eastbaybaseball

Giants 1B John Bowker is hitting below .150 since All-Star break

  The San Francisco Giants ruined another good pitching performance by their starter, the hard luck loser this time was Jonathan Sanchez (8-9). Sanchez took a no-hitter into the sixth inning and finished seven solid innings of 2 run ball, but the Giants fell 3-1.  That has been the story all season for the Giants. Starters go deep into a game, offense can’t put some runs on the board and bullpen fails to keep it close or blows late-game leads. 

  The continuous story has to be the Giants anemic offense.  They rank second to last in hitting and runs scored in the Major Leagues and ranks last overall in home runs with only 64.  The Giants continuously score 3 runs or less in almost every single game. It is like the starters have to be perfect to win a game or pitch with a lead and hope bullpen can hold a slim lead, which has been the case a lot this year.  Giants need to do  something, call some more young guys up and hopefully change can spark this offense.  We like that the Giants are going younger, but that still hasn’t fixed our weak and inconsistent offense.  Rookies Burriss and Bowker haven’t really done anything offensively. If Winn and Rowand don’t hit, Giants don’t score.  Lewis gets on base, but no one can drive him in. Molina either gets a clutch hit or is a liability on the basepaths and hits into a lot of double plays that are rally killers.  Giants just need one or two more players that can spark this offense, such as OF Nate Schierholtz and C/1B Pablo Sandoval.  Even Travis Ishikawa can do equal or better than what Bowker is doing offensively lately. Bowker has a nice swing, but has a difficult time adjusting to pitchers lately and hasn’t got out of his offensive funk he is in.  Well regardless of what happens the rest of the season, the Giants need to upgrade their offense, either internally in their minor league system  or through free agency. Maybe sign a 3B with some pop that you won’t have to overpay for like a Joe Crede who would be a perfect fit for the Giants and is good friends with CF Aaron Rowand. Frandsen should help fill a void at second base and provide some much-needed offense at that position that Burriss or Velez probably can’t on an everyday basis. Both have speed, but struggle to get on base consistently as their averages dictate. Ochoa seems to be coming into his own at short stop and has a good bat as we have seen, so Burriss has some competition at SS their next season. Competition is good for a team.  Hence, I hope I see some improvement in this offense as the season nears to an end and going into next season. 

Other Notes: Giants ace Tim Lincecum takes the ball tonight and faces off for the third time this season against Astros ace Roy Oswalt. It should be a good matchup and a pitcher’s duel, but hopefully Giants offense can pick it up for this night like they have for most of Lincecum’s starts and give him his 13th victory to further his Cy case  against Cy Young favorite Brandon Webb. Astros and Giants square off Game 2 of this four game series at 7:05 pm C.T. and 5:05 pm P.T. on Comcast Sports Net.

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