re: MLB: "If I can hit it, it's a good pitch. - Yogi Berra
Today's baseball game was played at Third and King in San Francisco, California was a testament to nothing less than the game's intrinsic, inherent genius, its symmetrical brilliance, its wild, wonderful careening between sheer otiose lethargy and tumultuous madness. Baseball has always been the way by which Americans organized their daylight, bequeathing a meticulous order to the world for the followers of the two teams engaged in the nine-inning-long contest. The baseball diamond, like a Masonic triangle, with flawlessly measured ninety feet upon ninety feet, burns brightly in the pitiless sunshine. The spring breeds hope, and the languid yet arduous summer provides answers to the hopeful. The replies from summer are frank and bristling, bittersweet and shy. Sometimes, as with the 2015 Giants, completely incongruous: the Giants' summer is a wild, willful little girl plucking at the petals of a flower, and the Giants are forced to accommodate her. "Does she, our Summer love us, or does she not?" The answer is a rotation of fleeting extremes, all provided without measure. 63 of the Giants' 117 games have been part of either winning or losing streaks of four games or more. The 2015 team runs scalding hot and frostily cold. One week after the calamity of Chicago, losing four in a row to the Cubs who the Giants helped, like some hapless professional wrestling jobber, to look like the 1998 Yankees, the good men of the City of Saint Francis win five out of six back by the bay.
Today was called "Los Gamers Day" at the ballpark. Juan Marichal, "The Dominican Dandy," the greatest starting pitcher in San Francisco Giants history, was honored. The first 20,000 fans in attendance, which included I, your humble correspondent, were gifted with excellent small replicas of the Marichal statue which adorns the Marina Entrance of AT&T Park. Marichal was the only San Francisco Giant to ever pitch a Complete Game Shutout, hit a home run and strike out 10 or more batters in a single game.
Until today.
:bum pitched and he pitched deliriously well. He's been pitching deliriously well in August. 35 strikeouts now, 1 walk (which was issued today). He struck out the side in the first inning. It should be noted here that the Washington Nationals, before the game even began, were in a collective foul mood. Losing streaks will do that. Barking at the umpires the pitching coach was immediately warned. Testiness was evident in the Nats' dugout. When Bumgarner threw a close pitch that was called a ball someone (I'm guessing bench coach Ron Wotus) in the Giants' encampment barked at the home plate umpire, fearing that the Nats coaches' declarations of bitterness may have swayed the umpire. Before the top of the first inning was over both benches had been warned by the home plate umpire. Such is the common fate of four-game series, especially ones which see the first three games won by one team.
But back to Bumgarner. He grounded out with the best contact of the lineup the first time through against Joe Ross in the 3rd inning (Ross was perfect through the first three innings). I joked about this to individuals who looked like extended members of the family of WF poster
@scrilla. His second time up he doubled, knocking in Kelby Tomlinson. More on Kelby-Mania later. The ball was hit so hard that Nats right fielder Bryce Harper could not get to it as the ball raced toward the fence in AT&T's cavernous deep right-center. In the 7th inning Bumgarner returned for his third and final at-bat, crushing a ball into the left field bleachers for a home run. It's hilarious to note (and of course his only pitching once every five days severely limits the sample size) but Bumgarner literally hits a home run on every third fly ball he hits. It's hilarious.
In the 9th inning Bochy allowed Bumgarner the opportunity to go for the CGSO. He struck out two, beginning with Harper. Harper had no chance. All three pitches were 93 miles per hour fastballs right at the uppermost rung (if not a tad higher in actuality) of the strike zone. Harper swung through them each and every time. Bumgarner was at over 100+ pitches at this point and here he was performing superhuman feats of derring-do to the raining chorus of "MVP!" at AT&T Park. Bumgarner channeling "The Dominican Dandy" was tremendous. The broadcast on the scoreboard showed Marichal in attendance applauding Bumgarner after the game concluded. Bumgarner struck out fourteen batters; I had joked with one of the members
scrilla's fam that I wanted another twelve strikeouts as with Bumgarner's last outing against the Astros, to which he grunted ala our brave commanding general Bruce Bochy.
Above
@CamillePunk rightly posts the grand play Brandon Crawford made
deeeep in the hole at shortstop. That was a supremely engineered play on Crawford's part, remarkable to witness up close and personal between home plate and the Giants' dugout. He throws a laser to Brandon Belt at first base and the rest was history. Here is a link to the whole play just because:
http://m.mlb.com/video/v377140583/wshsf-crawford-makes-great-throw-from-shallow-left/?game_pk=415412
Ah, yes, Belt. He leads MLB in Hardhit% and LD%. It's becoming clearer to see why with each passing game. He's using the whole field in a way he seldom used to; teams had begun to deploy radical shifts against him these past couple of seasons, but that seems to be dissipating as he proves over and over in 2015 that he can hit the ball to left field with authority. He's not at 25 opposite-field hits this season, and his double in the 4th inning to drive in Gregor Blanco was wonderful... and nearly a home run if he gets under it a tad more, much like Crawford's crushed double to deep right in the 4th. And Blanco. Blanco reached base in three out of four plate appearances with two walks and a hit. He also saved the day on the one ball Harper hit well all day, a long, deep drive to CF, making a fine catch indeed. Angel Pagan should remain in his hot tub, marinating, recuperating for as long as he can.
Justin Maxwell saved Bumgarner at the beginning of the top of the second with a diving catch in left field which replaced a double with an out.
In the fourth inning as the Giants were batting, following Blanco's single, Matt "ROY" Duffy's fly out and Belt's booming double off of the left field fence, Hunter Pence came up. But before that happened I yelled at him. As I noted in a post here I have been uncompromising in my efforts to make
ence do battle with
@AryaDark at the game of Hearthstone. Thinking that it'd felt like a while since Pence had hit a home run I decided to issue a challenge:
"Hi, Hunter! Hit a home run for Sabrina if you're not going to face her in Hearthstone!" He looked at me and cracked a smile and gave me a little nod, while performing his crazed batting practice swing. Pence soon uncoiled on a two-strike pitch, crushing it and providing everyone (but the small smattering of Nats fans) the joy of a 450-foot blast to left, practically at the very top of the bleachers.
There is much to say about Kelby Tomlinson.
First Joe (MV)Panik comes up in 2014 and he's good. This is surprising, but on the other hand he was a first rounder and was good in limited playing time in 2014.
Then :heston comes up. Heston is a massive surprise: he was a soft-tossing non-prospect, DFA'd two years ago to make room for Jeff Francoeur in a lost season.
Then Matt Duffy comes up, and he's good. This is so shocking that all of the disparate narratives attached to the Giants begin to warp for Duffy was ultimately a non-prospect. Now he's one of the league's best third basemen.
And, in the dog days of August, just as the national media are merely beginning to discern all of this and even notice it, the Giants, with MVPanik out, call up some nerd with glasses and almost no discernible baseball skills but for speed and sound defense and he immediately goes on a wild BABIP binge. The Cardinals must be surreptitiously inventorying their Anonymous White Dude Baseball Player factory hidden in some West Texas field somewhere just to make sure that no one is siphoning anything off from the assembly line.
Also I bumped into my dentist and his wife before the game started, as he was sitting several rows behind me. We discussed the Giants and other matters, reveling in the fineness of the day. Dropped the replica Marichal statue off at my dad's home and sought the coolness of the redwoods after baking in the heat of this incongruous, tumultuous summer.
@IDONTSHIV @MillionDollarProns @UnDeFeatedKing