When the Giants Come to Town, It's Bye-Bye Baby

06.16.2007
Post-Game 6/15: Total Team Effort

The effort of sucking huevos, that is. If tonight’s Giants were the Red Sox of the ‘70s, their catch phrase would be “25 men, 25 ways to gag.”

Let’s start with Mr. Rockstar: This the Barry Zito we fear, nibbling, unwilling to challenge hitters with a fastball, unable to put hitters away with two strikes. Walking Coco Crisp and Julio Lugo, two of the worst hitters in the American League? Untenable. Immediately giving back a 2–run lead in the bottom of the first? Un-acelike.

Barry had lots of help. On defense, a grounder that two infielders somehow missed (and was somehow ruled an infield hit) led to a run in the third, and a botched rundown led to three runs in the fourth. Another error (although officially the only one of the night) led to a run in the sixth.

On offense, the Giants hit against Julian Tavarez as if they had 10pm movie tickets.  The weak link in the Boston rotation, and an umpire who squeezed the strike zone like it was Charmin, and still the offense was anemic.

And Jack Taschner tops it off with one of the worst relief innings you’ll see in a long while.

As my old friend Jimmy the Fixer used to say, “Thanks for shopping.”

PLODAG: Are you fucking kidding me?
Also on the Network:



[June 16, 2007 10:52 AM]  |  link  |  reply
bigO said

If we were going to "steal" a game in this series this would have been it. Julian "fuckin'"Tavarez? You've got to be kidding me? Now the Dice is rolling and Wakefield knucklin' on Sunday (that should be entertaining) I think we could easily be swept. I just saw the lowlights and can't believe with everything else you mentioned they got Big Poppy thrown out of the game too. Hell they didn't need him. I'm trying not to jump to conclusions but Zito could have been a bad, a very bad signing.

[June 16, 2007 11:25 AM]  |  link  |  reply
BawLa said

I was pretty pissed too that Zito had trouble with Drew and Pedroia, who were the main reasons why Boston won. Zito may have been a bad signing. But there is no way to tell as of today. It is just too premature to make any sort of legitimate judgement. The man hasn't even been a Giant for a year.

[June 16, 2007 3:34 PM]  |  link  |  reply
Jonathan Bass said

Zito reminds me a lot of Reuter, with slightly better stuff and significantly worse luck.

[June 17, 2007 1:37 AM]  |  link  |  reply
Frank said

We knew he started slow, was famous for poor April's, so it wasn't too hard to wait thru May, tto, but Jesus, it's the middle of June, the season is 40% done. How can the guy be this much worse than last year? How? Even if he's in decline, how can his decline have become so precipitous? I am glad to read that Bochy is going to have a talk with him

[June 17, 2007 3:45 AM]  |  link  |  reply
Boof said

Zito was not that good to begin with, so the fall is not that precipitous. All his peripherals don't point to a true ace. He certainly is not, nor ever will be, worth the contract the Giants gave him. Just wait till those escalator clauses kick in in the next couple of years. The contract will look really bad then.