Just A God-Awful Week

Things were looking brighter after the sweep of Houston at home. But then the Giants left their bats and brains in San Francisco and posted a 1-6 record on a disastrous road trip that ended with being swept in Oakland. Splitting the two games in San Diego wasn't bad, since we now know that San Diego is for real. But the most aggravating thing about this week was being swept by Arizona and Oakland, two teams that in all honesty are not very good.

The six losses on this road trip featured everything that could have gone wrong for the Giants: shaky starting pitching (Todd Wellemeyer and Tim Lincecum), shoddy defense (Aubrey Huff/Freddy Sanchez), bullpen meltdowns (2nd game in Arizona), and our favorite, a NON-FUNCTIONAL offense. And even better, as was evident in the series against the A's, a non-functional offense that wastes great starting pitching.

The overall stats for the Giants' starting pitchers this weekend in Oakland: 21.2 innings, 17 hits, 8 earned runs. That adds up to a 1.13 ERA, and that includes Barry Zito's not-so-hot start on Friday. Matt Cain and Jonathan Sanchez did not at all deserve to pick up their fourth losses of the season.

A normal major-league team would have won two of three games, but not these Giants. They scored only 1 run in the whole span of 27 innings against the A's. ONE RUN IN THREE GAMES!!!! Seriously, a Division III college team could have done better than that. Trevor Cahill, Gio Gonzalez, and Ben Sheets are good, but they're not Ubaldo Jimenez, CC Sabathia, and Roy Halladay. The Giants have now been shut-out for 20 straight innings going back to the 7th inning of Friday night's game. They were 0-19 with runners in scoring position, lowering their league-worst average with runners in scoring position to below .230.

Perhaps the most embarrassing development over the weekend was that Bruce Bochy was thoroughly out-managed by Athletics' Bob Geren, who is in my opinion the most dispirited manager in all of baseball. I've defended Bochy in the past, but his managing this weekend was horrible. Case and point: the 4th inning in today's game. Bochy finally got the message and dropped Aaron Rowand and his .281 OBP out of the leadoff spot and replaced him with Andres Torres, a legitimate leadoff hitter. In the 4th inning, Torres coaxed a leadoff walk from Ben Sheets and then stole 2nd base. Up next was Freddy Sanchez, who had struck out against Sheets in the 1st inning. Bruce Bochy's melon-sized head was somewhere in the clouds as he did not put down the bunt sign for Freddy Sanchez to move Torres to 3rd base. Sanchez subsequently struck out, swinging and missing at a fastball on the inside corner. The next hitter, Pablo Sandoval, hit a fly ball to very deep right field that would have scored Torres had he been at 3rd base, thus giving the Giants a 1-0 lead. Yes, Sanchez when 100% is a very capable #2 hitter with great bat control. But he had already struck out in the 1st inning and being only his first week back from injury, he's still getting up to speed. Plus at that point, the Giants hadn't scored a single run in 14 consecutive innings. Maybe the Giants would have lost the game anyways, but who knows what that run would have done mentally for the offense and for Jonathan Sanchez? In that scenario, bunting Torres to 3rd should have been a no-brainer, and Bochy was asleep at the wheel. On the other hand, in the bottom of the 7th inning, Bob Geren had Mark Ellis sacrifice Adam Rosales to 2nd base to put him in scoring position with one out. The next better, Jake Fox, cashed in with an RBI double down the left-field line.

Many people have been clamoring for Buster Posey, who's hitting .327 with 5 HR and 28 RBIs with a .422 OBP and a .929 OPS, to come up to the big club. They're absolutely right; Posey should be in the majors instead of Matt Downs or Ryan Rohlinger. But it's naive to think that he's the answer to the Giants' offensive woes. He'll surely help, but the Giants' problems offensively go way beyond a quick band-aid solution like Posey. For better or worse, this offense is built around veterans and as Duane Kuiper said today on the post-game wrap, it's time for them to produce as the numbers on the back of their baseball cards indicate. I hope they have a meeting before Tuesday's game to get on the same page. It's time for this lineup to play smart team baseball and take quality at-bats. If not, all they'll end up doing is continue to waste the best starting pitching staff in the majors in its prime.

Giants Sweep Astros Again

After being swept by the Padres, the Giants had to sweep the Astros. Had to. Posting a losing record on a homestand is unacceptable. The Giants did exactly what was necessary, and they cleaned up a lot of aspects of their game that plagued them earlier in the week against the Padres.

The Giants got three superb outings by their starters this weekend, most importantly from Todd Wellemeyer. Wellemeyer went 7.1 innings and allowed 2 runs on 5 hits while striking out 4, and he showed that he can be effective if he has command of his fastball. Even though he doesn't through very hard, his pitches have a ton of movement, and he can keep hitters off-balance if he's around the strike zone. So far, his good outings have been only at home and he needs to translate that success on the road. 5th starters don't matter much for some teams, but for the Giants, a team that relies so heavily on its starting pitching, Wellemeyer is a very important piece of this team.

MVP of the series: Andres Torres. Torres went 6-11 in the series with all six hits being for extra-bases: 4 doubles, a triple, and the homerun today. He's been perfect in the #2 hole with his 14:14 K:BB ratio and a .407 OBP. On top of all that, he plays excellent defense in the outfield. His production has definitely softened the blow of Mark DeRosa's injury and with DeRosa likely to go on the DL, it looks like Torres is going to get the majority of the starts as long as he continues this hot streak. He's also one of the very few Giants players who has good speed and can steal a base.

Brian Wilson almost gave all Giants fans a heart attack in yesterday's and today's game. He always finds a way to get into trouble and then barely escape unscathed. Give him tons of credit for winning that battle against Kaz Matsui in Saturday's game. But sooner or later, Bruce Bochy is probably going to pop an artery.

The Giants are now off to....San Diego to play the Padres again for a short two-game series. The Padres just got swept at home by the suddenly red-hot Dodgers, who've now won 7 in a row (BOOO!!!). It's payback time for the Giants.

Another Sweep At The Hands Of The Padres...GAH!

22-12, a .647 winning percentage, 1st place in their division, best record in the National League: No, that's not the Phillies or the Cardinals. It's the San Diego Padres. No one thought they'd be in this position; not even the "experts" at ESPN. But the Giants got another good look at how good the Pads are, as they came into AT&T Park and handily swept the Giants.

The Padres are for real, and they should be taken very seriously. They have a fabulous starting pitching staff that rivals the Giants' and a dominant bullpen. If the Padres have a lead after 6 innings, it's game over with the likes of Luke Gregerson, Mike Adams, and Heath Bell in the San Diego bullpen. They don't have an overpowering lineup, but top to bottom, they take great at-bats, draw a lot of walks, steal bases, and come through in RBI situations. On top of that, they play solid defense. The Padres actually win games like the Giants should but don't. Adrian Gonzalez was a non-factor all series, yet the Padres dominated the series. Also, give tons of credit to Padres' manager Bud Black and his staff, particularly in positioning his defense. The Padres had all of the Giants hitters played perfectly. There were many instances where the Giants hit the ball hard (Matt Downs, Nate Schierholtz), but right into the Padres defense.

The Giants usually excel at home, but they played perhaps their three sloppiest games of the year this series. The Giants' pitchers walked 19 Padres hitters in the first two games of the series and committed four errors over the three games. They were a pathetic 3-18 with runners in scoring position. The offense is anemic right now and Pablo Sandoval looks completely lost at the plate. I've never seen him swing through so many fastballs in the strike zone. On top of that, the Giants received some very discouraging news regarding Mark DeRosa, who called his offseason wrist surgery "a complete failure."

You have to feel sorry for Jonathan Sanchez, who has now lost two games to the Padres 1-0 to Mat Latos. What awful luck! Sanchez pitched beautifully today, allowing only 1 run on 3 hits while striking out 5 in 8 innings, and he rebounded nicely from his previous two mediocre outings. Let's just hope that Sanchez, who's somewhat fragile mentally, doesn't get bogged down. He's the best #4 starter in baseball so far.

The Astros are coming to town beginning tomorrow, but it's going to be no cakewalk for the Giants. Lance Berkman is back for the Astros and they just swept the Cardinals in St. Louis. The Giants have to wake up and start playing like major-leaguers, because they won't beat anyone if they continue to play like this.

Giants Take Finale Against Mets To Finish 4-2 Road Trip

Coming off a sweep of the Marlins in Miami, the Giants were riding high into New York. But after being snake-bitten in the first two games this weekend, the Mets looked poised to sweep the Giants until Aaron Rowand and Brian Wilson saved the day. They say you always want to win the last game of a road trip heading back home. The Giants did just that and now head home to face the Padres having completed a 4-2 road trip against two very tough teams.

Citi Field, the Mets' new ballpark, has not been kind to the Giants, as they've gone 3-4 there the past two seasons. In this series, they were beaten by walk-off homeruns by two catchers the Mets initially didn't want, and today, a fly ball caught in the swirling winds cost Tim Lincecum his 5th victory of the season.

The Giants didn't play well at all until Rowand's HR today. They should have blown the game wide open very early on, as Oliver Perez walked a ridiculous 7 batters in 3.1 innings. But they blew many at-bats with runners on base. Dan Runzler had another shaky outing to cough up the lead, and he's now walked 9 batters in 12.2 innings. Even though winds were howling in New York today, there was no excuse for Andres Torres to misplay that fly ball off the bat of Jason Bay in the 7th inning. He should be used to the winds; after all, he plays half his games in San Francisco.

The Giants showed a ton of heart and resolve to rally late in the first two games of series and to grind out the win today, and it was only fitting that their toughest player, Aaron Rowand, came through with the biggest swing of the bat of the game. What a 180-degree turn for Rowand this season! As Mychael Urban put it a couple of days ago, Rowand is finally starting to play like a $60 million player. He's played fantastic defense so far, and he's become the Giants' best clutch hitter, not only with the homerun in the 8th inning today, but also the blast off of Leo Nunez in the first game against the Marlins. He went through a new fitness regimen and fine-tuned his swing during the offseason, had a blistering-hot spring training, and he's carried over that hard work and success into the regular season. In 17 games, Rowand has 17 RBIs and even though he's not a prototypical leadoff hitter, he's helping this team tremendously with his bat. The most impressive aspect of this team is hard they fight and how tough they are to beat. We haven't seen this type of fortitude in a Giants team in a long time. This is how champions play; it's very reminiscent of the 2008 Phillies.

Some final thoughts:

*Pablo Sandoval is in a deep slump, and his average is now down to .282. The most concerning part of this stretch is that he's swinging through a lot of fastballs. Maybe some home-cooking with help him out. He always hits well at AT&T Park.

*Someone tell Todd Wellemeyer to trust his stuff and throw strikes instead of messing around by walking people. He allowed 3 runs on only 2 hits, but he walked 5 batters. He has tons of movement on his pitches and if he's around the zone, he can be effective.

A Sweep Of The Marlins

One of the Giants' obstacles to making the playoffs last season was their play on the road. They posted an unimpressive 36-45 record on the road last year. The offense struggled mightily and in many instances, they wasted solid starting pitching. The team's play on the road had to improve dramatically for the 2010 Giants to have a shot at the playoffs and by sweeping the Marlins in Miami, the Giants showed that they have what it takes to make a serious postseason run.

The Giants in these three games demonstrated their winning formula for the season. They pitched great in all three games, aside from a bullpen meltdown in the 1st game. They manufactured runs as a team without much homerun power should (the first run of the first game of the series). Their hitting was timely, and they came through with runners in scoring position (Juan Uribe and Aubrey Huff in Game 1, Mark DeRosa in Game 3). They also played excellent defense and didn't give the potent Marlins lineup with the likes of Hanley Ramirez, Jorge Cantu, and Dan Uggla any gifts to capitalize on. When the Giants excel in all of these phases, they're pretty much unbeatable.

MVP of the series: Aaron Rowand. Rowand in these three games went 6-14 with 2 HR and 7 RBIs and he played phenomenal defense. He looked every bit as the $60 million player that the Giants envisioned he'd be when they signed up in 2008. His homerun off of Leo Nunez in the 9th inning of Monday's game saved the Giants from what would have been another hard-to-swallow loss in a Tim Lincecum outing. I guess we didn't realize how much the team missed Rowand's presence until this series.

The Giants face a tough assignment this weekend against a surprising Mets team in New York. They'll face the Mets' best pitchers Friday and Saturday: Mike Pelfrey, who's turned his career around with a 4-1 record and a 2.40 ERA, and the great Johan Santana, who'll definitely be looking to bounce back from his horrendous outing last Sunday in Philadelphia. But the Giants are on a roll and they need to sustain the brand of baseball they're playing now.

Giants Finish 6-3 Homestand

The Giants wrapped up an impressive 6-3 homestand against three of the four NL playoff teams from last year: the Cardinals, Phillies, and Rockies. They were 0-3 in sweeping these teams, but everyone should be happy with a 6-3 stretch against three very good teams, especially considering the disastrous 1-5 road trip that preceded this homestand.

The most surprising start in all of baseball: Barry Zito's 4-0 April. Zito even in his glory years in Oakland was always a notoriously slow starter. His renewed attitude and heightened focus are very apparent; he's pitching his guts out now. He went through the whole month of April without giving up a homerun (he gave up 21 last season) while holding opponents to a .167 average. As Buster Olney simply put it, "He's back."

Matt Cain finally broke through into the win column with a stellar outing on Saturday, completely dominating the Rockies. He pounded the strike zone all day, and since he's always been very tough to hit, the Rockies had no chance. Finally, the Giants scored some runs for him. Aubrey Huff said after Saturday's game that "the only time we really lose is when we don't hit." Great to see Huff start to heat up at the plate. The Giants need him to produce, and they need Mark DeRosa to get out of his season-long slump so that there's some punch in the middle of the lineup behind Pablo Sandoval. As great as the Kung-Fu Panda is, he can't do it all on his own.

It's time for the Giants to turn it up on the road. They say that if you win 2 of 3 at home and go .500 on the road, you're team will be alright (that comes out to about 93 wins). The Giants are doing great in home department, as they've taken 2 of 3 in every home series, but they have to improve on their 4-5 road record, particularly when it comes to hitting. This team will always pitch well, but the bats have to carry an equal measure of the weight.