Eric's Giants Blog

9-11 (no, not that one)

The Giants are 9-11 (in case anyone thought this was going to be the oft-threatened but never executed inclusion of politics into this space, fear not) and April is nearly over. They've scored 97 runs (5th in the NL behind LA, Chicago, the Mets and, of course, Colorado) and have allowed 105 runs (13th in the NL - only Philadelphia and, of course, Colorado are worse). It's sort of strange outcome given the conventional wisdom about [annoying phone company name of the week] park.

It's also strange in that what I had wanted for this team was to play .500 until Barry Bonds came back, because really to hope for more was quite foolish. But looking at the way this team is winning and losing, I have to wonder how much it will really help. Obviously it will make the team better, but this is a team that is scoring enough runs to compete, particularly if you factor in park effects, but can't pitch to save its life.

It's worth looking a little bit at how this is happening, even if it'll be relatively obvious.

The runs are being scored because of Pedro Feliz (.819 OPS), Edgardo Alfonzo (1.047 OPS), Omar Vizquel (.379 OBP, 7 for 7 in steal attempts) and terrific part-time performances from Yorvit Torrealba (1.064 OPS in 10 ABs), Jason Ellison (1.028 OPS in 22 ABs), Lance Niekro (.528 SLG in 36 ABs) and JT Snow (.441 OBP in 52 ABs).

So the scary part is 50% those numbers above - this is a team that is hitting well above its head and is still under .500. Really only Ray Durham (.596 OPS) and Moises Alou (.542 OPS) look very likely to significantly improve, while all the guys above look likely to decline. I'd probably include Grissom in the "likely to improve" category, but at 38 and with his history of helpelessness against right-handers, I'm not entirely sure. He's still hitting lefties well, although not crushing them, but it's a mere 14 ABs at this point, so nothing can be drawn from this. In his 58 ABs against right-handers he's hit like a pitcher, with an OPS of .565.

On top of all of this, Bonds' rehab is going slowly and Armando Benitez just hurt his hamstring. On April 27, 2004 the Giants were 8-13. They wound up winning 91 games. So of course it's too early to give up on this team. But I see very little I like right now.

posted by Eric @ 8:20 AM