hardly unique. Some Teams have back-up plans or acquire pieces shrewdly - we have done neither for several Seasons.

- Samardzija isn't a very good Pitcher - never was; probably never will be. He is an example of a poor long-term Contract. Cueto was a good Pitcher, & gave us one really good year & a smidge of greatness this Season. Another example of a poor long-term Contract.

- As should be apparent, defending Belt as some kind of Team linchpin is over for me. If Belt is a linchpin, you are a fan of a mediocre Team.

- Offensively, Posey was terrible this year ... terrible. Because I love him, & because he is why we won 3 titles, I can blame the lack of production on the injury. But, he is stubborn & proud & should not have caught as many games as he did throughout his career. The effective part of his career may be over. I hope not, but, if he is an every day Catcher after this recovery, he won't have much time left on the playing field in MLB.

- Machado ... are you ill? Right now, the Giants are not an attractive destination for any proven MLB player. Why would Machado think about coming to us?

- Melancon has no trade value. If he does have a rennaissance next Spring, then we should keep him. But, I am not hopeful about that.

- Hanson, Avelino, Tomlinson ... these guys are destined to be career part-timers in MLB, not franchise cornerstones or even under serious consideration as everyday players.

- McCutchen had all of 65 RBI's combined ... whoopee ... that's the Team Leader?!? Decent Teams have one or more hitters w/ that many RBI's by the All-Star Break.

We are broken. We are not within tinkering range of being even competitive. We have a crappy Front Office, an exhausted Manager, really, really poor Hitters, & no pride (see Exhibit A, the last series of the Season).

Team websites usually keep the last Game played in the little box at the top corner of the web page all off-Season ... Understand that that means that every time you open the Giants' website for the next 6 months, you will see LA 15, SF 0 (w/ the corresponding even more depressing line score). Look right now ... it's still there. I am ashamed of this Team right now. If we had any SELF-RESPECT, we would tell MLB, who control everything about everything (including what is on every website), to fuck themselves & take that embarrassing shit off of there. Or, is wallowing in losing 15-0 to the fucking Dodgers supposed to motivate us for the next half year? There is more than enough going on in the Country to be disgusted & embarrassed about right now w/o having to look at LA 15, SF 0 for 6 months, because that's what MLB says has to be on our website. Fuck MLB & their fucking micro-managing of everything. I hope that the Playoffs suck.