The Giants Baseball Blog

It's been under consideration for the better part of a month now, and on Sunday evening in Milwaukee, Bruce Bochy finally made the decision. Jonathan Sanchez is temporarily out of the Giants' rotation, and will pitch in relief for the time-being. Filling in for Sanchez on Sunday was 26 year-old Ryan Sadowski, and he was brilliant in his big league debut. Sadowski shut down one of the best hitting teams in the NL, in one of the toughest parks to pitch in. The right- hander gave the Giants 6 solid innings, in which he allowed just 4 hits, while striking out 2 batters and keeping the Brewers off the board. The quality start was good enough to give Sadowski, who's been in the minors since being drafted by the Marlins in 2003, his first big league victory, and also saved the Giants from being swept by the Brew Crew. Not only was Sadowski impressive, but the guy who's spot he took, Jonathan Sanchez, was pretty darn good out of the pen in his own right. Sanchez pitched the 9th...

We're just a few days away from July, and about 5 weeks from the MLB , non-waiver trade deadline. The Giants have been discussed a lot over recent weeks, as they try to find another bat to help their below-average offense, but I think that they need more than just one stick. Sure, bringing in a guy like Nick Johnson, or Aubrey Huff (two potential rent-a-players who the Giants could probably attain without parting with one of their premiere prospects) would give a boost to the clubs offense, but I don't think that an addition of one solid bat alone, unless on course it's a game changer and premier bat, will put this team over the hump. So I have been scanning the league a little bit, and found a possible trade partner for the Giants, in which they may be able to realistically add a couple of impact-type bats without giving up Bumgarner , Alderson or Posey . That team is the Baltimore Orioles. The O's are in last place in a tough AL East division, and probably will be l...

After losing game one of the second Bay Bridge Series of 2009, the Giants took game two, ensuring their season victory over their cross-bay rivals. The star of the show was once again, '08 Cy Young winner, Tim Lincecum. "The Franchise" threw his second complete game of the season (fourth of his career) en route to beating the A's 4-1. Lincecum struck out 12 batters, while walking just two, and needing only 108 pitches to get through the 9 innings. There were a few times late in the ballgame in which the A's put some runners on base with less than 2 outs, but Lincecum had the double-play ball going for him when he needed it as well. The only run the A's mustered off of him was a mistake fastball that he left up to Jason Giambi, in which Giambi put in the right-field bleachers. Other than that, the kid was once again nails, and furthered his case for starting for the NL in the All-Star game, which is just 3 weeks away. I think Timmy should get the nod for a coup...

The Giants reverted to their early-season form during their previous series with the Angels, but definitely got back on track vs. Texas over the weekend. The Giants swept the Rangers and put themselves back atop in the NL Wild Card standings. The Giants received some rock-solid pitching over the 3-game set with Texas and got just enough hitting to make that pitching stand-up. The two starting performances that really stood out were Matt Cain's 8 inning, 3 hit, 1 run, 9 strikeout performance Saturday, followed by Barry Zito's 7 inning, 2 earned run, 8 strikeout performance. Unfortunately, as was the case in so many of his starts over the last 2 seasons, the Giants offense couldn't come up with enough support to supply Cain with the victory, although they did end up winning the ballgame. It wasn't just the starters who carried the team this weekend though, the relievers played a big part as well. The Giants bully provided 8 1/3 innings of scoreless relief this weekend, wi...

For the final chapter of our 2009 MLB amateur draft coverage, I had a chance to catch up with Brian Foley of The College Baseball Blog for our annual draft recap interview. Brian's been extremely busy over at the College Blog, covering the CWS, but made some time to answer a few quick questions on some of the college kids the Giants drafted: Q : There were some other polished college arms (Aaron Crow, Alex White and Mike Leake etc..) and a 5-tool shortstop in Grant Green available to them. Who would have been your pick at 6 if you ran the Giants? BF : I would have picked Alex White as I think he was the best college pitcher available after Strasburg . I saw Leake's performance against Texas in the College World Series and was less than impressed as he is undersized and really doesn't have the front of the rotation stuff to be worth the eighth pick like he was. Q : I know you've seen a lot of the Giants third round pick, third basemen Chris D omi nguez from Louisvil...

The Giants had been on a roll coming into their recent 3-game set with the Los Angeles Angels on Monday night, riding a 9-3, 12 game stretch to start June. However, the Giants are still a flawed team, despite their play of late, and the Angels really exposed their weaknesses, and swept the NL Wild-Card leaders in their own house. Now, in two of those games, it was really just bad outings by the starters. Barry Zito has his worst start of the season, giving up 7 runs in the fourth inning of Monday night's ballgame, and despite a nice offensive charge late in the ballgame, the Giants just couldn't make up the deficit. Jonathan Sanchez followed Zito's rough outing with almost an identical line, giving up 6 earned runs in less than 4 innings of work, while yielding 10 base hits.Tim Lincecum did provide a nice start in the final game of the set on Wednesday afternoon, but the Angels got to him in 8 th inning, and gave the '08 NL Cy Young winner his second loss of the ...

The first half of Monday nights Giants-Angels game wasn't pretty. The Giants were down 8-0 in the fourth inning and those not at the ballpark probably started looking for something else to watch on television. However, even though they still lost, the Giants showed some fight by coming back and making it just a 2-run ballgame, something they haven't really done over the last few years. A big reason for that comeback was Pablo Sandoval. In the last post, I talked a little bit about how Sandoval's kind of taken over as "the man" in the Giants offense, but on Monday night, he really proved it. The Giants' rotund third basemen/first basemen/catcher had himself his best night as a Major Leaguer. Sandoval went 3-5, with 2 jacks and 4 RBI and almost single handily brought the Giants back into the ballgame. With 3 more hits in the game, Sandoval raised his average to a season high .332, good for second amongst NL third basemen. With the way he's played lately, San...