This year, Mission Loc@l will be doing a wrap after each of the Giants’ home series.
Omens
Having taken the master class in baseball metaphysics last fall, it was not a surprise, but no less of a shock; the blow that knocked Bryan Stow unconscious outside Dodger Stadium could not be softened. As the final game of the Giants’ opening home series began, Bryan Stow still lay in an induced coma, his condition stable but serious. We wish him and his family the speediest and most complete recovery possible.
The blow still reverberates; a personal and civilizational catastrophe. And a message from baseball’s metaphysical dimension? Yes, this is not just a family-friendly zone of metal halide lights, rally rags, thongs, baseball ghosts and the Power of Positive Thinking. It can be dark, dangerous and, like the game, unpredictable.
And, just as in the material world, a loss can mean more than a game.
Sunday in the Park
Meanwhile, back in the material world, the Giants play the third game of their opening series at home against the St. Louis Cardinals. Bright sun, clear sky, temperatures approaching almost sane for baseball (but not quite). Hung over from two days of GiantsInc promotion (of GiantsInc), fans struggle to stay on their feet during the national anthem.
It’s my first time back at Mission Creek since our Autumn of Awe. What’s changed? Everything — in terms of anticipation, expectation, excitement and lines to the men’s room. Food-wise, nothing. The names are strikingly similar — Sanchez, Schierholtz, Sandoval, Huff — and from the stands they look the same. That is, they don’t look like “world champions” — more like “your” San Francisco Giants.
What about Andres Torres? Cody Ross? Miguel Tejada? Injured. Injured. Resting. Having won the first two games of this series, boosting their record to a perfectly mediocre .500, manager Bruce Bochy gives some players the day off before the (relatively) big three-game series with the Dodgers beginning Monday night. Joining others on the bench, today’s special guest of honor, the 2010 Rookie of the Year, Buster Posey.
Most Valuable Player
Whether or not the Giants repeat as champion, they will most likely depend on their one true star left over from last year: Luck. A team that played .500 ball for most of the summer could not have won two-thirds of its games in September, and close to three-quarters in October (and November 1!), without Luck playing at a high level. No matter how inconsistent the hitting or unreliable the pitching, the Giants had Luck in reserve.
Who wouldn’t rather be lucky than good? We’ll take Miguel Tejada’s “double” Saturday night off Cody Rasmus’s glove to give the Giants a victory, just like we took Brooks Conrad’s game-winning (losing) muff in pivotal game three of the NLDS against the Braves.
Baseball wouldn’t have so many stat-stressed fans if Luck was not such a perennially good player.
Rookie of the Year
It’s one thing for Buster Posey to win Rookie of the Year, another to win it as a catcher, the position many consider to be baseball’s most difficult given the range of intellectual, psychological and physical skills required. Still more difficult: to win while replacing the veteran catcher, team leader and fan favorite.
Another way to look at it: Until 2010, only 11 teams with rookie catchers made it to the World Series, and only one walked away a champion, the 1947 New York Yankees with Yogi Berra. Until 2010.
Poor Little Rich Boy
Despite his many miracles, one challenge still eludes Posey: Barry Zito. Ever since coming to the Giants, Zito has been a major disappointment, and he doesn’t disappoint, in that respect, this afternoon.
He starts off with a promising curve, his changeup has potential, and his fastball — well, it’s his fastball. By the second inning he shows signs of slowing down, and in the third inning his control dissipates as he throws 25 pitches, most of them wayward. He holds on, but body language tells you he’d rather be playing lounge music in the Fairmont. In the top of the sixth he walks two batters with eight pitches. Bochy leaves him in to see what he can do to get out of this jam. David Freese doubles a fat slow fastball off the center field wall to break open the game.
Torture
Torture is back. Was it ever gone? No longer a covert foreign policy instrument, it’s now a marketing slogan that describes low-scoring games determined by one or two runs (and a menacing message to would-be whistleblowers like Pvt. Bradley Manning).
The 2010 Giants played, and won, a lot of these games — blood-rumbling, stomach-slipping, towel-chewing affairs that, to a degree, reflect the nature of the game. But the Giants exaggerate the tendency, with their lack of speed and dependable hitters. They rely mainly on a strong pitching staff to keep games close until the team can get creative or someone comes up with a big hit. It’s usually the latter — not the best formula for consistent success.
If you forgot that close games like these are often lost on a clumsy error, check out the Giant fumbles and bobbles of the first two weeks. It’s early in the season, we hope.
The kinds of games we saw in the first two of this series, low scoring determined by one run, with thrilling late-inning comebacks, are the most exciting baseball games to watch because they’re the most uncertain and unpredictable — the kind of games that resonate in the physical and emotional core of an observer; the kind of games that, win or lose, you get your money’s worth.
If you think that’s torture, maybe you would have liked today’s 6-1 loss, over by the sixth inning and characterized by another Giant power outage. Beautiful day, though, if you didn’t pay to sit in the sun.
Beat L.A.
The Dodgers come to the banks of Mission Creek for three games. We’ll be thinking of you, Bryan.
Mission Loc@l will be writing a wrap of each home series.