OUT OF LEFT FIELD

Happy Saturday, all, presuming you've climbed out of your post-Thanksgiving stupor. There's a lot to talk about, and no, I don't mean the USC-Notre Dame rivalry game (kicks at 4:30 p.m. our time), or the improving fortunes of the San Francisco 49ers or the Golden...

by DrLefty You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. (Matthew 24:6, New International Version)   There's been a lot of Giants-relevant news this past week, and we'll...

by DrLefty One week ago tonight, the 2022 World Series ended with an Astros victory in Game 6. Congrats again to Dusty Baker, Mauricio Dubon, Will Smith, and Pete Putlila. Since then, a bunch of stuff has happened. This next week, more stuff will happen. Let's break...

by DrLefty One way or the other, by tomorrow night, the 2022 baseball season will be done and dusted (Dusty Baker pun intended there). The Houston ballpark has a roof, so there will be no "inclement weather" postponements. MLB is hoping for a Game 6 closeout so that...

Eight years ago today, Madison Bumgarner and Buster Posey celebrate the Giants' win in Game 7 of the 2014 World Series. by DrLefty Well, the World Series is off to quite a start. The Astros had been undefeated in the postseason and had an early 5-0 lead with their ace...

These next couple of weeks are a bit of a lull in the Giants news cycle--we've passed the end-of-season postmortem press conference, but since the playoffs are still going, it's too soon to talk about free agency, the Winter Meetings, and so forth. But there have been...

by DrLefty The first week or so of the MLB playoffs is in the books, and now that I'm a bit more removed from being salty about the Giants' disappointing season, I'm enjoying the drama. Most notably, as of today we are one Padres and Phillies win away from the #5 and...

Photo credit: San Francisco Chronicle By DrLefty The fourth edition of my first and most successful academic book will be published in early 2023. My co-author, a classmate from USC, and I published the first edition back in 1998, when we were young things just a few...

  by DrLefty *I do understand the considerable risk I'm taking of pissing off Surf Maui in assuming for the purposes of today's column that this is the final weekend of the Giants' season (and the final OOLF).   Last week's Out of Left Field was called...

...and just like we all predicted back in March, Shelby Miller struck out seven batters in 2.2 innings in late September for the Giants. I don't even remember an announcement when the Giants signed Miller to a minor league deal back on June 8. I just noticed that he...

  by DrLefty The weeks and days of this ghastly 2022 Giants season are winding down, and I for one am not going to miss them. I'll miss baseball. I'll watch the postseason. I already have hotel and airline reservations to go to Scottsdale for spring training in...

I was so sure that the Giants would be on an eight-game losing streak when I drafted this column that I fell asleep last night thinking about movie and TV titles that involved the number eight: "Eight Men Out," "Eight is Enough," "Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag," and,...