Brandon Webb is good, sure. The Giants didn't capitalize on the chance they did manage to get off him, which is the same old story. Same old, same old from Matt Morris -- a fantastic complete game loss.
Ryan Klesko got thrown out at third base in the 6th on a sacrifice attempt by Sweeney. The TV guys were all over Klesko for his late break, and the director cut to shots of him in the dugout at least twice during the rest of the inning. OK, we get it, he didn't run the bases well. What about Sweeney? He made a terrible bunt right back to Webb, who then had an easy force at third. (Compare his bunt to Matt Morris's in the next inning. Morris kicked his ass.) Kruk and Kuip didn't say anything about it, although Krukow was quite complimentary about Morris's bunt.
Feliz almost bailed everyone out with a single to left, but Durham got thrown out at the plate. Yes, the extra base is a myth when it comes to the Giants.
Anyhow, I've always hated the sacrifice, but I don't know what the Giants should do there. Let Sweeney hit and likely ground into a double play? Bah, who knows? How many teams have to seriously consider asking the No. 5 man to bunt?
So then Alfonzo leads off the 7th with a double, Morris coming up. OK, bunt with the pitcher, even though Morris can handle the bat. But Winn follows with a weak grounder and Lewis gets out, so the Giants come up empty.
So, by this logic, does Az suck? They had fewer chances to score than we did. 6 inches lower and their lone run is a harmless double. 2 ft and Omar's foul is a 3 run jack. It's a game of inches. We're an inch short right now. Every one of the 5 one run losses to Az could have been won. We are not getting blown out and then scoring 3 useless runs in the ninth to make it respectable. We are in every game. Sure, we could play better; so could the other teams. We tend to think we suck when we can't score, but we're great when we keep them from scoring. Scoring runs is hard. We're actually pretty good at it. In their recent 12 game hot streak, we've lost twice to Az by a run each time. The Mets lost 5-1 and 4-1. The Phils lost 4-3, 11-5, and 5-4. Houston lost 8-4, 5-4, 13-3, and 9-1.
Posted by: Frank | June 06, 2007 at 11:15 PM
Young probably would have scored on the following single to center had his ball not gone out.
Posted by: Marty | June 07, 2007 at 02:12 AM