Sunday, August 12th, 2007 by Adam Wagner
There’s a Team (Maybe) Worse Than the Pirates?
The Pirates seem to have found a team that they can beat on a consistent basis in the San Francisco Giants. The Giants’ problems have been well-documented (namely that they build around Barry Bonds and ignore the fact that their team just keeps growing older), along with their strengths (that they have very good young pitching). The bigger problem that the Giants seem to have, however, is that they simply can’t win games.
Friday night, for instance, the Giants saw Matt (Don’t Call Me Warren) Morris, a pitcher who they should be very familiar with. And they destroyed him, as Barry Bonds jacked number 758 and Morris gave up five runs in six innings. The Pirates, however, improbably staged a comeback in the eighth inning against hotshot prospect Jonathan Sanchez (and three other pitchers). The Giants performed what can be described as nothing less than a Pittsburgh bullpen meltdown . . . at the benefit of the Pirates. This is totally inexplicable, as normally the Pirates just sort of quit when they’re down by four runs heading into the eighth inning.
Of course, the other team usually doesn’t have Rajai Davis (who came within a home run of a cycle Friday night) in center field. Davis makes every ball an adventure, as he hasn’t quite mastered the art of following the flight path and waiting for the ball. His speed is usually enough to make up for his potential errors, but he also fails to catch some balls that he has no right missing. Davis is, simply enough, one of the worst center fielders that I have ever seen play the game and makes Xavier Nady look like a gold glove candidate at times. It is symbolic of the (offensive) gap between these two teams that Davis could not crack the Pirates’ lineup, but has been playing for the Giants since he was traded there.
Just look at last night’s game, where Rajai became the first runner in about a month that the Pirates threw out attempting to steal a base. That’s almost as embarrassing as the 13-3 score in favor of the Pirates, who roughed up “Franchise” Tim Lincecum for six runs in six innings, while Tony Armas (yes, that Tony Armas) held the Giants to three runs through six innings.
The Giants are, very simply, a terrible baseball team without too much of a future unless they quickly develop some offensive talent to go along with their young pitching. At least they have the semi-consistent young pitching, though, which is more than the Pirates have been able to say over the last month or so.
At least Pirates’ fans can thank the Giants for an ego boost (now San Francisco is going to win 17-2 this afternoon).
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