A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball

Ok, thankfully that is over. They won two, probably should have won 3 since Monday’s game was right there for the taking, but the bottom line is that they played like a .250 win percentage team. No game today, as God intended, and now all our energy and focus turns to Oaktown where the Dubs begin their brilliant march back towards glory. I know we will all stand as one Flapping Nation as their destiny unfolds. 🙂 🙂 🙂

Derek Holland is a fine #5. But when you’re #1 of the Fives you have a problem. This season that looked doomed after Bum, Smarge and then Cueto went down is realistically in grave danger if we don’t get get one or two of these fivers to start going 6 innings. That may be too much to ask.

Last night was just a bad game. Wash it off and move on. One thing we all agreed on was that this was going to be a brutal road trip. So we should have all built up a resistance for this stretch. I actually think Bum returning could have a more positive effect than just one start every 5 games. This staff needs a leader badly, he will make them all a little better. And at this point who wouldn’t rather see Dereck Rodriguez in for Smargerine? Because that’s probably the newest member to The 5 Fives.

Besides the loss, Longo studded out. Posey finally hit a ball out. Today isn’t going to be any better with Flyball Holly pitching but if we don’t play defense and only hit solo bombs it doesn’t matter who’s starting for us in Colorado.

Tough loss last night. Any game we have a chance to win on this brutal roadie we need to close the deal. Smarge in Nepal? Yikes. At some point this guy has to get back into the strike zone (although you could argue that was actually his problem last season).

Dubs/Cavs finals again. Four straight years. Is that a problem? Not if you’re a fan of one of those teams, I guess. But this is probably not ideal for the NBA if they are looking to keep fans buying season tickets to teams that apparently have no chance of ever seeing the finals.

I’m going with Dubs in 5 (assuming Love comes back). If he’s out I think we sweep them. Lebron can’t win a game completely alone against this stacked squad. I hate Cleveland fans and look forward to this wipe out.

Friends, prepare for annihilation. Total wipe out destruction. Look away, this one is going to be hideous.

I’d like to say, “hey this is baseball, anything can happen.” But I don’t really believe that anything can happen. About the only thing I can think of to hold on to is that Colorado is only 9-12 at home. But that’s obviously a freak stat that will correct itself starting tonight.

Thank God we have The Dubs to distract us from this nightmare.

Hopefully bad things don’t come in twos.

Giants calling up Derek Rodriguez (Pudge’s son). These jokers with the hair, Jesus.

Tyler Chatwood is beatable if we are patient with him. He has an unseemly 41/40 SO/bb ratio. Seriously, how can you start games and walk that many dudes? Anyway, if Blach can *five* his way through this game I like our chances.

My buddy asked me last night “Isn’t it less satisfying to beat the Rockets without Chris Paul?” And I was like “uh, no, are you an idiot?” Tough luck for them but winnings championships is a long journey that is always worth it no matter how you get there. It’s so hard to get to the top of the mountain. I don’t have any idea what will happen tomorrow night but it’s Game 7 and there isn’t a more fun moment in sports. I can’t decide who I want to win tonight. On one hand I’d like to see Boston stick it to Lebron and watch Cleveland fans weep in unison on twitter. On the other hand, the Cavs would be a cakewalk in the Finals.

At some point James has to slow down. He HAS to. Dude is a machine. He’s better than Jordan the same way Brady is better than Montana.

Stratton’s wife gave birth on 4/24. Check out what happened since:

He seems to be welcoming walks and home runs to the family as well. But he’s placed strikeouts up for adoption….

Jose Quintana is ok. He can fire up a good game now and again as well as a “5 Five” type of game. Actionless and Longo have had decent success vs him. Hoping we see Mac instead but Jackson can’t just sit on the bench in perfect health all the time. He needs to play now and again, maybe Gork’s sits today. Actually, he’s one of our main power hitters and he did hit a bomb yesterday so he and Willy probably play, Actionless sits; collecting dust and hording perfect health…..

Five years ago….

Trying times in the Bay these days. At least we have our *ace* going today. Holland (who sucks less than the other 4 guys) is faced with a task today for sure. And for added fun the wind is blowing out.

Whatever, we just need to hit the ball. Forget the pitching, hit the damn ball. Win a damn game.

Speaking of *five guys*, the Warriors have become the ultimate front runners who can stroke it when there’s no pressure on them. But lately, when the moment arises and we see who stands tall and who falls there has been a lot more *falling* than *standing*. These guys are coming out of time outs in critical situations and it’s like they’re playing basketball for the first time in their lives….

The Houston series went pretty much how we thought it would go. I had hoped they’d take the first one but losing both was hardly a surprise. For *fun* I checked the collective ERA of our 5 Fives and was secretly hoping it would zero out exactly at 5.00. It didn’t. 5.22. The question is whether they could whittle that down to an even 5 by the end of this roadie and I think I’d take the “hell no” on that bet. But who knows? Anyone see these five fellows whacking their number down to 5.00?

Yesterday was just one of those days in sports you just gotta wash off. Everything went wrong. I should have known it was going to be a bad night after Matt Harvey cobbled together his first quality start of the bet. Embarrassing for Pittsburgh. And for me after I talked a bunch of shit about him.

The Giants are going to continue to get killed if they can’t outhit the damage the Five Fives will be causing. And really, if they get blown out in all 8 of these games it’s a solid indication that this isn’t their year, that even with a strong streak of resiliency, they couldn’t overcome the devastation to the starting pitching staff. Smarge has a large start tonight. Maybe The Panda gets in Verlander’s head. He’s just a man…..

The Warriors flat out choked. No other way to put it. Houston deserves credit for playing hard and not giving up but you don’t blow big leads like that in the playoffs in your house. That was awful. And I don’t even know what that was at the end of the game. What was that?

Bad day. But it’s cool because you don’t get to know what a good day feels like without some of the shit ones thrown in there for reference…..

If we are going to take one in Houston, today is probably the day. I’m gonna have to see this new and improved Gerrit Cole for myself before I believe he’s the AL CY leader. His K’s are up, his walks are down and he’s dominating in a hitters park. It doesn’t usually work that way.

Personally I’m more worried about one of our unfab five taking the hill. Suarez? Against these guys? Pfffttttt….I think we’ll hit Cole but this could be a high scoring game….

Tomorrow? Verlander is the best pitcher in baseball. Maybe he’ll have an off day or something…..

What we know for sure: There are five of them. And they aren’t very good. If they were hitters they’d be snapped up by The Bowker Gang in an nanosecond. Their ladies are big as houses….

Actually I don’t know about that last one.

But there is definitely a problem with these 5 sordid soldiers. Their ceiling is low, their floor so far down I can barely see it.

But we need these 5 felicitous fellows as there are not 5 better chosen to do this type of shit job…..

The bullpen is ragged. The bats are tired. But it’s all hands on deck until we get Bum and Cueto back and Smarge stops slumming with these dudes….

This road trip is gonna be….my advice is to look away. Just look away….

Congrats to the Rays for having the balls to let Yarbrough pitch to two batters three times. He faced Pujols and Simmons 3 times. Wow. I can’t believe he made it through such a grueling task.

Here’s a cutting edge idea: how about you just never pitch your starting pitcher at all? Yeah, announce him as the starting pitcher….but just start Romo every game….at some point….warm him up 2 or 3 times….then….never….bring…..him….in.

That would trick the shit out of the opposition, eh? Saves wear and tear on that arm, too.

Cautiously optimistic about Blach today. He’s from Colorado and has pitched well against them in the past. Today is a pretty critical game. We are about to embark on a most difficult stretch of the schedule. Two in Houston, three at Wrigley and then three in Nepal. If we went 3-5 I’d be ecstatic but feel like it’s going to be worse than that…..

Our ace let us down last night. He brought home the bacon, he just couldn’t fry it up in the pan. And if the reliable Holland has left us, we are in a pretty dark place, my flappin’ friends…..

Not being able to hit continues to be a problem. We can’t just be a better hitting team than we were last year. We have to be SIGNIFICANTLY better. And we aren’t.

Jon Gray is a stud who should shut us down. The Royal Wedding has ended with their first glorious kiss as husband and wife. And Pimlico is under water.

Lame weekend….

Colorado has done a very nice job of building an A+ bullpen. It will be interesting to see if these guys can keep it going this year with all the wear and tear on the body and the arm they have to deal with way up there…..

I’m trying not to be down on Pierce Johnson. He’s given up no hits in 11 of his 18 outings this year. He’s really only had 1 horrible game. Bottom line is that we didn’t get enough hits, bombs or singles, last night…..

Lame weekend coming up. Pimlico track likely to be screwed up with water. I still like Good Magic but won’t be surprised if this is an easy win for Justify. And then we have to deal with the idiotic Royal Wedding on Sat, too. All those people just need to go away.

On Sunday, Dubs rolling at Oracle. Three more at AT&T and I don’t feel good about any of these games.

At least we have our ace going tonight…..

Man, that turned quick. We went from a “Perfect Night” with the Dubs rolling and the Giants winning to…I don’t know what that was. Just like I’m still processing that video I posted of the “little incident down at the Starbucks.”

Colorado isn’t hitting. They are leading the NL in bombs (always expected) but they’re 10th in team OPS. That’s wild for a team that gets to play half its games in Nepal.

So as long as Smarge can keep his pitches from leaking right down Broadway we should be ok tonight.

Right?

Question posed on Tolbert’s KNBR show yesterday: Would you rather have a player hit a homerun every single game (and strike out in his other 3 at bats) or would you rather have a player go 4 for 4 with 4 singles every single game? Explain your answer. And don’t ask me any questions about the question, that’s the only info you have to make your choice.

Looking forward to your responses on this one…..

Finally, this…..

Great job connecting a couple of wins off this bad team. There’s a little extra in today’s game with Matt Harvey making his second start for the Reds. As you know, I have a bet with the great San Dawg on how many quality starts this chump will stagger through this season. We settled on 4.5 as the number. That could also be the number of beers he has before first pitch. But I digress.

I will be catching this one on the radio today. Pound this drunken has-been into the ground….

did Belt go crazy about the called 3rd strike? He should have, look where it was (#7).

Great day for Bay Area sports last night. Dubs rolled. Giants won. Stratton was pretty average. Man though, he was one clean inning away from a quality start. If Harvey shakes his way through 6 innings/4 runs (in 5 starts) I gotta pay up to San Diggity? Eh, I’m still not worried. Harvey (who sucks) will come through for me in the end….

Unseasonably cold, lame weather day today. Check out the ticket prices according to espn. We are the one at the bottom. ATT is no longer the place to be.

Go out and beat the Reds (who suck). I have no idea how this team swept the Dodgers. LA has flat out given up and it’s a glorious, wonderful thing….

The other take is that LA has just been ravaged by injuries and just WAIT! till they get their guys back. You know what? Screw that. We lost our top 3 starters this year, we’ve been sending out pole smoker after pole smoker to the mound and yet we have stayed competitive on the year sitting only 3.5 games out.

Resilient….

We have a 7 games at home and it would be a good idea to win as many of them as possible. After that we go on the road for 8 against Houston, The Cubs and Sherpaville. I’m not one to sweat the schedule but that is a killer 8. If we burn up the bullpen early in that stretch I don’t know if I’ll be able to bring myself to watch the Colorado massacre.

Our plucky, average starting pitchers should appreciate being back at home. If they can’t do it here, they can’t do it anywhere….

Harvey goes against Suarez on Wednesday….Extra excited for that one.

Dubs tonight….

Finally we get some relief as we get our best fucking starting pitcher back today. Derek Holland had the best line of all these chumps. Way back in the 4-2 L he went 5 and only gave up 3. All 5 other SP’s did worse than that. Can’t win with starting pitching like this.

I was going through an old box and found some journals I used to write in. Here’s a snippet from one related to our Giants. The first part is about a gun shot exchange I witnessed, not something you typically saw in Palo Alto, then or now.

Another *fun* day of baseball where we get Smarge throwing his 96 mph heater at the Pirates and them sending it right back up his ass at 115 mph. He pitched a game in Pitt a couple of years ago, it’s stuck in my mind for some reason. Gave up a lot of bombs. That was the game where I was like “man, this guy can really serve up the homers.” And he’s been serving ’em up like flapjacks at IHOP ever since.

I don’t know what to say about this road trip except that it can probably get worse. I mean, why couldn’t it?

So what’s gonna happen in Pittsburgh? Are we going to compete as we did in Atl or get taken to the woodshed as we did in Philly?

Somebody is stoked to be in Pitt:

I wonder how guys like ‘Cutch, Longo and Jackson feel about their first couple of months in SF. All 3 certainly had better results in their last stop. Is it a total grind to be a San Francisco Giant now? Do they hate it?

I’ll tell ya one thing, with all these damn K’s the team is piling up I’m definitely gonna have a few “Taillons” at draftkings today….

Don’t watch the game today. Besides not having to watch another shellacking, it’s unacceptable that online is the only way to watch this game. Listen to it on the radio if you have to keep up. The game is better enjoyed that way anyway.

Facebook is stupid. Watching this game just feeds into their stupidity.

Also, we suck right now. I’m still not sure why this is happening. If we were this bad we’d be getting crushed every game. Think about it. If me and 8 other Flappers took the field, we’d get mercy-ruled every game.

The “mercy rule”. I always lqtm when I hear that term, it’s a great term……

Holland was who we thought he was. He got through 5, he gave up home runs. But he kept the team in the game about as well as any #5 can do.

As usual, you can look to the power production to see how the Phillies are doing this. They’ve hit 7 bombs we’ve hit 1 (a pinch hit bomb). You cannot compete in a bandbox by striking out a billion times and not hitting at least a few bombs.

Philly pitching has been good, that obviously has something to do with it. But even good pitching understands they’re going to surrender home runs in dumb ass venues like Citizen Banks Park.

Two young pitchers going at it today. Let’s see who sacks up and leaves the yard….

Not a good night for Bay Area run differential. -25 for the both of them. I wonder if that’s some sort of modern day record or something. Gonna have to check with Elias Sports. How do you do that? When I was a kid I used to think it was some dude named Elias who had all the stats on everyone. He was a freaking genius. Anyway, shout out to that company for staying relevant despite the internet taking over…..

Today could be another rough one. I hold out more hope that Smarge can recapture the magic than I do that Derek Holland is useful.

I don’t sweat big losses like last night’s. It looks bad, it’s just one loss. They had a let down, they’re traveling on the other side of the country, not a huge deal…..

I’m not going to look ahead at the pitching match ups anymore. It just kinda bums me out. The mindset has to be, keep wielding the bats like men and hope the pitching stays out of the way.

We’re 13-5 over our last 18. Don’t fear any team, any park, any pitcher. The only danger we face comes from within…

I love the Joe/Brady arguments. There’s no way to prove any of these generational comparisons and yet they seem to inspire some of the most spirited debates. I may be able to finally admit that Brady has had a better career than Joe but if I needed to win one game there’s no QB I’d even consider starting. Joe forever.

Also….Happy Birthday Ferrethead.

This Hanson guy is bringing a nice, *no-Honky* look to the team right now. Ron Hansen is my favorite all time jockey, may he rest in peace.

Atlanta doesn’t know what’s fucking hit them this weekend. It’s refreshing to see that we can beat a young, athletic team. And we are beating them to a pulp. I’m not really sure how we’re doing this actually.

Next guy up? Suarez? Sure, why not. Hides the ball well, he competes. Another guy who fits into the resilient mold that you’re required to have if you want to play with these guys.

Sweep ’em, why not?

I’d like to point out that when I made my prediction for 88 wins it was before Bum and Smarge went down and there was still hope that Melatonin might still be able to pitch. I didn’t change my win # after all those guys went down because as a great Flapper once told me, “there are no rebuys at the Flap.” So I won’t be changing it now that we’ve likely lost Cueto for the year. And really, predictions are stupid anyway. The team you start with is never the team you end the long season with, so who really knows anything with a baseball seasonal prediction?

Having said all of that, we are on pace to win 86 wins. That isn’t going to get it done for a wild card spot but they have been entertaining and competitive. Actually I think my boldest pick was that the bullpen would surprise everyone and I think they’ve even surprised me. The entire pitching staff has been nails and maybe this is all happening with smoke and mirrors but I don’t think so. You can’t go 17-15 by sending nothing but magicians and their tricks to the mound every single game.

I woke up this morning thinking of one word to describe this team so far and I landed on the word “resilient.” They haven’t made a single excuse about all these lost arms they just go out there and get the job done. Sometimes that job has required the bats to sack up and they’ve done that many times already this year often coming back from a large deficit–something last year’s limp bats couldn’t do.

Realistically, I now question whether they can make a run this year with the team they have. The season is just too long, they’ve already lost their best arms and you have to think more of these guys will be going down as the year progresses. But a resilient team can surprise you. Already, they have surprised everyone. Including me.

Derby Talk:

This is, without question, my favorite day of the year. The Breeders Cup comes close, the Super Bowl maybe, obviously certain holidays with fam, but Derby Day is at the top. I have had mixed results at best in betting the Derby. With 20 horses running the longest distance any of them have ever run before, it’s a tough race to handicap. A lot can happen, even a one split second bad decision by a jockey can ruin the trip and the chances of winning. This year an interesting thing has happened. I am dead set AGAINST both of the favorites. Neither will be on top of any of my tickets. Justify and Mendelsshon are regally bred steeds who will likely have HOF careers by the time they retire. But that doesn’t mean either wins the Derby today. Justify didn’t run at 2 and until that qualification gets met (it hasn’t happened since Apollo won in 1882) I won’t be betting on a horse who didn’t run at two. Plus, those fractions in the SA Derby were a joke, he’s faced an average of 4.7 horses in his career thus far (19 today) and Baffert being his trainer is going to overvalue him in the eye of the public. In fact if this were Mick Ruis training him they’d say he was crazy for trying to rush a horse to the Derby like this. Therefore, for me, he’s a toss out for the top spot.

Mendelsshon is getting too much credit for his UAB Derby win. Yes he won by 18 lengths, yes it was stylish. But it was on a wicked speed favoring track. 16 of the previous 17 dirt races in Dubai were won by the horse who got the lead on the rail. By the way, the horse who came in 2nd that day (Rayya) ran up the track yesterday in the Oaks. So while Mendelsshon has every right to one day be a superstar I don’t think it will be today.

And if you can throw the top two betting favorites out of the top spot on your tickets you are now looking at an awful lot of prices to get the job done. I will have several horses on top in my pick 3, pick 4 and tri and super. I won’t list them all off because that would be overkill. If you put a gun to my head I’d still pick Good Magic to win it but I’ve gone back and forth between him and Bolt d’Oro. Doesn’t matter, I’ll have both (and others).

Today is the only day you get. Go do something *resilient* with it.

This will be a very interesting road trip. ATL/Philly/Pitt. On one hand, if we keep playing the way we’ve been playing, I could see us going over .500 easily. But when you look at that SP staff, man, it’s tough to remain positive. I would like to think that Stratton is back on his regular schedule, his weeping is over, and he’s ready to focus on his trade again.

Derby weekend. I shall release my picks tomorrow. My last 2 publicly released picks (Cloud Computing who won the Preakness at 13-1) and Ascend who won a G1 at 35-1 should have your interest peaked.

If you are playing the Oaks today, I like 3 longshots: Coach Rocks, Wonder Gadot and Eskimo Kisses. Let’s see if one or more crack the exacta…..

Winning games, staying at or above .500, this is exactly the blueprint we had hoped for when the season started. Unfortunately, things are looking grim. Injuries are a part of the game, next man up, yadda tadda, but this team isn’t built to withstand these types of blows.

The only sliver of hope is that we can hit this year (unlike last year). Maybe we stay competitive on the strength of our bats but I’m really just saying that rather than believing it….

I guess we’ll see what happens. Pffftttt…..

It was all Dubs at my house last night so I didn’t catch a ton of the game or any new info on Cueto’s elbow. That is obviously of much greater concern than a May loss to the Padres.

I think we all know where this is going. Either he needs TJ surgery or he’s going to try to gingerly pitch through something and neither of those scenarios are gonna work.

It’s really amazing how all the guys who keep getting hurt are the guys critical to our success. Gorkey’s, Jackson, Hundley, etc…those guys walk around without a scratch on them….

Let’s just put that W in the bank and marvel at 15-14 for a moment…..has it ever looked this good?

But there is a huge looming problem, my friends. Iris’ pimp Sport lurks in the shadows. Smarge has lost his heater and that could be a disaster. He’s down to 91.7 mph, 3 mph off his career average. And being the dope that he is, his plan seems to be to throw more fastballs. He’s running that huffer and puffer up there 60% of the time, easily his highest FB usage since 2010.

Smarge is way too dumb and stubborn to ever turn himself into a craft pitcher. So, either the Giants need to DL him and he needs to get healthy (which isn’t going to happen) or he’s going to turn into “Derek Holland Light” and we already have our hands full with the high caloric Derek Holland.

So I’m stoked, the vibes are all May flowers and shit. But this Smarge thing is a real problem because he is not healthy right now….