Post by (Chanel Taschen) Oct 2010
SAN FRANCISCO — Using young pitching, a breakout catcher and a lineup peppered with veteran castoffs, the San Francisco Giants have put themselves on the doorstep of winning the National League West, needing just one win over the weekend to clinch the division. And for the first time since George Bush — the first one — was president, they have done it without Barry Bonds. They didn’t do it Friday night, as the wheezing San Diego Padres staved off elimination with a 6-4 victory. The Padres, who had lost four of five, falling three games back with three to play, took out their frustration on the right-hander Matt Cain, who was celebrating (or perhaps not celebrating) his 26th birthday.
Still, the mere fact that the Giants are on the verge of a playoff bid — and their first division title since 2003 — is a marked departure from the last years of the Bonds era, when he commanded three lockers in the corner of the clubhouse and, for better or worse, the vast majority of attention from reporters.
When Bonds retired in 2007, the Giants lost more than 90 games and finished last in the West. Yearly attendance, consistently over three million since the opening of AT&T Park in 2000, dipped below that mark in 2008. Many in the stands, it seemed, had to come to cheer for Bonds, not the team.
Now, however, fans seem to like the no-name Giants, who are poised to top the three million mark again by Sunday’s finale.
“There’s no superstars; they just win,” said Derek Rivette, an Air Force staff sergeant who had driven 80 miles from Sacramento to see Friday night’s game. “It’s not like you’ve got the best player in the world winning it for you. They’re just a team.”
That includes an eclectic, some would say eccentric, cast of young stars. Cain, a baby-faced right-hander, has arguably been the ace of the Giants’ rotation this season. Tim Lincecum, also 26, the two-time reigning Cy Young winner, had a rough August before righting himself to win five games in September. (Lincecum, known as the Freak because of his long hair and unnatural talent, now occupies Bonds’s corner, having replaced Bonds’s flat-screen TV with a more modest portable DVD player.)
As good as Lincecum has been recently, his stellar September was outdone by Jonathan Sanchez, a 27-year-old lefty whose earned run average for the month has been 1.19, and Madison Bumgarner, a 21-year-old rookie who beat the Diamondbacks on Thursday afternoon, pushing the Padres to the brink. The old man on the staff, at 32, is Barry Zito, who started the season well but went more than two months without a win over the summer.
The Giants’ young hitters, like third baseman Pablo Sandoval, have struggled, and the offense has been led by players like Pat Burrell, Aubrey Huff and Juan Uribe, who were considered to be past their prime by their previous teams. The roster includes Jose Guillen, who was designated for assignment by the Royals in August and landed here shortly after; Freddy Sanchez, the onetime Pirates star whom the team traded for last season; and Edgar Renteria, now in his 15h year in the majors. Even the newer major leaguers on the Giants are older. Andres Torres, 32 the leadoff man and center fielder, spent the better part of 12 years in the minors, before getting his first extended shot with the team this year. (He also provided some of its off-field drama when he missed 11 games during the pennant race because of an emergency appendectomy.)
The notable exception to the mature lineup is Buster Posey, a 23-year-old catcher. In his first extended stay in the majors, he has hit 17 home runs and batted .313.
“I feel good about every guy we have here,” said Manager Bruce Bochy, who may be aiming to prove something to his previous employers, the Padres. “We’re in a good position here.”
Much of the credit for the Giants’ recent success has been given to General Manager Brian Sabaen, whose job security seemed to be in question as recently in 2008, when the team lost 90 games, and who seemed intent on collecting fading stars like Dave Roberts and Rich Aurilia. His position didn’t seem to be helped by the fact that the man who hired him, the owner Peter Magowan, stepped down as the managing partner of the team as they stumbled to a fourth-place finish.
This year, however, he is being hailed by fans.
“The superstar on this team is Brian Sabaen,” Rivette said.
Sabean’s shrewdness was nowhere more evident than with the pickup of Pat Burrell, the longtime Phillies star whose brief stay in the American League came to an unceremonious end in May when he was released by the Rays. Shortly after that, Burrell signed with the Giants on a minor league deal. He made his debut in early June and promptly revived his career with 18 home runs and timely hitting.
Burrell hit a three-run homer Wednesday, giving Lincecum more than enough support in a 3-1 win. The Giants swept the Diamondbacks on Thursday, giving them a three-game cushion over the Padres, who have flailed in the closing weeks of the season, watching a six-and-a-half-game lead in the West — held on Aug. 25 — evaporate. The Giants have been on a tear since early July, going 50-29, and had won 19 of 27 going into Friday night’s game.
But San Diego has given the Giants fits all year long at AT&T Park, now having taking six of seven. The story was much the same on Friday at the stadium — an orange-and-black-clad sellout — as the Padres ripped Cain for six runs, then held on as the Giants fought back.
Just as Bonds both added value to the Giants and proved to be a distraction, the new veterans had a mixed showing, with Aaron Rowand hitting a pinch-hit two-run homer in the sixth, and with Sanchez being doubled off first in the bottom of the ninth on a long drive by Huff.
None of which seemed to faze Bochy, whose demeanor seems impervious to mood swings.
“I’m not concerned at all about their mind-set,” Bochy said after Friday’s loss. “We knew it wasn’t going to be easy.”
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But San Diego has given the Giants fits all year long at AT&T Park, now having taking six of seven. The story was much the same on Friday at the stadium — an orange-and-black-clad sellout — as the Padres ripped Cain for six runs, then held on as the Giants fought back.
Just as Bonds both added value to the Giants and proved to be a distraction, the new veterans had a mixed showing, with Aaron Rowand hitting a pinch-hit two-run homer in the sixth, and with Sanchez being doubled off first in the bottom of the ninth on a long drive by Huff.
None of which seemed to faze Bochy, whose demeanor seems impervious to mood swings.
“I’m not concerned at all about their mind-set,” Bochy said after Friday’s loss. “We knew it wasn’t going to be easy.”
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