Baseball, Basketball, Horse Racing
The Giants weren’t playing very well going into this series so what do they do? Take 2 straight from LA.
Still one more sleep to go before Game 5.
The Belmont unfolded with a sense of predictability that sound handicappers like myself appreciate. Though I didn’t bet him there was a small part of me that wanted to see Rich Strike run well. Sadly for him, history will put him in the same category as Mine That Bird and Always Dreaming. Everything lined up on 1 day and 1 day only…..
A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball 
Took 7 guys, though Littell didn’t help much, but Long and the rest held off Dogs. Estrada did make another error, his 4th on season and 3rd this week, but also started DP that got Garcia out of 7th and snagged the final out of the game for Alvarez (!) save. 13 hits/3 BBs for LA, who had on OB for game of .370 but only 2 runs.
In the game story on mlb.com, Kapler credits “quality assurance coach” for keeping Giants relievers grounded.
Somebody called the Giants a Jekyll and Hyde team the other day and that description couldn’t be more accurate. You never know what you’ll get. Shit the bed against the mediocre Rockies, then beat the Dogpile twice.
Yeah, it just shows there is still hope for us. Anytime we can beat the bums makes it fun. Don’t know if we will get the engine running on all cylinders or not but I guess every once in awhile will just have to do.
A “quality assurance coach”? So, does he/she go out there and assure the pitcher that if he throws some quality pitches he’ll be rewarded? Or does the coach just go out and say, you’re great, now turn two?
Yeah, wonder what the qualifications necessary were for the job. Oh well, win 107 guess you can hire as many coaches as you think you need.
True, but I can’t help thinking that as a couch coach, I should also be on the payroll.
My team was the only UC Berkeley software group that had a bona fide QA engineer on it. In lieu of testing functionality using lots of other support staff to click through every scenario, this guy wrote scripts to test it all automatically before we released. Even though he was very fast at churning out code, he obviously had a limited capacity, which in turn constrained the ambitions of the designers and other coders when he complained that the software was getting too complex for him to keep up. It limited overall ambitions. He slowed everything down. I really hated him at times.
What does this have to do with the Giants? Nothing, as far as I can tell. But I patted myself on the back for hiring him, and I enjoyed the uneasiness it created among other teams for putting out stuff that didn’t work so good.
Time of game 2:13. “The ball was small sometimes, the ball was large sometimes, sometimes I saw the catcher, sometimes I didn’t.” – Dock Ellis
Crazy. I could see being super into the moment tripping balls. Pitching to a lobster holding 7 bats may have been distracting though.
As a contrast, the Dodger game Friday night, by the of the 6th, the game hit the 2:30 mark.
Kap (and beat writers) said Casali hamstring was really hurting (“he was compromised” Kap’s exact words) and he called the safety squeeze to try and keep him off bases and remain in the game. 3 more with KC after today’s finale before a day off Thursday, so I guess we see more of Wynns.
I’m sure it’s widespread, but I just turned on the Yankee game and the telecast has a big blue GEICO logo superimposed on the mound that is beyond distracting…
1. Austin Slater (R) CF
2. Darin Ruf (R) 1B
3. Mike Yastrzemski (L) RF
4. Wilmer Flores (R) 3B
5. Thairo Estrada (R) 2B
6. Brandon Crawford (L) SS
7. Heliot Ramos (R) LF
8. Austin Wynns (R) C
9. Luis Gonzalez (L) DH
P: Carlos Rodon
Was thinking about $$ discrepancy yesterday btw LA lineup, especially with Kershaw starting, vs. SF and its openers. Opie makes more this year than 7 pitchers Giant used combined, without question.
Betts makes $22mil+, Freeman $27mil and Trea Turner $21 this year, and J Turner makes Crawford money. Take Craw out of Giants lineup, even with Pederson in it yesterday, and Betts by himself has to be paid more than everyone else Giants used to start game.
Same thing today and yet Giants poised to sweep.
Position players, not including Rodon salary. Ruf Slater Wilmet Yaz = $13 mil total Gonzalez Ramos Wynns Estrada making bare ML minimum.
At the end of the 2019 season, who had this as a potential Giants lineup????
I think all of us would have thought then that no way Crawford would still be a starter.
The QA coach, from what I’ve read in MLB, is a liaison guy between data and player. He translates what he sees on video and in the stats to making advice for the coaches and players on craft and situations. In reality, for baseball pitchers I think that means figuring out for them and the pitching coach when the pitcher does best and when he doesn’t, and helping him get to the best combo of situation/batter and pitch most of the time. Similar job in NFL, the Quality Control guys watch and catalog tons of tape and stats on their team and other teams, use that to predict situations, sets and best formations/plays to use in those situations, etc. More than a few HCs now in the NFL were QC coaches. With all the analytics now, the QA/QC guys are absolutely necessary…
Karros is a regular broadcaster for the Dodgers, and does Fox games on Saturdays. And he was mostly neutral in the Fox broadcast yesterday. But he just couldn’t contain his glee in telling the story about Muncy’s “look for it in the ocean” quote about Bum. To Bum and Giants fans, it’s almost a complete nothing memory; but to Dodgers fans it’s a big deal story. Dodger fans hated that Bum had 3 World Series championships and Kershaw had none until finally he got one in ’20.
This season, at the moment, Muncy has 4 HRs and is hitting .158. I’d say he needs to look for his baseball career in the ocean.
But, to be fair, he did have a horrific elbow injury last season. But I think the bigger issue is that MLB isn’t using the juiced ball anymore. If any player was a creation of the 5-year juiced-ball era, it was Muncy.
Dodger fans would get enraged when Bum had his shouting moments with Puig; but now Dodger fans would rather not even talk about Puig. They’d rather just forget Puig. It’s as if they decided that Puig was actually kind of a jerk.
Slater leadoff tater!
Yaz bomb!
Yaz’s sounded great off the bat.
OK, the Matt Cain bobble-card looks pretty good. I’m not as negative now about the bobble-card concept.
The awesome Joaquin Arias.
Equally awesome Mrs. Vogs sitting next to Mrs. Cain at game.
Muncy,J Turner,&Bellinger all suck ass and that’s a big chunk of salaries to be that awful..
Without the juiced baseball, things are different. Swinging with a huge launch-angle isn’t as effective.
Nice drive by Cain on his golf shot in McCovey’s Cove.
Dustin Johnson wow things have changed, he’s now a Villain along with Mickleson and 15 other golfers suspended playing in the Saudi league! Props to Jay Monaham making a huge statement imo
But, they’re just looking out “for their families”, and taking this opportunity to “grow the game of golf”.
Coming up — the Bonesaw Open…
Shades of Latrell Sprewell and his”how can I afford to feed my family on $18 million a season?”
Yep. The Medellin Cartel Columbia Open coming soon.
They offered Tiger over $900 million to play. He declined.
He’s just barely rehabbed his reputation from all the muck before.
He’s a billionaire, he doesn’t need the money, he needs his legacy intact.
Jack has already soiled his by associating himself with Drumpf…
Yeah, Mickelson is pretty much a toolbag for doing this. He said he was doing it for the changes the he feels need to happen regarding the PGA. What they are I don’t know.
If Putin started a megabucks tour, I think some of these souless pro golfers would consider it…
Hey, Rodon made it through 5 innings.
Six innings!
Yeah, the game has changed when going 6 innings is considered “going deep” in a game, according to Krukow.
Especially for Rodon, who couldn’t get to the 5th vs the Rox.
We need more runs. Ruf!!
Fat slider. Willlburrrrrrr.
Thought Rodon could of went one more inning, now I wished he had goddam BP Brebbia giving off a leadoff double yikes ..
They showed Rodon in the dugout. Don’t know if he was talking himself in or out of the game.
Oh fuck.
Nibbling in the Brebbia aisle. Wow. Horrible pitch that was so bad, it worked.
Nice!
Dialing the Dodgers down
Padres win and the whining dodpile goes into 2nd place with are sweep 🧹
Rox up 4-2 on the Pads.
Fuck the Pads.
Hooooo boy. Nice break on the ball by Slater. Almost overran it.
Pads down 4-2 after 8.
Smith is tough out, hits Giants well.
Slater saved that inning.
Leone works out of it.
Um, first 2 up for LA in 9th would be Bellinger and Muncy.
would Kap close with McGee?
Here we McGo.
SWEEP L.A.!
How sweep it is.
whoosh. have a safe flight home.
Wow.
McGoo with a 1-2-3 9th?
That seems rare. And, very cool…
Sweep LA Sweep LA Sweep LA🧹🧹🧹
Nothing better then bitch slapping the Dogpile all weekend!!
I have to admit I can only name one Royals player, the catcher Perez, who we all remember from ’14.
We sure step up against the Dogs. Great weekend
They threw Buehler Opie and Urias and Giants beat them all. Unbelievable, and Saturday was Long and 6 other pen guys.
Slusser said Giants pen gave up only 1 run all weekend. Total of 16 innings if you count 3 from Long.
The bullpen guys have really stepped it in JuneThat trend needs to continue to stay close.
Sweep was so important picking up 3 games instead of one..
Awesome. 1st game I’ve watched in a while. FUN!!!
Only 3 back of LA in the LC.
Our trash heap Giants…