Giants Hit Rock Bottom (We Hope)

They say good things don't last.

Apparently bad things don't either.

In only two hours and two minutes the San Francisco Giants were shutout on three hits by the Nationals' Tom Gorzellany and Drew Storen. As my Dad said, "Pitiful." Bruce Bochy has had trips to the bathroom that were longer than that. And I'm willing to bet they were only half as frustrating and painful.

I'm going to restrain myself from writing a full "Roadtrip Recap" until the Giants complete their series in New York. Chances are most of the things I have to say about the first 7 games of this trip will apply to the last 3. I hope I'm wrong.

 

The Giants' offensive woes are reaching a painful level. Since being swept by the Braves, they have scored 3, 0, 5, 0, 2, 2 and 0 runs. Using math, that's 12 runs in 7 games.

And this hasn't been against Clayton Kershaw and Tommy Hanson. This has been against James McDonald and Tom Gorzellany.

The worst thing about it is, with every weak out the Giants make, the frustration grows. We've reached a snowball effect of epic proportions. It's like repeatedly trying to open a jar of pasta sauce and the cap just won't budge. You've tried so many times that every additional attempt just infuriates you more and more until you're read to just chuck the damn thing against a wall. The Giants are that pasta sauce and that stubborn cap is a run.

What starts as merely soft expletives under your breath in the first three innings grows to "CAN'T YOU BUMS DO ANYTHING?!" by the 7th. The Giants are making outs so quickly and so weakly it's a wonder they haven't literally bashed their lockers in with a bat yet. But hey, at least they'd have a good chance of making solid contact.

Or maybe not. How did Pablo break his hand again?

I summarize all this with one question: at what point do you stop using the word slump? Is this the Giants?

Let's go back to April 20th, just thirteen short days ago. The Giants had just scored 7+ runs for the second game in a row against the red-hot Rockies. They secured their 4th consecutive series win. Things were looking up. I even wrote that they might be nearing their "groove."

I say this not to lament about how far the Giants have fallen, but rather to remind us how quickly things can change in baseball. Momentum is gained as quickly as it is lost. And 12 days from now, this current debacle could be as distant a memory as Opening Day is now. We're still in this thing.
But currently, the Giants are in a bad way.

NOTES:
-- Miguel Tejada needs to be released and sent to space in a rocket ship. Someone get him in touch with astronaut Mike Dexter.

-- We figured the offense would be sparse. We knew their aging legs would cost them defensively. But the pitching has been underwhelming, too. The Giants one certain strength hasn't been there. And that's the thing -- the Giants haven't done anything very well thus far.

Look at a team like the Oakland A's. Their pitching has been sensational. They lead MLB in team ERA. It's their offense that has let them down. As of 5/2 they rank 28th in runs and 22nd in batting average. But at least they know their strength and can play to it.

The Giants meanwhile look like an entirely mediocre team. They rank 26th in Runs, 20th in average, 26th in OBP and 23rd in Slugging. That won't shock anyone. What will shock a few is that they rank 20th in quality starts and only 11th in team ERA.

Lincecum, Cain and Sanchez are not pitching bad by any means. Lincecum and Sanchez each have an ERA under 3 with Cain topping out at 3.53. Bumgarner has looked shaky, but pitched quite well last night.
What's killing the Giants is this: mediocre pitching combined with mediocre hitting can sometimes breed success. Elite pitching combined with bad hitting can sometimes breed success. But mediocre pitching combined with absolutely dreadful hitting never breeds success. If the Giants starters give up a two runs, they're going to get a loss.

They either need their pitching to be great (not good) or for their offense to be at least mediocre.

-- Aaron Rowand. As a friend astutely put it, Rowand has an inverse relationship to the rest of the lineup. When the rest of the lineup is hitting, Rowand disappears. When the rest of the lineup disappears, Rowand hits like Stan Musial, err, like Marvin Bernard. All I can say is, imagine where we'd be if Aaron Rowand was hitting like Aaron Rowand right now. The Giants are lucky to be a few games under .500

-- Jose Reyes to the Giants. Get ready for it.