A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball

I don’t want to hear about Kershaw’s back. He performed how he always does in a big post season game. And it was glorious. See what I mean about the Dodgers choking in the post season? It’s nearly as fun as watching the Giants win in the post season.

I am so disgustingly sick of this shit.

I don’t care where he ranks on the all time sack list. Fred Dean was the best at it I ever saw. Every single sack he made was important and he was one of my favorite Niners of all time.

Talk about FLEECING the Chargers, wow. This was a haul.

Transactions: October 2, 1981 – Dean traded from San Diego Chargers to San Francisco 49ers for 2nd round draft pick in 1983.  Note: On April 22, 1983 – the 49ers reacquired that 2nd round draft pick in a trade that had Chargers send two 2nd round draft picks in 1983 to the 49ers in exchange for a 1st round draft pick in 1983 (Billy Ray Smith, LB, Arkansas, 5th overall). San Francisco dealt their reacquired 2nd round pick in another trade and used the newly acquired Chargers 2nd round pick in 1983 (Roger Craig, FB, Nebraska, 49th overall).

____________________________________

The Braves seem content on handing game 4 over to the Dodgers. I’ve never heard of Bryse Wilson and if he’s going to continue to spell his first name that way I give him little chance of success vs LA today.

Grienke was a beast last night.

______________________________

This is not a political comment but it should make you think. I reported a false/misleading ad to Facebook in March of 2019. Yesterday, they finally got around to removing it.

It’s so funny to watch their big bad hitters succumb to a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears Atl pitchers. But what the Braves pitchers are doing this post season is really incredible. And now we look to be on the precipice of a Tampa/Braves series. Bring it on.

That’s how many days it’s been since it was 1988. Honestly, I would be fine with them making the WS because it’s always more hilarious when they lose on the grandest stage……

Whatever, they have so much talent, the days of us laughing at their 32 year failure is nearing an end. But until that happens, I will be LQTM at their inability to close the deal…..

I’m not going to pretend to know how it shook out because I didn’t watch any of it, but I think it’s very cool that the NBA pulled off the bubble. And with zero covid cases. That’s pretty amazing when you think about it. Congrats to Lebron who is a lot more likable as a Laker than he was playing for the hated Cavs.

What happened to those Shanny play calls that were always teetering on the edge of genius? Dude was famous for getting multiple guys 5 yards open every play? And I’ll give Jimmy G a pass because he’s obviously still injured. But that offense has their weapons they should be scoring. The defense is in ruins, however.

Big MLB night with Tampa trying to take a 2-0 lead and LA/Atl.

Honestly can’t pick a team to root for today. On one hand I really like how the Astros overcame adversity to make it back to the ALCS. And I will always love Dusty. But they’re playing the Rays who are impossible not to like.

Niners today. I got a bad feeling about this one.

This guy. Imagine how awesome it was to be him during this moment.

Considering the history between those two as well as his own history of being undrafted, man, what a moment.

Three teams laid down like dogs yesterday. The Yankees are now in perfect position to ruin Tampa’s dreams. New York, Houston, LA, this post season is shaping up to be quite villainous, aye?

When you look up 1974 in the dictionary it should be this picture:

That catch by Bellinger was one of the best I’ve ever seen in the post season. The best? Who had a better one?

Drafted in the 4th round in 2013, here’s who the Giants draft before he was drafted: Christian Arroyo, Ryder Jones, Chase Johnson…..then the Dodgers took Belly…..then we drafted Brian Ragira. Not Sabean’s best draft, aye?

A’s, Yanks, Marlins and Pads with their backs against the wall today……

Still struggling mightily with the EVH news…..The Dodgers finished off an in tact 4 team parlay for me and after I hit it I actually felt worse. Weirdly, I haven’t seen a second of the NBA playoffs this year. I think there was just too much time off and without the Dubs in it I just never gained any interest or traction.

Four more baseball games today. Who cares, nothing matters.

I gotta admit, Dusty’s Astros are starting to grow on me a little bit. I like people/teams that overcome adversity. And all the A’s do is strikeout. Who doesn’t still love Dusty? At this point I can confidently say I am no longer rooting AGAINST the Astros.

Honestly, I was ok with how the Niner game was unfolding and I didn’t even get mad at those 2 absurd picks Mullens threw. He is the back up QB. That’s how those dudes roll sometimes.

My issue with the game last night was with the coach. What in the actual fuck was he doing kicking an onside kick at the end of the game with 2:02 left and 2 time outs? The onside kick used to be a play with the potential for to be one of the most exciting plays of the game. But the NFL rules committee ruined it by disallowing the unbalanced line as well as not letting players get a running head start. After the rule change the success rate dropped from 21% to 6%. That was going into this season I don’t know how many onside kicks have been recovered this year. I am going to guess NONE.

So instead of kicking the ball through the endzone, playing defense and forcing Philly to kick it to you around your 30 with a chance for a runback, Shanny decides to not only try an onside kick but he does it with that ridiculous drop the ball on the ground and then kick it attempt. Of course, it had no chance and at that point we were nearly guaranteed to be pinned inside the 10 which is what ended up happening.

A game we should have won. My expectations for Mully were low. My expectations for Shanny were much much higher…..

No baseball till Monday? Eh, I guess I see why they’re doing it. They CAN do it and it beats going up against football.

So we’re all Padres fans now? Or would it be that much sweeter, as it always is, to watch LA lose another world series?

So weird to type that in October. Anyway, I like Art Collector I was devastated when he got scratched from the Derby.

The post season of no offense continues onward. Seriously, where are the runs?

Congrats to the A’s who made it through to the next round (whatever that’s called now). Disappointed to see Kershaw pitch a gem. I never thought for a second that the Cardinals were home free in that game. Tatis is the best player in the game (and the most fun to watch, BY FAR).

Don’t even try to tell me this goofy looking bastard could have pitched against today’s competition. And you are looking at the ALL TIME career WHIP leader. Lol.

Yesterday was just a fun day of games. Cleveland lost and that’s always delicious. Minnesota was eliminated with their still impossible to believe 18th(!) post season loss in a row. That A’s won and that’s fine with me, I hate Cleveland and LA way more than Oakland. And look what happened in San Diego. Oh my. Now facing elimination with the grizzled, revitalized Waino on the mound? This has gotten VERY interest VERY quickly for one of the favorites……

The A’s got wacked by the White Sox yesterday and when I heard that was their 5th straight post season loss I lqtm. “Stupid A’s,” I mused. Then Minnesota lost and I head that was their SEVENTEENTH post season loss in a row. WTF????? I was certain that was a mistake. But nay, it was accurate. How does a playoff team loss 17 times in a row at anything?

Once again, mlb blew it. They were the only sporting event going yesterday, they had 4 games and they still ran all 4 on top of each other. Manfred is incompetent.

Barn is on fire today. EIGHT games! Woo Hoo let’s go!!!!!!

I can’t make any sense of this bracket, at least in terms of who I think will win it all:

Everyone thinks The Reds are overmatched. What if Bauer fires a gem in game 1, which he absolutely could, and they take command of that series? Or Bieber tonight vs the Yankees? To me, and I know this is contrary to how I look at the state of *today’s game*, most of these series will come down to how the aces do–because there really aren’t that many aces. Toronto is going with a freaking opener today for mud’s sake.

Will also be interested to see if the A’s lay another post season egg. I’m not looking it up but they have been pretty terrible the last several years whenever they make the post season (which, if memory serves has mostly been in the play-in game?)

Hey, we got wall to wall baseball the next 2 days. Screw the Giants, enjoy this!

Our season collapsed in frustrating fashion but it was really hard to get too worked up about it. Yes, the ump was terrible. But do any of you really think any of our hitters were going to touch Rosenthal? In the strike zone or not?

It was fun to see McCovey Cove filled up under such a resplendent sky. And how great was it to see Hunter Pence take part in the fun? We didn’t make this post season but that is almost a badge of honor. I’m not going so far as to say it’s a sham. It HAS been fun to watch baseball again. But this season was pretty stupid. DH’s, 7 inning games, cut out fans, that dude trotting out to 2nd base starting the 10th……

Our hitting shocked me this year. Kap and his staff deserve credit for that. I think. They certainly went out of their way to TAKE credit for it. I’ll trust them on that one…..

Kap had his moments of idiocy but overall he was fine. I’m willing to believe he’s going to get better. One thing that has to get better is our pitching which was just not very good.

There were many weeks in a row I didn’t think we were going to see any baseball this year. And we got 60 games. Every single one of them did the job of distracting us from the terribleness of 2020.

Ok, so what has to happen today? We need to win and the Brewers need to lose. Our old pal St. Louis needs to step up and beat a pretty beatable team. Both games go off at roughly the same time.

Also, the Niners facing The Giants.

Lots of Giants action today.

This is my second attempt at writing today’s thread. The first time I sat down opened my laptop, couldn’t type anything, closed my laptop and went to buy bagels. I have now returned to try again……

The one thing that is clear as day is that Kap doesn’t know how to manage his bullpen. He seems to have a pre-set idea of what he’s going to do in the later innings no matter what the moment is. I wonder how much influence Andrew Bailey has in these decisions. If the answer is “not much” maybe he needs more……

“out of adversity comes opportunity.”

It’s entirely possible that the post season will be that much sweeter if we make it because of last night. Let’s see what happens today.

Well, here we are. The final regular series of 2020. It certainly doesn’t feel like it should be ending so quickly but that’s what a 60 game season will do to you. We might get in if we win 2 games, we will likely get in if we win 3. San Diego’s motivation level is low so we might have a chance. Either way, if they do get in I’ll feel better about their walk of shame spot because they will have at least beaten a top team to get in……

Back in the post season saddle.

I don’t know how much resistance Colorado is putting up. They have a distinctive *Seattle* feel to them. But whatever, we can only play the teams on the schedule. While part of me doesn’t want to see them make the playoffs due to the extremely high chances for nationwide embarrassment, I really don’t have anything else to do these days other than root for them to win ball games.

Therefore, “go fast and win”–name the movie for a notch on your Flap trivia belt.

Lots of contributors last night—I heard on the radio today we don’t have the tie breaker so we need to take down the 8th spot like men, outright. Tie breakers are for pussies anyway.

Cueto was awful. And this improbable season seems to be settling into something fairly predictable. Yaz is proving to be the MVP of the team. Without him, fairly rudderless.

If the season ended today they would have surpassed my expectations. And Kapler, after a horrendous beginning, has turned into something not really that noticeable—probably the best thing you can hope for in a good manager.

Kokonuts just sent me this pic of him and Dennis Z having lunch. He says afterwards they played catch. Am I imagining this or is Dennis Z the dude who always started his comments here by telling us he takes a shot of whiskey each morning before saluting the flag? Eh, that’s a lil’ different than how we roll out here in the am but I will always proudly salute a fellow Giants fan.

And just like that, he disappears into the Oracle night sky……

Enormous game tonight if you are hoping we make the post season…….

All these NFL injuries are directly related to not playing any pre-season games. There are too many pre-season games in a typical year.

Zero is not enough games……

This is probably the biggest game of the year. Not just for our playoff chances. If we zero-out again in completely pants-down bent over the couch fashion it really will be more of a blessing in the long run. Who wants to watch this team get embarrassed by LA in the first round? We have no chance of being competitive in the post season playing like we have been playing lately against good teams.

Being terrible against the good teams is, frankly, what the Mariners are. So this 0-7 vs A’s/Pads isn’t really making a lot of sense. Unless you think we’re Seattle. Which we aren’t.

I’ve accepted that The Grave Duggar is buried deep on a depth chart somewhere. I need more Luis Baseball in my life. Let’s see him get a start today. And I woke up feeling either Wilmet or Solano was gonna go off today. Let’s see that happen, too.

Need a W. Anxious to see Gausman’s stuff today.

This is really outstanding and a testament to how well this has been managed over the long haul. NBA and NFL, too. The three major sports are doing a great job with this.

We got a little problem with Yaz but I’m not that worried. Could it be time for The Grave Dugger to resume his digging?

Beating up on Seattle is fun but shit gets real again tonight.

I’m sure this lady is a good Giants fan but she’s just not operating at a The Flap level of consciousness.

There we go, that felt good. Feasting on Seattle. Why can’t all our opponents be Seattle? I’m interested in your take on this quote:

I’m not saying Kap and his band of “approachateers” haven’t given these guys something new to think about at the plate. But for Crawford to discount the *closed* stadium seems a little off to me. Hey, he’s the one on the field, he would know. But it’s probably a lot better for your ego to say something like this, especially when you are in the twilight of your career, than admitting the park is playing much easier for hitters this year. Intrinsic vs extrinsic debate. I’ll go so far as to say it’s a little bit of both.

If there is one thing you want to thank Z for it should be on not re-signing Bumgarner. That deal is now teetering on *worst mlb contract in history*. He has, by far, the worst ERA in the major leagues for pitchers who qualify. Timmy, Cain, Bum….what is it about Giants pitchers who completely fall apart when they hit their 30’s?

Are the Giants playing today? I thought yesterday and today got canceled but they’re listed as playing today. Seattle is listed as the home team.

I guess you could argue we just aren’t very good at 7 inning double headers. Of course, those were against the 2 best teams in the league so maybe we just aren’t very good at playing the best teams. Either way, we are back to playing the friendly Mariners and it’s a good time to get back on the Covid-Free beam with a success……

NFL is back and I really can’t believe it, actually. But if they’re willing to play I’m willing to watch and gamble. And it sounds like we have some good news about the Giants—if I’m understanding this correctly, and I am out of town so I might not be, The Dick had a false positive test and and subsequently tested neg twice. That is excellent news.

I’ve been tested 6 times (and once for antibodies). Everything has always come back negative. I know it’s frustrating to have Dick test false + but that doesn’t change the importance of testing. I had a buddy of mine the other day say, “what’s the point of getting tested? You could walk outside right after the test and get it.”

True, idiot, but if you test + then you know it’s time to immediately quarantine and begin contact tracing. I’m not sure what so hard to figure out about this. If you find out you are + at any point in this take the necessary steps to get better as well as keep yourself away from other people.

(and yes, I recognize this thread straddles the line of political talk. That’s all I’m going to say about it).

We were rolling along and all of a sudden, BAM! Fucking Covid. It doesn’t really matter who it is. Might make a decent story to hear, I guess. But the reality is our momentum has now come to a crashing halt. It did give me a chance to go find and post this clip:

So now, we sit and wait. We have all gotten pretty good at this this year so just sit down and do it.

See what dopey Zaidi did? Release the Panda, team turns to crap. How else can you explain the direct correlation between the release and then the sluggish 6-1 loss? Exact same thing happened when we got rid of the powerhouse known as Duffy. In fact, at this stage of his career he has a lot in common with Duffy—no power, no speed. And that combo plays quite poorly in today’s game…..

No no, it was time for the Panda to go go. Truth is, he and Pence never should have returned. There is no WAY Zaidi made that move on his own. I’m sure that decision came from management—they never gave Giants fans enough credit for understanding the game, they think all we care about is the name on the back of the jersey. But after the pandemic hit and they don’t have any fans in the park anymore anyway AND we have been playing solid ball despite the impotent production we got from Pence and Pablo, it was time for them to go.

Their era ended in 2014. It’s incredible to me that management thinks so little of us that they thought they’d have to bring those 2 guys back to keep our interest in the team……

I might change that to my new laptop password. What a beautiful ass number….

But maybe it’s time to stop all the winning. The only team I want to face in the first round is the Dodgers. That’s it. I can’t imagine a better way to kick off the post season nor a better outcome than knocking their asses out in round 1 of a best of 3.

Are they more likely to win? Of course. But that’s the beauty of it. We got nuthin’ to lose.

Two tweets stuck out last night, here they are:

I have no idea how many games remain. All I know is that we are .500 and have a 58% chance to slide into one of the “walk of shame” post season slots.

After all these years of boring nonsense, I will take that.

One of my favorite things about horse racing is the language. A tie is called a “dead heat.” A horse that’s never won before is called a “Maiden”. A day when the track is closed is called a “dark day.” It goes on and on.

Baseball is like that, too. Single, double, triple, home run.

And the *stolen base*.

I’ve been fascinated by people who are fast my entire life. To me, speed is the ultimate human coordination. I would give anything to be fast. I’d rather be fast than have the ability to fly although to me it’s kind of the same thing. Rickey Henderson is my favorite non-Giant player of all time.

There are a lot of things I miss about the way baseball used to be played. The stolen base dissolving in importance is the thing I miss the most.

In 1974 Lou Brock stole 118 bases. He was 35 years old. That stat will forever blow my mind.

RIP

Well, Bum made it through 4 innings. San Dawg did try to lure me into this bet but I declined:

In the end, we could not agree on a bet.

Seeing Bum in another uni didn’t really do much for me one way or the other.

We are still riding that 39% chance into the post season……

Well, this is going to be QUITE the day. Horse racing and Bumgarner. That is quite the exacta. Thankfully not competing for my time.

Funny story. I woke up, hadn’t had coffee yet, was at Draftkings and I clicked on the SF pitcher for tonight’s game. It said Cahill. I was like, “What, Bum’s pitching today I thought.” Lol. Then I remembered I needed to click on the AZ pitcher if I wanted to see Bumgarner’s name……

Anyway, I’m a pretty sentimental person when it comes to almost anything. I will hold the memories that country fuck’s given me FOREVER in my heart.

But we need this game. I hope we light his ass up.

Derby weekend, Flappers. I shall be occupied today and tomorrow. Go Giants.

Well, you can’t love the 23 runs scored on Tuesday and then complain about the loss yesterday. Coors Field is a joke, the goal is to not let the joke be on you. Tough loss but utterly understandable in that environment.

post season chances actually went up with that loss for some reason from 39% to 42%.

How do I know Dickerson reads the blog? Because he looks like he plays with a chip on his shoulder. And on the early morn of Aug 30 with smoke billowing just outside my bedroom window I wrote this about the reason the Giants should pick up Jackie Bradley:

Before the ink even set to dry on those fateful penned words, The Dick set out to prove me to be quite the fool. He’s gone 7 for 10 with 4 bombs and 8 RBI’s. In two games played. Astounding production and if Z and Kap had been waiting on him to heat up they were right to do so.

When asked by Baggs where this surprising offensive explosion came from, Dickerson snarled, “Tell Flavor he can stick that bottle of lightening right up his ass.” And somewhere up above, Twinfan raged…..

Even with our suspect pitching staff we have a run diff of only -1. The final post season “walk of shame” spot is ours for the taking if we want it badly enough…..

No surprises yesterday, Clev and Marte were the two biggest names to get moved. Even Clev in that 9 player deal, there weren’t any top prospects moving around. The Giants? Look, they weren’t going to trade Luciano, Ramos, or Bishop, after that the prospect mantle is pretty bare. I applaud Z for not making a move just to make a move. And we got the tatted up Banda! Come on, our street cred went up yesterday. You can’t put a price tag on street cred. I’m tired of living off the faint memory of what the Bowker Gang used to do for us…….

Lots of buzz about who might get moved today. So far, no stars have been moved, as expected. Supposedly the Rangers are floating Gallo and Lynn, both of who I would love to have but I can’t imagine Z paying the asking price.

My plan would be to roll deep with the guys you have. No trades. This team has been fun to watch for the most part–they deserve the chance to keep it going and try slide into the last post season spot.

On a more self serving note, it appears I have had a tweet go viral (at least for me, most of my tweets get ignored and/or liked by Diggity and another friend or two).

But not this one, check out these stats. Shit’s going viral faster than motherfucking Covid.

Here is the actual tweet (yes, I know it’s funny, thank you in advance):

I’ve re-considered my thoughts on JBJ. While his bat would be a certain drain on our production it’s not like it would be any worse than Dickerson who has clearly let the lightening out of the bottle. And he would be an enormous upgrade defensively. If we offered little and Boston accepted I’d be fine with that. I still want to the team to try to snag that final post season spot. Why not?

Very sad to wake up to the news that Clifford Robinson had passed away. He was always one of my favorite players mostly because of his attitude and the way he carried himself–he was a total badass. I was going to Lewis and Clark when he was just beginning his career with the Blazers. I was at a club he was at one night, he was dancing in the middle of the dance floor with like 3 chicks, he was high as fuck. I told my girlfriend “hey that’s Cliff Robinson” (he was “Cliff” at the beginning of his career before he went to “Clifford”) and we went out and started dancing right next to him for a while. It was so much fun. I don’t know why this memory has always been so vivid for me but I remember it like it was last night.

A’s traded for La Stella—to me, that’s about the ceiling of what we can expect regarding moves before the deadline. Some “La Stella’s” getting moved and others not at his quality level.

14 innings. Zero runs. Man, that felt just like the old days, right? Now we get to go to Arizona and face their best pitcher. Tough assignment.

I still don’t know why Gausman isn’t better. His stuff is incredible. Maybe he needs to locate it better but it looks completely unhittable.

I don’t know about you guys but I am diggin’ the fact that we have a dude named “Luis Basabe” on our team. Come on, rearrange that last name a smidge and add a couple of LL’s and his last name is literally “Baseball” .

I am tired. I’m tired of watching friends stay unemployed. I’m tired of businesses and schools being closed. I’m tired of watching the virus run rampant through our country. I’m tired of watching Americans get shot and/or killed for no reason. I’m tired of fucking riots. I’m tired of the nonsense that still is happening on a nightly basis in my second home Portland. I’m tired of societal division. I’m tired of fires. I’m tired of smoke. I’m tired of worrying about a close family member who is facing a terminal illness…..

Surprisingly, I’m not tired of wearing a mask. I have merrily embraced the mask culture. I spent too many years letting strangers breath on me. I will probably continue wearing a mask in many public buildings long after Covid is gone…..

I attribute most of this lingering tiredness to a slew of mismanaged crisis’ in our country. And while I appreciate having a place to vent about my ongoing staid state of mind, this is not the place for it.

If you go to the blog on your phone this is what you should all be seeing (I don’t know why it doesn’t appear on your tablet or laptop):

When I started the blog I named it “THE San Francisco Giants Blog–Unauthorized”. I thought that was a little too “TMZ” so I changed it to
“THE San Francisco Giants Blog—A Place to Talk About Giants Baseball”.

Just like with Facebook, Twitter and other places the Flap morphed into something other than what it was originally intended to be. I enjoy a lot of what the blog has become. But the political stuff is ruining this “place” that I started with the purest intentions.

So, we are going back to our roots. This is a place to talk about Giants baseball. Other topics are of course allowed and encouraged. The recipes you guys post are meals I still make to this day. The music videos, eh, I’ll leave that for others to enjoy.

But we are ending all the political talk. There are many other places you can vent your thoughts about that subject. No more Trump talk, pro or con. Those posts will be immediately and summarily deleted……