Black Monday Wrap: Giants Baileyed Out!

Aug 14, 2023 | 2023 Season, Latest Post, Weekend Wrap

by
Johnny Black

Happy Late Monday, Giants Nation. Sorry for the late post it’s just that, well, I was on the 18th hole and I had a chance to beat my accountant for the first time in forever and a year and well, I shanked a putt. So I am a bit down but hey, the Giants won yesterday!

Yesterday’s Game

There’s a certain magical sound, perhaps the most beautiful “craaaack” in sports. It’s that snappily sonorous crunch when a baseball is well struck off a wooden bat. When Patrick Bailey hit his two out, two run walk off home run in the bottom of the tenth inning yesterday after the Rangers had taken the lead, I felt like it was a ball that had a chance… In fact, it was a laser beam, just to the left of the cars above the left field wall. The ball was on a super sonic flight path from Bailey’s bat to Giants pandemonium.

The win gave the Giants a refuge of sports, preventing them from losing their fifth game in a row and getting swept in San Francisco by Bruce Bochy’s Rangers. It was huuuuuuuge. I’m not saying it was as good as the historic postseason shots but as regular season long balls go it is one blast we will not soon forget. How lovely that blast was! I want to write a poem for it. Or, at least cheer it when I am having my next Margarita!

Bailey hit that homer from the right side of the plate. It came on an inside fastball from former and forever Giant, Will Smith. Remember, Bailey is a rookie! But he looks like he belongs and yesterday he “Baileyed” the Giants out!!!!

I know, it’s a bad pun but I could not resist.

“Fantastic but it’s not surprising because since he got to the big league level all he’s done is come up in big moments, make big plays, do a really good job of leading our pitching staff.”

–Gabe Kapler

The Giants struck out a season-high 17 times against Texas pitching but found a way to win after leading from most of the game on a Michael Conforto solo homer off Rangers pitcher Dane Dunning, who was otherwise downright brilliant.

Logan Webb was one out away from the win after pitching a complete game shutout. But the Rangers squeaked a run across in the top of the ninth when Brandon Crawford could not quite make the play on a ball hit deep into the hole with Martinez on second who was running all the way on the play and scored. The first two batters of the inning quickly made outs and Logan Webb appeared on the way to a complete game win. But it was not to be as Martinez doubled to center. That brought in Camilo Doval who wold get out of the inning with only one run and get the win by pitching the tenth and allowing, what appeared to be the potential winning run to score, on a balk!!! It was a bit ticky tacky by the third base ump to call but it was a balk. The Giants were one laserblast from Bailey from a bad day.

Saturday’s Game

Well, a lot happened on Saturday but the Giants still lost, 9-3. It was not Alex Cobb’s day.

The Giants did honor the 103-win 1993 club and Barry Bonds was there. He even walked across the field to a standing O and asked for a hug from Bruce Bochy.

Heliot Ramos hit his first Major League home run.

Conforto went deep and appears to have awakened from his mid-summer hibernation. One can only hope it continues….

The Black Monday Weekend Wrap©

Ok, so here’s the deal: The Giants are who we thought they were. That is, they are a middlin’ club, maybe a shade better than .500 but not much better than that. They have played to expectations and even exceeded them until this latest bed-wetting streak that included a sweep in Oakland in a two-game series, losing two of three to the Angels, and getting largely pantsed by the Texans. This Giants club has stopped hitting. They miss Yaz, yes yes yes. But that’s not enough to explain the run-scoring draught. Haniger’s injury hurt but so did Casey Schmitt’s disappearance. What happened to Michael Conforto before this weekend? J. D. Davis looks utterly oblivious to hitting. Is he nursing an injury? Is he not the same player he was at the first half of the season? Was his body snatched by space aliens? I have no idea.

The rough and tumble bullpen games are largely working. The pitching has hung in there, for the most part, it’s just that the Giants hitting attack (Where have you gone LaMonte Wade Jr.?) is in the skids.

At 63-55 the Giants are in second place only because the Diamondbacks decided to phone their season in and lose nine straight. The Dodgers are now 8.5 games ahead in the NL West and nobody is going to catch them with only 44 games left to play in the regular season. I don’t know what to make of this team anymore. I know, I have said that a lot in my Weekend Wraps! What to make of the Giants regime? How should we evaluate the Zaidi moves and tenure after nearly five seasons?

Are the Giants headed in the right direction? Isn’t five seasons enough to turn a team around?