Tuesday, May 18, 2010

I don't like the Padres (or the Giants) right now



In our lives, we've all come to know just how a nemesis works. A nemesis, a thorn in the side, a pain in the ass, a bully, an a-hole, someone that always beats you in whatever you do-- this is what we're looking at with the San Diego Padres.

The Padres are two the Giants what Newman was to Jerry.

Sometimes it goes deeper than a jerk pantsing you every chance he gets (like Randy Fulcher did to Peter Griffin). The hold that the Padres have over the Giants has now entered mythical proportions. I really wish I was joking about all this, but we've seen it. We're now 0-7 against San Diego, which you know, but it really seems like they've cast some sort of spell on us. It's as if a bunch of wickens or dungeons and dragons nerds got together behind the Captain Video, pooled all their nerdy power together, burned some magic cards, some pokemons, some old lady's heart medication, and prayed to the baseball gods and Joe Biden that the Giants would never beat the Padres again.

Maybe it's Santeria or Voodoo. Maybe Sammy Gervacio and Sarah Jessica Parker are involved. I just don't know.

Inevitably, some interesting facts arise when one team owns another team.

- Pablo Sandoval and Aubrey Huff are both hitting .290+ against the Madres in '10

- The Giants are 21-16. That means that if you take away the 7 losses to San Dimas (I call SD San Dimas sometimes. It amuses me), we'd have a 21-9 record. As Hank Schulman Twittered yesterday, we'd be on pace for 110 wins. So basically, that means that the Gyros play .700 ball against everyone else, a group that includes Philly, LA, and Atlanta, and we play .000 ball against the frickin Padres.

- In 5.1 innings, Dan Runzler has allowed 4 earned runs and 4 walks to the Padres

- The Giants have scored 9 runs in 7 games versus San Diego

- During that time, we have been shut out twice, and only allowed 21 runs. We've basically lost 7 games by the score of 3-1.

It just goes beyond all logic and reason that the Giants, a team that even with the 7 games against San Dimas factored in, still have an offense ranked sixth in the NL in batting average, second to last in strikeouts, and uh, well everything else isn't great, but dammit, we're getting some hits sometimes!

And this whole drumbeat for Buster Posey just doesn't make any sense to me. Would I love to see him up here raking in the cleanup spot? Yes. I would like that very much. But where does he play?

So we're going to call him up to take at bats away from Molina, who is hitting .330 with a .407 on base percentage? Is he going to take away AB's from Huff, who's hitting .280 with an .800 OPS and 18 RBI?

Look, it just doesn't make sense. None of it does. That's what makes this so damn frustrating.

The Giants performance against the Madres has been horrific, but we don't play them every day, and we're still 5 games above .500. We've already banged out a good portion of our games against these scrappy base thieves, and the rest of our season can play out normally... at a .700 clip.

The point is, just because this one team is killing us with the help of some evil Star Wars character or Ozzy Osbourne biting the head off a Pablo Sandoval bobblehead doll, doesn't mean it's time to freak the eff out and start blowing up the team.

We just need to take a deep breath, step away from the ledge, and realize that we are 21-16, we sweep people all the time, and that as long as we're not playing San Diego, we find a way to win more often than not.

Anyone feel any better? No? Sorry guys, I tried. Go Sharks.

1 comment:

  1. I'm with you on the step away from the ledge. For whatever reason the Padres got our number. We will be fine... These guys will step up and if they dont handle business tonight in SD. Then they better start tomorrow in AZ and then this weekend in Oakland!

    King
    SF Giants Rumors
    www.sfgiantsbaseball.net

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