Pitching On The Block
Rumor that the Reds are open to trading flame thrower Luis Castillo. Let’s hope they get more than Casey McGehee for him. Yikes. Sometimes it’s the trade you don’t make that’s the best one of all.
Cincy is also trying to trade Sonny Gray.
We can afford neither of the asking prices.
A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball 
Yeah Reds were trendy pick coming into last season but wound up .500 team even with Bauer. Now they’re dumping salary and letting go of good pitchers.
Wanted to ask you Flav, about differences btw racing on turf vs. dirt . Do trainers specialize on one or other, especially for their better horses? Is recovery time different for horses themselves?
Analysts yesterday at LosAl commented on horses that had done well on turf yet they were unsure about them on dirt. As you’ve noted, jockeys like Rispoli and Prat (Juan Hernandez too) do very well on turf…why is that?
Lots of answers to this. Some people like the angle of a horse going from turf to dirt in their next race. Some horses run better on turf and you can see that in the breeding of horses (ie, if the parents of a horse were good on turf there’s a good chance their offspring will be too). Turf races are run a little differently than dirt races usually— in Europe they run exclusively on turf (which is what we should be doing here, btw, it’s much safer than dirt). Euro turf races are usually run slow early with a sprint in the final furlong or so. US turf races tend to run that way too, though not as pronounced. The best turf riders understand this and are patient with their rides. Most of the time if you see a horse blaze off to an early lead on the turf they’re done in the stretch. Early speed, in general, carries better on the dirt than on the turf.
Those are my stream of consciousness answers, hope that helped!
Thanks, looking forward to Santa Anita, supposed to start this coming weekend, right?
dec 26th is my 3rd favorite day of the year for racing maybe behind only Breeders Cup day and Kentucky Derby day
Chron story from Peter Hartlaub (who visited 2012) says Finnerty’s owners made it official, closing until further notice.
“While this is the end of Finnerty’s for now, we truly hope to share a drink with you all again soon”, statement from Messrs. Seelig and Stapleton.
I hope so. It was truly amazing to walk into that place, in Manhattan, and see all the people and feel the Bay Area vibe.
Well timed Flav, was just reading about that Castillo availability and the gist of it was that the Reds would want to add another lomg contract to that deal to make it palatable. We had our eyes on Castellanos before and did the Giants not pursue him for trade deadline in 2019 and as a free agent???
And by willing to eat more contract while no one in baseball not even the Flodgers will make such a deal while they have big roster extensions to make in-house themselves, we could be in the driver’s seat and not have to deal more than 1 premium and couple lesser pieces I would expect. I would be willing to deal Ramos-Bishop and something mid-tier to make that happen.
Would be a better deal than pursuing a Blake Snell trade or the unlikely hope of landing Trevor Bauer because we would be adding that right-handed power bat we have coveted for years…Castillo being the #1 arm as well…Lester I am expecting will be a Giant…
not sure if this is behind a paywall or not I didn’t click on it but this will be interesting to many Flappers
There is another Twitter post from Finnety’s (not sure how to post as you have Flav). Basically it says:
“We wanted to update all of our friends and fans on the status of Finnerty’s.
With heavy hearts we have to announce today that we will not be reopening our doors. There’s too much to say in one tweet, so check out our full farewell here, which is this video message:
Great video! A great tribute.
I am so grateful that I was able to visit Finnerty’s when Blade and I did the Right Coast Flapalooza in 2016, and it was while the Giants were in town. So sad…
Bummed I never got to go here.
Ahhhhh didn’t see yours Chuck.
final standings for WillieD (and anyone else that has picked up horse racing as one of their new favorite sports 🙂
I know you said you didn’t have winner in Race #8 at LosAl, but going in Cedillo was tied with Hernandez and 1 up on Pyfer. All 3 were riding in that race, and Hernandez had mount in #9 Pyfer in #10, while Cedillo wasn’t riding in either one. so he picked up the W in stretch, his 3d on the day and won leading jockey in short meet.
Tyler Baze comes from family of riders/trainers. Anyone else like that you can recall from out here?
Miyadi dominated NorCal circuit for years before moving down south to take down bigger purses. Wong is controversial, I think it’s pretty well known he uses a steroid milkshake on his horses but he hasn’t gotten busted yet. But when he claims a horse, watch out, it almost always improves several lengths when it has a month or so to *acclimate* to his barn. (Wong also dominated NorCal before moving down south)
From the last thread . . . I wonder if the gap between athletes from different eras more generally can be sort’ve measured by track and field records. Bob Hayes could still compete in the 100, but Jesse Owens couldn’t.
that’s a very interesting thing to look at. I couldn’t find a list of the 100 meter final times for each Olympics (I didn’t look that hard, maybe later)
just looked it up. So Bolt was about a second quicker than those slow loafy fucks from 1912/1920/1924 etc…. That’s pretty substantial
James you probably know this, how many feet would Bolt beat those slow loafy fucks by if he beat them by a full second?
One second in 90 years? What about horse times? Have they bumped up any in that time frame?
Well, using round numbers a person traveling 100 yards in 9 seconds would beat a person traveling 100 yards in 10 seconds by 10 yards or 30 feet, right?
https://www.olympic.org/rio-2016/athletics/100m-men
Figure this is the range of competitive at the pro level, so that lends some credence to the idea baseball players in the first half of the 20th century could not play professionally today. Joe DiMaggio? Barely good enough to be a member of the Bowker gang!
Given they start from a dead stop, I’d think the margin of victory would be more like 15′.
I was thinking it was more about the money. If the older players(baseball, football, etc.) would’ve had the same opportunities as nowadays they would have trained more and ate better. Physical fitness has come a long way. Because what those older players had was heart and some were tough as nails, a lot of then did it because they loved the game.
with deader ball too it was different type of game, more emphasis on conga line type scoring before Ruth and HRs became more popular—moving runners along, taking singles hit and run yada yada.
Kevin Greene dead at 58…
he was a niner briefly at the end of his career. I remember him playing with great energy. How did he die?
They ain’t said, yet…
Kevin Greene wow what a shock. The guy was not the fastest,not the biggest, but his motor never was idle.He was relentless getting after the QB, had 160 QB sacks which ranks 3rd alltime! Just a great player sadly taken too soon.RIP Kevin
Too bad about Finnerty’s. Brian and Dieter are great guys. We Giants fans owe them a debt of gratitude.
I mean, is the Giants’ new GM Ronald Reclamation? Sammy Scrapheaper? Harriet Hasbeenpicker? I’m less than less than thrilled with these signings of down-and-out bargain-basement AAAA players. What are we, the Oakland Athletics?
Golden scorecard, zumieeee.
Pawlie I hear you on 4:39, but yes Oakland and LA is where Zaidi learned. Yaz obviously tremendous pick up where he was wasting away for Orioles. looked up few of Dodgers who had similar pre/post acquisition spikes.
Justin Turner in 4 years with Mets was .696 OPS guy signed by LA after Mets let him walk. Since then 7 years of .886 hitting.
Max Muncy of course was released by A;s in March of 2017, signed month later by LA where he exploded.
Chris Taylor spent 3 partial years with M’s where he was under .600 OPS guy. Dodgers traded one Zach Lee for him in 2016, who has since been released by 4 teams after M’s waived him. Taylor has .805 OPS for LA since coming over. Under radar signings of guys that turned into everyday lineup fixtures.
donovan Solano has been quite an under radar find for Z as well. 4 partial years with Marlins he hit .257 with .634 OPS. 20 ABs with Yanks he hit .227, granted FA, LA had him last and he never saw majors til Giants signed him and he’s raked ever since last 2 years.
Yaz and Solano might be Giants 2 best hitters and most fun to watch outside of Wilmet. If some of the draft picks wind up this good, it would be tremendous boost.
John Fulboam Brebbia with an exploded elbow is not the xmas miracle I wanted, but if the Giants can guarantee a longshot pen man like him almost a million, I bet they can pony up a whole lot more for a sure thing.
meant to thank you for mentioning Stanley Cowell the other day; sorry to hear he’d passed. I had some of his Strata East recordings with Charles Tolliver on LPs in 70s, good stuff. I’m sure the KPFA tribute was good listening. His solo recordings at Maybeck were reviewed quite well.
Damn. Greene had a strong year in ’97 for the Niners. 10.5 sacks. No cause of death released yet.
Cincy is beating the shit out of the Steelers. They’re only up 3-0 but they have hit them hard.
10-0
Yeah Bengals are really laying the wood on Steelers! I like it, there secondary reminds of the 49ers glory days with Lott,Williamson,Wright,and Hicks..
Pittsburgh looks like the 2-10 team. They are getting whomped. Cincy better get all the points they can before they figure their shit out.
17-0!!
17-0 and dominant go figure?
3 turnovers are hard to overcome and this defense/ offense for atleast one game is smacking the shit on both sides of the ball!!
btw, I noticed the other day that Mac the Oaf’s lawsuit got transferred (“removed”) from San Francisco Superior to federal court. Mac’s lawyers sued only China Basin Baseball Company LLC, a Giants subsidiary incorporated in Delaware. The LLC operates the park. They wanted to avoid suing the Giants, his employer. (Workers Comp, mlb arb, etc., would’ve been bad.) But as they sued only an LLC that’s a “citizen” of a different state, the LLC can try to demand that the case go to the federal venue. Many differences between state and federal. Smart defendants usually prefer the fed in civil cases because jury verdicts presumptively must be unanimous there. In Calif. state court, 9-3 can win it for a plaintiff. Things are tighter in fed ct., and generally more expensive, too.
Distinction between the famous Reggie Bush lawsuit some years ago and Mac’s. Bush argued that the danger of the slippery concrete edge around the St. Louis turf was not known to out of town players, and certainly not to Bush. Mac’s lawyers are arguing that everyone in baseball knew that the China Basin pens were perilous and that on-field pens always are bad. That’s why, they say, in 1989 15 mlb parks had on-field pens, but by 2018 only 3 did.
Give him some money and a minor league scouting job.
Bush was a 49er when that happened iirc.
Question to you locals: I haven’t seen anything at all written about / quoted by Giants’ GM. I don’t even know his first name. Pretty sure Harris is last name. Do you all see / hear more about this guy? Z obviously calls the shots. Well, maybe not obviously. I don’t know. I can’t remember ever not knowing anything about the GM of “my” team. Something seems odd.
P/A The GM’s name is Scott Harris but as far as I know he has done nothing but tell Z,yes I approve your dumpster dive pickups..Beam me up Scotty, I need 30 minutes to start the warp drives..
lulz…
Rents are comin’ way down in Manhattan and people are sick of being cooped up. When this Corona crap is over, I wouldn’t be surprised to see many of the bars and restaurants resurrect themselves at new locations.
I think one of the guys said something to the effect that Finnerty’s might be back…
Well I hope the best for all the east coasters.A place like Finnerty even though I have never been there( and I would for sure make that place a main watering hole if I lived in NY) is a legendary establishment that needs to continue shining on!!
Chuck I have been in Walnut Creek for 20 minutes but I still haven’t seen you anywhere what is there to do here?
You grab a bag of walnuts and eat them by the creek..
Kat is the best…
Walk. I don’t go to that fucking mall and I try to stay away from downtown WC. You have to pay to park everywhere and nothing is open anyway. Stop by and we can drink a cold one outside.
Grew up in WC, but different now..