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
Tonight the Giants had the joy of facing their 2009 number one pick, Zack Wheeler, who is having a great season. Predictably, he kicked ass. He's part of a formidable three-headed rotation that also features Jacob DeGrom and Noah Syndergaard. Wheeler missed all of 2015 and 2016 and much of 2017, but is now popping 98 mph with his fastball. Not that it matters: the Giants make everyone look like an ace. Mickey Calloway probably left Wheeler in for one inning too long, and the Giants tied the game in the 7th, but he still struck out ten against only one walk. It was all for naught as the good guys prevailed in 13 innings, 2-1, the winning run the result of two Mets colliding in left field.
The Mets, like the Giants, expected much more of their season. They were NL Champs in 2015, the year after the Giants won the Series. And they made the Wild Card game the next year, losing of course to the Giants and Madison Bumgarner. Like the Giants, they stunk last season (70-92) and are stinking this season (54-69). They are also on the hook for some big salaries with aging stars: Yoenis Cespedes, David Wright, and Jay Bruce have $113.5M coming in 2019 and 2020. But this isn't about the Mets. It's about the Giants.
At the trade deadline the Giants stood pat. They were 55-54 on July 31st, and five games back, and optimists could say they still had a chance. They followed that with a 6-10 run to effectively jump off the cliff and take themselves out of the race. I know, there are 36 games remaining, but the team can't win games consistently enough to generate any enthusiasm among the fans or strike fear into their NL West opponents. At this point they'll be lucky to finish with a .500 record.
Andrew McCutchen has been placed on revocable waivers (according to Baggs). That's not surprising. They'll give him a chance to exit with some grace and style and it will save the team a few shekels the rest of the way. You have to assume this means the organization is waving the surrender flag. Will another poor season force the staid and conservative Giants into big changes? I can't answer that. They should make some big changes, but I'm not much for should. I'm only interested in what they will actually do. (Not that I don't want to hear what you guys think! The comments section awaits your words.) I'm patient--the big stuff will have to happen in the off-season.
--M.C.
11 comments:
MLBTR weighs in on Cutch.
Ironically, McCutcheon is about the only guy who is hitting lately.
The season is over for the Giants, not that I won't keep watching the games and cheering for every good play. I found myself thinking about which team(s) I will pick to support in the post season. I probably should go with the A's, but I have VERY strong negative feeling about both the American League and Oakland. Of course, being against the Dodgers is a given, but that isn't enough. It is sad to be forced to give up hope for the season, but so it goes in the life of a sports fan.
Despite all of that, I am still looking forward to the Bumgarner-DeGrom matchup.
I feel the same way. There's plenty of fun and interesting baseball to watch. As far as post-season NL teams go, I don't really care, other than the usual ABTD (anybody but the Dodgers). In the AL, I don't really care either, but I'd like to see Cleveland finally win one, so they are my default. The Sawx at this point are the team to beat, and as they are my mom's team that's OK by me. Although I'm not an A's fan you have to like a team with their payroll (under $70M) challenging the defending champs. They have only one player (Piscotty) signed past 2020 and only one player making $10M+ (Davis).
I have found (assuming the Giants are not involved) over the years that I enjoy post-season baseball a lot more when I have no real rooting interest in any non-Giants club. I sort of develop a "favorite" as the playoffs progress. I enjoy seeing the players I don't normally get to watch.
there have been teams that come back from 9 games back with only 3 weeks to go. I have been watching baseball for too long. It is crazy to give up at this point. Cutch although not having a great season, is our biggest run producer and one of the more fun guys to watch. Looks like the giants got rid of Austin Jackson a little too early. Looks as if over the last month it is Crawford who is not hitting, and Jackson who is. About 2 months ago, Posey and Crawford were hitting about 120 points higher than Goldschmidt. Not the case now. Baseball is a strange game, if the odds makers, and the forecasters were always correct, there really would be no need to play the season except to sell some tickets and merchandise.
Seems to me the Giants are writing off the season. Putting Cutch on waivers, now Posey likely headed for surgery, the FO has decided the team isn't going to make it. My wife believes that a team is in it until they are mathematically eliminated, and that writing any team off at any time before then is absurd. She's right, of course. There is always a possibility. But I'm too steeped in probabilities to fully embrace it. If you played the rest of this season 100 times I'll bet the Giants would manage to win the West just once. I don't like those odds and I don't think the Brian Trust does either. We'll see if the fans show up when there's no Buster.
For all this talk about the Giants, it's the Nats who have thrown in the towel. They jettisoned Matt Adams and Daniel Murphy for, as near as I can tell, stale peanuts and a player who may or may not be named later. I don't follow the Nats closely, I don't know if they have minor leaguers that they think can fill in the slots adequately for the rest of the year (both those guys are free agents after 2018). But the Nats are a .500 team, currently sixth in a tight "wild card race" and the Phillies are fading fast. The Giants are currently eighth in that race, 1.5 games further back than DC (who is, this morning, 6 back). Putting a player on revocable wavers is not an indication of giving up, but if a trade was offered that really was compelling........
But that hardly ever happens. The only way that happens is if a team has, say, 2 third basemen and needs an outfielder (not totally unlike the Giants) and another, playoff-hunting team has a really good outfielder and their sole third baseman was out for the season. Posey going for surgery, however, is a way of saying that they are not going to make a run at it, unless he is just hurting more than he lets on.
The Chronic today has a Bruce Jenkins article about how the Giants are caught between two unappealing options - trading team members, and standing pat. It goes through the top players and speculates on whom could be gone in the post season. But these articles always drive me nuts because you can't trade a player and improve your team unless you have a trade target. And of course, the usual blather (I consider it highly unrealistic) about Bryce Harper coming here. He's not. I'll save my thoughts on trades for the season's end.
I think that, short of an amazing trade offer (which isn't coming), I see the moves in the off season. They may figuratively throw in the towel, but they will play out the string, not deconstruct the team now. Because there's no where to go. There's no team out there that is going to give the Giants their future for someone or some several players who have thrown up a .250 BA / 13 home run season so far. Maybe a miracle would happen. I doubt it, but they aren't eliminated yet. September's coming, maybe they can be spoilers. I'm past hoping, 2017 and a 3-games-under .500 2018 has burned it out of me.
If you're interested in a Bruce Jenkins article where is he is not (for a change) bitching about using statistics: https://www.sfgate.com/giants/jenkins/article/Lifeless-Giants-Who-will-stay-and-who-will-go-13172291.php?t=fe24abca10
Harper is not thrusting Washington to the pennant, at least not so far this year. What makes anyone think he could do that for the giants in the future?
The Nats can afford to dump Murphy and Adams. They've probably got ten guys out-performing those two. They have the most exciting rookie in baseball (19-year old Juan Soto). They still have Anthony Rendon and Max Scherzer and Stephen Strasburg and a bunch of other quality players. They'll be OK next year even if they lose Harper (and if they do they'll get salary relief and a draft pick, assuming they give him a QO). The results haven't been there for them even though they score runs at a better than average rate and prevent runs at a better than average rate. It can't all be bad luck, but that's part of it. Even with the house-cleaning the Nats still have a better chance of making the playoffs than the Giants.
Harper is having a bad year by his standards and yet he has 30 HR and a .381 OBP! He's a 3-fWAR player and yet he will be the goat of the team in the eyes of the press and many of the fans. This is a results-oriented business and if you don't bring home the rings then you are a failure. I suppose Harper will likely wind up somewhere else next season.
If the Giants had salary room I'd be all for going after him (he's only 25!), but the fact is the Giants need much more than just one player. And we saw last year that big-ticket FAs don't seem to want to come to SF. The Giants have a big question coming with MadBum, that is, pay him or trade him? Trading him is the bold move, but the team does not seem to do the bold move very often. More likely they'll try to keep him around until at least 2021 as Buster and Cueto are signed through then.
Cutch cleared waivers.
Post a Comment