The Giants Baseball Blog

The MLB Waiver Trade Deadline is just 3 days away, and the Giants could still use some help in various areas of their roster. I'm not expecting anything too big to go down if something indeed does, but there has been some rumblings going around over the last 24-48 hours that are posing some interesting scenarios. According to MLB.com, the Giants have placed a waiver claim on Brewers closer Trevor Hoffman. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that they're going to acquire Hoffman, but it does give them the chance to discuss a deal w ith the Brewers while also keeping Hoffman off limits to the Dodgers and Rockies. I think Sabean was more so trying to keep Hoffman away from those 2 squads, which promoted them to put a claim on him, but the more I think about it, the more Hoffman would actually make sense for this team. Earlier in the year, the Giants bullpen was having trouble finding innings to stay fresh, but now they're starting to get a tad overworked. Overall, the Giant...

This weekends series vs. the Rockies was definitely one that the Giants wanted to use to gain ground in the wild card race. It's still pretty early, and they do see the Rockies a couple of more times before the end of the season, but if they can't manage to win Monday nights game and split the series with these Rockies, they'll find themselves 4 games back in the race and will have a hole to dig themselves out of. The Giants who had been heating up coming into this series (Eugenio Velez, Nate Schierholtz and Randy Winn) have really gone cold in the mile high city. Velez was thriving in the leadoff spot for most of the second half, but ha s gone just 1 for 19 over his last 5 ballgames, and his average has dropped from .330 back into the .270's because of it. Schierholtz is another guy who was really swinging a hot bat coming into this series. He hasn't quite fallen off over the last couple of games like Velez has, but he'd be the first one to tell you that h...

The Giants just missed sweeping the Cincinnati Reds on Thursday, as their offense was unable to support another Matt Cain solid start. They did however take 2 of 3 from the Reds, a team they had to take advantage of after losing 2 of 3 at home to them a couple of weeks back. Now, it's on to Colorado, where the Giants hope to gain ground, and possibly re-take the top spot in the National League Wild Card race. The starting pitching was once again rock solid in the Reds series but unfortunately, none of the starters got credit for a win. Surprisingly, the Reds got to Tim Lincecum on Tuesday night and handed him his worst star t since May 15th by getting to him for 5 runs on 6 hits in 6 innings of work. It wasn't a horrible outing by the reigning NL Cy Young winner, but certainly not Lincecum-esque. The Giants offense luckily came through for Timmy though, and allowed him to exit without a decision, furthering his impressive streak of just 2 losses since April 12. Barry Zito and M...

After mustering only 7 runs in the first 3 games of their series in New York with the Mets, the Giants offense exploded in Monday's finale, enabling the Giants to leave Flushing Meadows with a 4-game split. The Giants have been playing very average baseball of late, and haven't really taken advantage of the teams they need to be taking advantage of. The Mets are a team that has scuffled all year long, are completely banged up, and shouldn't really have the fire power to keep up with a team like the Giants, yet the Giants could only salvage of split. A big reason why they were able to salvage the split was the offensive day from Aaron Rowand . The Giants' center fielder had arguably his best day as a Giant, going 4-5 with a home run, 2 RBI and 2 runs scored. Rowand's average had dipped below .270 for the first time since May 2oth, so his big day was definitely something he needed and maybe that will get him back on track. The other outfielder the Giants would very mu...

Since the second half of the year started, the Giants have either been on a hot streak, or a cold one, but nothing really in-between. They lost 4 of 6 at home to the Dodgers and Reds over the week, and couldn't get anything whatsoever going vs. the Mets' Brett Parnell Friday night, making the right-handed rookie look like a young Doc Gooden in the process. The problem for the Giants over the last week has once again been offensive struggles. They scored just 7 runs in 3 games with the Dodgers after losing 2 of 3 at home to the Reds. The team has struggled since the start of the second half, but they normally save their struggles for the road, which made it a little concerning to see them choke so hard at home. They barely avoided being swept by the Dodgers, thanks mostly to Tim Lincecum's masterpiece no-decision on Thursday, but the Giants are going to have to start learning to win when they don't get the 8 inning, 1 run starts from their starters, and they haven't ...

This year, the Giants Baseball Blog started a monthly interview with the Fantasy Baseball Hot Stove Blog , in which we here at the GBB answer various questions regarding the Giants' players value in fantasy baseball. Here is the final interview of the fantasy season, done Monday @ http://fantasybaseballhotstove.blogspot.com/: FBHS : I had no idea until I read your blog. Barry Zito has been dealing of late. His last five starts he ha s a 2.32 ERA as you point out. I'm still not convinced though. He is Barry Zito after all. Give me one reason why he will be able to keep putting together quality outings. GBB : Well, I'm not too sure he's going to sport an era in the low 2's for the rest of the second half, but Zito's clearly in a rhythm now, one that Giants fans have yet to see him in since he crossed the bay. His velocity is up from 85 mph on average last year to around 88-89 with consistency this year. It doesn't seem like much, but I think that's makin...

The Giants suffered a rare home series loss this weekend, losing 2 of 3 to the Cincinnati Reds, and it was the pitching that couldn't hold the Reds down. On Friday night, Tim Lincecum put together a pretty good start on paper, but if you watched the game, you know that he did not quite have his best stuff with him. He allowed just 2 earned runs on 6 hits in 7 innings, and struck out 7 batters in the process, but he got into a little bit of trouble late and the Giants' bullpen couldn't hold on for him. The Reds scored 7 runs in the final two innings of that ballgame and ultimately blew out the Giants after entering the late innings down a few runs. Brian Wilson blew his 5th save of the year and Sergio Romo continued his struggles by allowing a run in just 1/3 innings pitched. The Giants bullpen has hit sort of a dry spell lately and I think it has to do with them not getting as much work, which is a good thing. The Giants starting pitching has been terrific lately, even wi...

Joe Martinez made his first big league appearance since he took a line drive off of the skull back on April 9th. The 26 year-old made his first career major league start a memorable one, by defeating the Astros and leading the Giants to a big road series victory while pushing their record back to 12 games above .500. Many wondered how effective, and what kind of confidence Joe Martinez would have if and when he returned to a big league mound, but just as he showed during him minor league rehabilitation assignment, he's throwing with plenty of confidence and doesn't seem to have missed a beat. He went 5 solid innings on Tuesday, allowing 3 runs on 7 hits while walking none and striking out 4 against a very potent Astros lineup, in a very potent offensive yard. The Giants are really hoping that Martinez can step up behind Lincecum, Cain, Zito and Sanchez and help anchor down the starting rotation until Randy Johnson can rejoin it (likely not until mid-September) and he has locke...

Fans started to panic a bit when the team came out of the all-star break so stagnant, but it looks like they have righted the ship, as they so often have at home this year, with a 6-1 home stand. They've also regained their hold of the National League Wild Card spot, although the Rockies, Cubs and Marlins are breathing right down their necks. During this recent stretch of good ball, one of the pleasant surprises, and a big reason why the team went 6-1 during the home stand was the play of Eugenio Velez. The Giants speedy utility guy got the call-up just before the Pittsburgh series, and has torn the cover off the ball over the last week (12-27, 7 RBI, 5 runs). Velez has also played all 3 outfield positions for the Giants as well as second base, furthering his value and providing the Giants much needed flexibility while their two starting middle infielders (Renteria and Sanchez) took it slow. Renteria is going to be battling a bone spur in his right-elbow for the rest of the season...