Thank you for the kind thoughts and remarks,
@The Absolute,
@Notorious,
@The Son Shala, @H and others. Most appreciated! Best of luck to your Windians going forward,
The Absolute!
@AryaDark @scrilla @CamillePunk @Teh Kok @Pratchett
When Matt Moore, who pitched an exemplary gem. 1 ER, 2 R, 10 K, 2 H, 2 BB... Astonishing. The Cubs seemed to have almost no chance against him. By the 8th inning it seemed as though a statue of MVMOORE may be created.
As the bottom of the eighth concluded, all I could say was,
"Bochy should just bring Moore back out to finish this."
It was a questionable thought. A starting pitcher at almost 120 pitches, having thrown eight wonderful innings against a powerful offense, with that offense's 2-4 hitters returning to the plate in the top of the ninth.
Why did I have it? Because I have watched hundreds of hours of 2016 GIANTS baseball... and those hundreds of hours of GIANTS baseball informed me of something. And that something is
DON'T TRUST THE BULLPEN. WITH ANYTHING.
Granted, on one hand, the very previous game should have assuaged some fears. The bullpen had to pitch eight whole innings and only surrendered two runs. The bullpen was the actual star of that game!
Yet because of the wear and tear picked up from that experience, my instincts were telling me, "No. Take the stellar 'pen performance from Game 3 as the improbable gift that it was. Do not go back to that well tonight. Leave Moore in."
"Leave Moore in."
"Leave Moore in."
As Derek Law was giving up a fairly weakly-struck ground ball that just so happened to find a little hole, I could not help but say aloud, "Leave Moore in." As Bruce Bochy motioned for Javier Lopez (!!!???) to pitch against Anthony Rizzo, I said, "Leave Law in."
Why Lopez, who has liberally displayed conspicuous signs of not being terribly effective anymore, got the first crack out of the 'pen as the lefty of first resort over Will Smith still leaves me befuddled. Bochy loves his veterans. Always has, always will. Lopez walking Rizzo did not surprise me. Do not believe it surprised a single soul attending the game.
"Don't bring in Romo," I said.
Bochy brought in Romo.
"Don't bring Smith in right here, because Maddon will simply bring in Contreras to bat."
Bochy brought in Smith "right here."
What I'm saying is, I should be managing the San Francisco Giants.
No, I am not saying that. I am saying that on this night, in this circumstance, with these players available, against these other players, and with Jupiter on its present trajectory, circling the zodiac over its 12-year run, the Planet of Luck, or so those who write those asinine horoscopes would say it is, I was gifted with visions and voices.
Or perhaps baseball is all just a guessing game. Will the pitcher throw a fastball to start the at-bat? Which location? Two-seamer tailing away high, or four-seamer over the hands? Is a fastball truly coming with a 3-1 count? Are the pitcher's mechanics right? Is he in an unstoppable groove, so to speak, a state of mind and body that is so ethereal and exquisite and undefinable that we cannot categorize nor quantify it but for using the most basic statistics and through the old critical "eyeball test"?
Moore appeared to have been in such a "groove."
Bochy went to the leaky ship and the leaky ship was blown out of the water.
Bochy is still on that field, you know. Walking back and forth, from dugout to mound, and back again, signaling to the bullpen, over and over, seeking to take the ball away from a pitcher on the mound who is not there. And he will go on walking back and forth, from dugout to mound, for the rest of his days... In
The Twilight Zone... Right, Mr.
SHIV?
The bullpen was a gaping, nearly fatal wound of a problem all season long. By most statistical measurements, the worst bullpen in the history of the San Francisco Giants. This was an epical, historic collapse, but it was altogether fitting and not in the least bit surprising as a way by which the whole season concluded.
It was numbing. It seemed appropriate.
"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops. Today, October 2, a Sunday of rain and broken branches and leaf-clogged drains and slick streets, it stopped and summer was gone."
--A. Bartlett Giamatti
For three even years in a row, the GIANTS and their fans earned their way to dancing all the way through winter. I would accept thirty years of improbably devastating conclusions to a baseball season that says goodbye to summer as the price to be paid.
GIANTS