Giants Cruise to 7-2 Start

As the Giants head back out on the road Thursday, and have to feel pretty darn good about themselves and the way they've performed at the midway point in the first month of the season. They sit atop the NL West at 7-2 and have the 2nd best record in all of baseball behind the 2008 World Champion Philadelphia Phillies (7-1).

The Giants continue to get tremendous starting pitching, as Jonathan Sanchez was the latest starter to put together a masterpiece. Sanchez was almost un-hittable against the Pirates on Wednesday afternoon, throwing 8 shutout innings, allowing just 3 hits and 3 walks in route to an 11-strikeout performance, a season high for Giants' starters. It had to be a nice confidence builder for Sanchez too after failing to get through five innings in his first start. The 27 year-old lefty was backed by homers from Aaron Rowand, Eli Whiteside and Aubrey Huff (inside-the-parker), as the home run ball attributed for all the Giants runs on Wednesday. In just about any other park in baseball, Huff would have likely had a three homer day, as he hit 2 balls off the right-center field wall and one just shy of the 421 marker. Mike Krukow made a good point mentioning that Huff cannot get frazzled by some of these balls not leaving the yard. Huff looks like he's starting to heat up, and as long as he keeps that same swing going that he had yesterday, he'll have plenty of homers, not to mention a ton of extra base hits in general, by the end of the year. Both he and Mark DeRosa are already making their mark on the Giants lineup, although neither are hitting for a particularly high batting average. DeRosa's hitting just .200 entering the weekend series in LA, and is slumping a bit, but you can tell by his approach that he's going to be just fine.

DeRosa should hit his groove any day now, much like Aaron Rowand did upon returning to AT&T Park last week. After going 0-10 to start the year in Houston, he's responded by going 14 for his last 34, good for a .412 batting average over that span. The one area of Rowand's game that has to be causing Bochy a little bit of concern with him being at the top of the lineup, is that he's yet to take a walk this season through 9 ballgames. I like the way he's hitting in the 1 spot, and he seems to be getting the lineup going, but he has to start taking more pitches and show a little more patience up there, especially when he's the first batter of the game and the Giants try to get a look at their opposing pitcher. If Rowand can start doing that, his walks will come and he's going to be an even better hitter. I'd also like to see Eugenio Velez put up there when get starts games, and after his big home run Monday in the ninth inning off Octavio Dotel, I'd think his next start will be coming soon. Andres Torres isn't a bad role player to have around, but I don't agree with him getting all these starts over Velez. Granted, it's mostly vs. lefties which Eugenio doesn't handle quite as well, but he seems like more of a spark to the lineup than Torres. I'd like to see Boch try DeRosa in right and Velez in left vs. the next lefty the Giants face.

The Giants are off to their best start since 2003, a year that they ended up going wire-to-wire to win the NL West and also sport the best record in the NL if my memory serves me correctly. This team kind of reminds me of that squad in some ways. Both teams aren't the most powerful, but send up a very solid 1-8, and the starting pitching and bullpen from both '03 and '10 were/are one of the best in baseball. It's easy to have all this positivity towards the team cause they still have a major hurdle yet to pass. There is going to come a time where they aren't going to lose ballgames and go on losing streaks and have players slump. Seeing how they pull themselves out of those situations will show us what this team is really made up, but so far, you have to be pretty pleased with just about everything with the club if your a Giants fan.