A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball

I didn’t watch the game but I saw the final score. 3-1. I stared at it, scoped the box score a bit. Looking at it was boring. Some dinky hits and 12 walks. Pffftttt. The Giants remind me of the Dubs from like the 80’s till We Believe years. Or the Giants in the early 80s. Completely irrelevant. When an equally irrelevant team is your opponent and nobody is at the game I wonder what it’s like for the players. It can’t be like Giants games from the early 80’s. All the guys today are getting paid, that’s gotta ease some of the pain.

I shouldn’t complain about a win, but in yet another *down the drain* season it just doesn’t do much for me.

It’s nice to know that we can still run out our ace, our rock, our legend and still keep the loss deferential to less than 3 runs. I hope Z doesn’t lead with that fact when he opens up trade negotiations for Bum….

Anyway, screw the Giants. We have bigger birds to bake, my friends. Tonight we’re serving up some northern Raptor. There should be plenty to go around, see you at Casa de Flavor for dessert and a toast to true greatness…..

I’d like to think it happened like this: down 10 to the woeful Marlins headed to the top of the 9th, the vets gathered the team into the tightest circle they could and put out the call for a rally.

Belt spoke first: “We can’t lose by double digits to this team.”

Buster: “Exactly. We are world champions. Losing by 10 or more, again, that’s not in our championship DNA.”

Crawford: “Yes. Losing by 10 again is not in that book Bill Neukom wrote.”

The team emerged from that inspiring meeting as 1 unit and began the 9th inning with the eye of the tiger in…….all of their eyes. Knowing home runs were the most unlikely source of production they fell back on what they know. A single, a double, a sac fly and an infield single. But when Duggar popped out to third it felt the same as when Salvy Perez popped out to third and The Panda did this:

Well, ,maybe not completely the same. But goddammit they whittled that loss down to less than 10–The vets put out the call, the rest of the team knew what was in front of them and they made it so.

Will they build statues of this 2019 team? Unlikely. But they’ll go down in our history because of valiant efforts like last night. How lucky are we? I’ll leave that to others to decide……

Brandon Crawford returns to the site of his greatest solo achievement, The Seven Hit Game. Man, how long ago does that feel? A shell of his former self, he’s been battling pink eye for the last few days. Did they have pink eye in the 70’s? I feel like that’s a newer thing, yes?

Guys like Crawford and Belt, man, they are snake bit aren’t they?

Or is it something else?

I suppose a cock-eyed optimist would notice that the Giants whittled down their run differential in the Arizona series from 16 to 6 to 4. Of course, my mammy didn’t raise no cock-eyed optimist. The bottom line is that it’s poppycock to be optimistic about anything having to do with this last place (guaranteed in February) team. As the immortal Jack Black once said: this team plays like cock-ass. They should change their mascot to a cocker spanial. Or maybe just a guy dressed in a limp cock mascot costume. That would be hysterical, that actually might get me out to a game this year.

I’m running out of words to describe how bad the Giants are. If you have tickets to today’s game and you’re still going, man, more power to you. You are a better fan than me. If Shaun Anderson and rainy weather gets your motor going, you win.

What are we looking forward to now? Yaz’ grandson getting his first hit as a Giant? Pffttttt….a more underwhelming future there could not be.

…I mean, WOW. I know terrible teams lose badly sometimes but I wasn’t ready for 18-2 vs one of the most average teams in the league. Adam Jones is awful, right? Yeah, nobody wants him. Four hits in a game would just piss me off. It’s overkill.

THEIR FIRST FOUR HITTERS HAD 14 MOTHERFUCKING HITS LAST NIGHT!!!!!!

IN OUR LAST TWO FULL GAMES , 22 MOTHERFUCKING INNINGS, ALL OF OUR HITTERS COMBINED HAD 14 HITS!!!!!!!!

Just WOW.

Anyway, here ya go.

Yesterday was just an embarrassing display of offensive ineptitude. Until Pillar got a hit in the 13th they hadn’t had a hit since the 7th. Posey went 0-6 with three K’s. Mac The Doof struck out 5 times in 5 at bats. Someone named Donavan Solano ended the game by making the final out. Meanwhile the Twins hit 8 bombs yesterday. Our opponents have out-bombed us 70-47 this year….

Anyone got a problem with Drake? I have no problem with his antics on the sideline. I suppose you could make a case that if all the court side fans were acting like that it would cause problems but they aren’t all acting like that. It’s an exciting game and I don’t feel like he’s a *fake look at me* guy, it looks real for him……

I’ve reached that stage of grief in the season where I try to figure out the mlb fan bases who have it worse than us—-the fan bases who have the worst time watching baseball right now. Right off the bat, you gotta look at the 3 beauties and get a big time bounce from them. As bad as we’ve been for half a decade, we still have those to fall back on.

But still, we’re terrible and watching these games is a grind.

In the NL there are 2 teams with worse records than SF–the Marlins and the Nats. But the Nats have a better run diff than we do (-38 v -51). The team with the closest run diff to us is Pitt (-50) but they’re 2 games over .500 and are probably more fun to watch on a day to day basis.

In the AL the Tigers have a worse record than we do AND a much worse run diff (-93). They’ve been getting killed regularly since they started out hot to begin the season. I still watch the daily Angry Tiger Fan videos and he’s at his wits end, lqtm.

Baltimore has a worse record and the worst run diff (-107)–just following both teams (Detroit and Baltimore) from a fantasy perspective, I still play more guys from those teams in daily fantasy than I do the Giants—that translates into some interest in those teams, at least for me.

Pitching duels are dumb if you’re losing most of them. I guess we don’t really even engage in those much anymore, anyway.

If you like power, we’re ranked 27th in bombs, OPS 28th, sb’s 22nd (our crown jewel of offensive achievement) and for all the Flappers who beat off to walks we are ranked 25th. Grim all the way around.

I’d probably say Tiger and Marlin fan bases are the 2 that have it worse than we do, at least when it comes to being forced to watch our shit teams play day in and day out.

Agree? Disagree?

That one ended too late for me to see it. Nice win. Pillar and Panik, 1.0’s for each, hit two decent pitches, too.

Reading over Loo’s trade proposal, eh, I’d probably do that, not sure NY would. But maybe I’m underestimating how done they are with Stanton. You know though, we aren’t getting out of this through blockbuster trades of shitty deals. That’s why I don’t mind what Z is doing. He hit on Pillar and gave away shit. He’s got to do more of that. Lots and lots of that. And in a throwaway year there really is no ceiling to the number of transactions he can log.

Gear up for the draft, nail a couple of those, add a few more 1.0’s off the scrap heap.

Go from there. That’s the plan.

Giants are saying 29,815 attended last night game and that is just lame. When did they stop counting the turnstiles? What is to be gained from releasing obvious inaccurate info like that? 29,815 WERE NOT AT THAT GAME! I doubt the tv viewership was even that high. lqtm.

Suarez proved he wasn’t so awful that he shouldn’t get another start. I’m fine with him pitching, especially considering our options.

So what the fuck are we going to do for nine (9) more days?

That was quite an exciting bomb from our co-bomb leader. I wonder what the fans in Boston are thinking about The Panda? Assuming they don’t care anymore.

Suarez gettin’ after it tonight, he better be on his game or this is going to get ugly, early.

Dubs sweep Blazers to the curb tonight. The Finals await.

When the Blazer fans started over-celebrating Meyers Leonard 3’s, that’s when I started getting pissed off. Up till that point I was pretty composed, just happy to be in Portland with my main man Chris, enjoying the #saladday. So I got a little loud. And the knowing dude head nods were snapping up and down at a crisp rate on the way out of the Moda Center.

Giants won, I hit the pick 4 at the Preakness, Dubs rolled….days don’t get much better than that.

When you talk about salad days, you’re talking about weekends like this one. I’m flying up to Portland tonight, Preakness tomorrow and then right after it me and BirdDog storm The Rose Garden—at least that’s what it was called when I was going to Lewis & Clark, not sure what they call it now.

I’ll finish cappin’ the Preakness by tomorrow am but right now I’m leaning towards Bourbon War as my top pick.

Giants in Arizona tonight. Smarge in the thin air, this might not work out too good….

Giants have another off day for some reason.

Probably just as well.

Dubs have another beatdown scheduled for 6pm. Don’t miss it.

I don’t mind going with an opener at all. Make the opposition face 3 different pitchers the first 3 times through the line up–I can dig that. If we had better pitchers this wouldn’t be needed. Which brings me to Beede. Eight walks through his first 6.2 innings ain’t gonna cut it. At this point there is no reason to not keep trotting him out there. Maybe one of his *sunset hearthand* instagram posts will motivate him to shine now and again. Maybe the pitching coach can get through to him, get him to stop mashing the post button on his phone and actually refine his pitching repertoire to something that works at the major league level. Either way, we have nothing to lose. When you are a last place team mid-level talents like Beede get more run.

Dubs game went as expected. Portland’s strength is our strength and it’s not as good. Easy series to handicap.

I’m gonna be shocked if Portland makes a series of this. Their strength are their guards who are not as good as our guards. Kanter has some offense but he’s so bad defensively, how can you even have him out there? I love Lillard. Should be a fun wipeout to watch though.

Giants going with the opener in Vincent and then Beede, whatever you want to call him–This is a decent spot to evaluate Beede, even in this sheltered role. Toronto still can’t hit much and they’ll probably be even worse on the road in an NL pitcher friendly park. If Young Beedah can’t do it in this spot the time for chances are over.

Just throwing up a new thread cause we need it. Yesterday was so cool. Games like those are the reason why I could care less about Game of Thrones or Marvel movies or whatever. Ain’t no spoilers to worry about in sports. You watch the end just like everyone else, nobody knows what’s going to happen.

And if you think I’m FOS on this, watch this. These dudes are the best.

“To be honest I have no idea what they’re doing. And I’m not talking about Boch and them, it’s the front office….I did a fake injury, so I’m not happy about that…”–Holland.

So, say goodbye to Derrick Holland. You can’t call out your boss like that and skate free. And that’s fine, he’s not part of any solution, he was, at best, not a bad dart throw from our past.

But this is good for Zaidi to hear. I like all the moves he makes because it’s the polar opposite of Sabean and Evans who literally did nothing once the season started. And as I said repeatedly before the season, last place was always GUARANTEED for this squad. Moves NEED to be made. But we’re still dealing with human beings here, and even worse baseball players, some of the worst creatures of habit roaming the earth.

So hopefully he’s learning as he goes. He can’t expect his players to celebrate the 32 catcher transactions he puts in each week…..

Woke up today feeling like we just won another one. Couldn’t be more proud of the perseverance these guys showed. The bench stepped up. And Steph, who I was cursing loudly and often at halftime, reminded me why I love him. I’m a damn fool for ever doubting him.

That *heart of a champion* stuff is real. Paul and Harden don’t have it. Steph, Klay, Draymond, etc… do have it. And is there a better sports moment than watching your team call on that heartbeat for one more run to the top? Doubt it.

I see the Giants were shut out at home 7-0. That was fairly predictable with that major climate shift they had to deal with….

I guess we shouldn’t be totally surprised, this guy might have been pitching with luck on his side last season. Still, the difference is startling. He gave up 9 bombs all season in 2018. It’s May 10th and he’s given up 9 bombs so far this year. Every number is worse. This is a no-pressure season so we can be patient I guess. But it is rather unnerving that he’s gotten this….hittable?

Here’s what I want to see in the Dubs game tonight: I want to see either Jordan Bell or Quinn Cook get some run. With his energy and athleticism Bell seems like a natural rotation guy in this series and yet he gets no minutes. Cook, too. We need a shooter out there, Cook can do that.

I know it’s early, but as I type this it is 33 degrees in Denver and snowing. So, maybe we get a game today, maybe we get a snowball fight, I dunno…

I’m bummed about the KD injury but I’ve seen Steph, Klay and Draymond ball out too many times to just wave the white flag. I think Game 6 is a loss but Game 7 could be the most electric game we’ve ever seen….

What an improbable comeback story this is. Mac The Oaf was nearly literally left for dead on the waiver wire two months ago. Nobody wanted him. Not ever for free. In a game that has evolved into how many power hitters you can squeeze into your line up, it was fairly astounding that the one thing he did, blast bombs, wasn’t wanted by a single team in baseball.

So there truly isn’t enough credit that I can shuttle this guy’s way. Maybe he kept playing because he’s a baseball player and it’s all he knows how to do. Maybe he’s just resilient as hell. Either way, last night was awesome.

I don’t usually get into fantasy stuff here at the blog but some of you might get a kick out of this after all the shit I’ve flung Hunter Pence’s way. Last night one of my team’s finished 3rd in the $4 (50K) Four Seamer (3rd out of 14,863 teams, you’ll also notice I had a completely separate team finish 10th, that is very hard to do). Thank you, among others, Hunter Pence! lol

So two flaps up for MTO for the long road he has traveled and what the hell, Hunter Pence, too…..

Dubs lost but my confidence is still in tact. Houston is a good team, this was never going to be easy. And Golden State is on the downside of the dynasty. I’d be thrilled with just another Finals appearance but that seems so far away….

SF in Colorado tonight. Yikes. And there will be rain.

Tell me something hockey fans: every year I hear KNBR and the callers tell me “this is the year for the Sharks.” And every year they lose. Is that just hopeful nonsense being spewed out on the airwaves or are they actually good every year but always fail to close the deal?

Early morning diddy. Pom Pom needs to get it going.

Loo, thanks for posting that box score. Man, did Thrill get 3 hits every game or what? What a stud.

Still going over the Derby in my head, still wouldn’t have put Country House on top. And in a sick way, I was right, he couldn’t win, he didn’t *win*, but he was right there. At 65-1 that is a great pick. At least my buddy Chris (who posts here as Bird Dog occasionally) did something with him. He hit the trifecta ($5800). And my buddy Scott hit the exacta ($1500). So I am happy for those guys.

Lost in all of this is how nobody was able to pass that horse after he set such strong early fractions. Look at this slow mo, wow, thank God everyone ended up safe after this.

If Bochy was considering walking away mid season he probably isn’t considering it anymore. Wow, what a game. Even in their current stinking state, games like that probably fuel his old bones for more; for life. And how about a couple of shout outs for old man strength. Vogt and Longo played like men last night. 1.0’s for everyone on the team though. You don’t come back from 8 zip unless everyone is together and on the same page.

Ok, Derby time. I am sticking with Improbable to win, War of Will has a shot and while he can’t win I am shocked at the early wagering odds for Country House (71-1). If he stays at that price you can bet your bippy that I’ll be spotting him in 3rd and 4th in the superfecta.

But let’s see how the track is playing, there is going to be a lot of water falling today. Derby Day. My favorite day of the year…..

Fun lil’ diddy in Cincy this weekend. Small yard so that should fix our offense, right? Derby weekend so I am focused elsewhere. The weather will be bad again at Churchill. Right now, I am picking Improbable to win with War of Will right there, too (he is my best longshot pick of the race).

Beede getting the call tonight. It’s easy to see this not going well. I wonder if his new bride will capture the carnage and post it on twitter/insta?

LA has no heart, man. There’s no other way to explain how we just took 2/3 from them. They have talent, they like to pile up the NL West crowns, but at the end of the day they just got no heart. And it’s one of my favorite things about them.

Lots of good signs last night. Bum was rock solid. Posey yanked a ball, albeit it not very far. Still, good enough for the game winner and another 1.0 in the bank.

This season is going to be all about the little things. I’ll take the wins when they come but the moments are even better. Last night had some great moments.

If you believe there is a flame still flickering in Bumgarner, every start is critical from here on out. He can’t keep pitching like this if we want to get any value at all for him by the deadline.

We are so bad offensively, just the sheer volume of shit has kept me from calling out certain players this year. But that time is over.

BRANDON CRAWFORD! I am looking at YOU, sucker. A .495 OPS? Lol, What in the actual fuck has happened to this guy? HE HAS 2 RBIS THIS YEAR! It is May 1st today…..