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Tuesday, October 22, 2002 |
Bottom of Ninth
No damage. Giants become lambs.
Final: Angels 10, Giants 4
More thoughts later after I clear my disappointment.
9:23:41 PM 
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Top of Ninth
Wow that was a beautiful double play by Aurilia and Kent. Sweet.
No new damage.
Angels 10, Giants 4
9:05:19 PM
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Bottom of Eighth
The penultimate play of the last half-inning spoke volumes. The Giants
are just not present in the moment tonight. They're making stupid
mistakes and playing very lackadaisically. It's like they've given up.
Which may explain why most of their fans have by now as well.
Well, J.T. led off with a single. Baserunners are prequisite to
ralllies. He said obviously.
Angels' flare hits drop, ours don't. Just another sign of what's going
on tonight.
Double play ends the "rally". What a disappointment these guys are tonight.
Angels 10, Giants 4
8:59:11 PM
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Top of Eighth
Scott Eyre on the mound. 7-8-9 hitters due up.Maybe we can get through
this one with no more bleeding.
And just like that the bases are loaded.
The graphic Fox showed that indicated the Angels' first four hitters are
batting .375 with 14 runs and 10 RBIs against the Giants' top four who
are hitting only .227 with 10 runs and 6 RBIs is very telling.
Jeez! How do you miss that force play at the plate like that? That's
just the ultimate insult to the Giants' fans. Piece of cake and you blow
the damn thing.
Angels 10, Giants 4. Game over, dude.
8:54:00 PM
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Bottom of Seventh
Well, the crowd seems like it's back into the game. Jack Buck is right:
this is the Giants' best chance to climb back into it if they're going
to do it.
Aurilia goes gently into that quiet night. Or some shit.
Kent makes a teeny bit more noise.
So Bonds comes up in a who-cares situation. They can pitch to him. He
can homer. No matter.
The guys in front of Barry have to get on. This kind of thing kills us.
So he gets pitched around "accidentally" even when he's not a danger.
Santiago violates a key principle. If the guy in front of you has
walked, particularly on four pitches, you take the first pitch. But
Benito is a first-ball hitter. So he's out.
Angels 9, Giants 4
8:40:40 PM
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Top of Seventh
Lead-off double by Salmon. Man, when these Angels are hot, they're
unstoppable. I hope this doesn't continue past tonight.
Two easy fly balls in a row. That's comforting. We're reduced to
cheering for outs.
Lofton makes all three putouts and the Angels go without scoring.
Angels 9, Giants 4
8:30:19 PM
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Bottom of Sixth<.h4>
Nice AB by Bell, fouling off pitches, hanging in 3-2 and drawing a walk.
Good stuff. The guy's a real pro.
I like the idea of Bell taking over 2nd base next year with Pedro Feliz
moving into third and the whining Superman gone.
These guys in the white jerseys and no names are playing like they don't
remember THIS IS OUR HOUSE!
Down like lambs. This one feels like it's over.
Angels 9, Giants 4
8:21:07 PM
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Top of Sixth
OK, now the trick is to hold these guys for a couple of innings and see
if we can climb back into this sucker.
The Pac Bell Park fans near the visiting bullpen love doing that
slide-whistle sound effect when the other guys are warming up. I don't
know if it has any effect but it's a nice touch nonetheless.
Kennedy trying to bunt his way on with his team up by four? Bush. (Hey!
I just realized how apt that word is these days.)
Shit. Why didn't Dusty bring Rodriguez in to face Eckstein? Man, that
cost us a run.
Angels 9, Giants 4
8:06:07 PM
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Bottom of Fifth
Lofton leading off. Let's see if we can at least make this respectable.
At least Kenny gave it a ride.
I haven't been paying attention to the baseball news outside the World
Series, so I just heard tonight from the Fox broadcast team that Bobby
Cox was named NL Manager of the Year. What a joke. But an even bigger
joke? A-Rod as player of the year. Terrible, terrible choices. It's
Dusty and Bonds. No contest. Those selections are embarrassing, I don't
care who made them. And for McCarver to say A-Rod has been the best
player in the game for two years is a surprisingly ignorant observation.
Alright! Richie parks one. Thank you, Mr. Aurilia! Angels 8, Giants 2
Rally time! ;-)
Oh, right. It's Miss October, aka Jeff Kent. Hey! Even Jeffy got a hit.
Woohoo! Another Barry blast. Angels 8, Giants 4.
Three homers in each game in the Series. And A-Rod is the best player in
baseball, eh? Bullshit.
Well, at least it's starting to feel respectable.
JT pops out to end the inning but we get back in it.
Angels 8, Giants 4
7:53:28 PM
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Top of Fifth
Aaron Fultz in to pitch. He did well in his last outing but it's
probably too late.
I'm not sure, but that might be the first time tonight we've gotten the
lead-off guy out. This has been a crappy game for Giants fans but I
gotta say I'm impresssed with the Angels on offense.
Do we have anybody who can get these guys out tonight? This is
becoming ludicrous.
The game is half over on the scoreboard but you get the feeling the
Giants are down for the count. They're not showing any grit.
Angels 8, Giants 1
7:43:08 PM
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Bottom of Fourth
Giants are looking meek now, but of course two outs is when we do our
damage, right?
Wrong.
Feliz would not be my choice of pinch-hitter in that situation, but the
guy I'd prefer, Damon Minor, isn't even on the 25-man roster. I think
that will turn out to be a mistake on Dusty's part.
No action.
Angels 8, Giants 1
7:36:07 PM
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Top of Fourth
Well, now we see why Eckstein doesn't take the bat off his shoulder very
often. When he does, he doesn't do well. Heh heh. One gone.
I wonder how many pitches Livan has thrown. Too many, I think. He won't
last through the sixth at this rate. Good thing we have a solid bullpen.
OK, Dusty, time to hook Livan. A walk in that situation was just not
acceptable. No excuse. Hernandez is nibbling at the corners and missing
constantly.
Crap. Double-steal, now a single scores two. That goes to Hernandez as
well. He's just not in the game. He's starting to look more and more
like the Livan I thought we should have traded mid-season. Wow. What a
disappointment in the post-season.
RBI groundout by Anderson, Angels up 5-1. For my money, that at-bat does
not justify keeping Livan in the game. That ball was hit hard.
This, my friends, is not good.
Witasick walks the first guy he faces (though I thought he went around
on the third strike). Sharp RBI single by Spiezio and this game is
getting close to out of hand, 6-1 Angels.
Man, I can't believe this shit. This is just pathetic. The Angels are
hitting everything we're throwing up there.
So much for my early prediction of a low-scoring game, eh? Now all we
can do is hope that the game will ultimately be close and the Giants can
rally to win. But it doesn't feel like it right now.
Even Molina -- the nobody -- gets a hit. This one's a laugher now. 8-1
Angels.
Strikes out the pitcher. There's a tough assignment.
Angels 8, Giants 1
7:22:19 PM
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Bottom of Third
Big bats due up this inning. The Giants need to get some runs back here.
Alright! Lead-off single by Aurilia. Getting the first guy on is so
important.
My wife and I are wtaching the game together. She said, "I wonder how
many miles all of Barry's homers would add up to." I thought the
question was silly and of course I didn't have the answer anyway.
Minutes later, the TV commentators showed the answer. I liked the
answer: 42.
And Kent disappoints again. This guy's turning out to be useless in the
post-season, especially for a guy who criticizes Bonds, grouses about
the attention Barry gets, and tells people that Barry's a great player
but that "we've got lots of great players on this team."
I cannot remember the last time I saw Barry strike out on three pitches.
Nasty. Impressive outing by Ortiz.
Wow, no production. That does not bode well, folks. Heart of the order
can't generate a comeback run when it needs one.
Angels 4, Giants 1
6:56:58 PM
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Top of Third
X-Factor walks on a full count, never taking the bat off his shoulder.
Patience is a virtue in a lead-off hitter. The old rule: a lead-off walk
will hurt you more often than not.
Hernandez is one of those guys who will throw breaking stuff when he's
behind in the count. Most people have no idea how rare that is.
If Livan walks this guy, Dusty or Rags needs to go out and talk to him.
Well, at least he didn't walk him. Sheesh. With the running going on
the pitch, it's kind of surprising he didn't score.
Bell got handcuffed by Salmon's grounder and nothing good happened.
Tricky jump, but no excuse for the bad throw. Tie game.
Still nobody out. Nail-biting time but Bell shouldn't have been put into
that situation. Hernandez has seemed lost this inning.
Whew. Long fly-out. That's what we needed. One gone. But Glaus coming
up. No opportunity to breathe easily here.
If Livan can get out of this inning with no further damage, he'll be
fine. It's a pattern. But if he gets hammered, he's done.
Ouch. Hung that one and it costs us a run. Giants 1, Angels 2.
Spiezio crushes one into Triple Alley and the Angels are on top 4-1.
This has all the earmarks of a situation getting completely out of hand.
Livan has just fallen apart.
I bet Molina's never been intentionally walked in his major league career.
Inning over on nice play by Hernandez.
Giants 1, Angels 4
6:50:08 PM
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Bottom of Second
Sanders may be a low-ball hitter, but he's not paying attention here as
he goes down swinging on a pitch that was well out of the zone. People
sometimes wonder how a hitter can do that. If the pitcher has good
stuff, it's not that hard. The batter has something like 0.25 secs to
decide whether and where to swing. Easy to guess wrong in that situation.
Nice job by Livan to move the runner over.
The umpire allowed Lofton to call time after the pitcher had started his
motion. At the beginning of the season, the umpires were warned not to
allow that, but they've been doing it more than ever in my experience.
It's dangerous. Pitchers can get hurt that way.
Giants 1, Angels 0
6:19:28 PM
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Top of Second
As I said at the top of the game, I'm also participating in Dave Winer's
live outlining of this game over here.
One thing I like about the outlining approach vs. the approach I'm using
here on my Web log is that in one "post," Dave gets his comments to
appear as he makes them. I have to wait until I've finished a post
(which I've somewhat arbitrarily but hopefully rationally defined as a
half-inning) before my comments appear. Even then, there's a delay
because I'm posting via email.
Look at Livan's motion. You don't see pitchers that fluid very often.
He's just one smooth motion.
Troy Glaus, another hot hand in the Angels' lineup. I don't like the
fact that he's chewing tobacco, though. MLB players ought to know better.
Wow. Glaus hits a very loud strike. Livan gets behind 3-1 and throws a
hanging curve. Gotta be more careful than that, Livan! This is going to
be a close game.
Glaus is doing a good job of hanging in there. The guy has some serious
clout.
The announcers are making a point of the fact that Pac Bell is the
toughest park in the majors to hit a homer. I read recently that a
sportswriter had determined that if Barry had been playing in any other
park two seasons ago, he'd have had 90 homers because he had at least 17
long outs at Pac Bell that would have been gone.
Whew. Adam Kennedy's ground-rule double was a real break for the Giants.
One factor here that should be noted is that AL pitchers don't hit all
season. So walking the guy ahead of the pitcher's spot is going to be a
much easier and more obvious decision for the Giants for the next three
games that are being played under real baseball rules.
Livan shouldn't even mess around with him here. Just blow three by him
and grab some pine.
Was that one of the 10 ugliest strikeouts you ever saw? Gee, looked
beautiful from this seat!
Giants 1, Angels 0
6:11:19 PM
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Bottom of First
Lofton was just determined to get on base. I thought his decision to
bunt on 3-1 was great, even though as the TV commentators said it was
surprising. He's a good bunter and he's quick. Another part of that
strategy is that by squaring around, he sometimes distracts the home
plate umpire. I thought the third pitch was a strike that Lofton conned
the ump into calling a ball.
I suspect the hit-and-run was on when Richie missed that outside pitch.
He doesn't usually show that kind of impatience at the plate.
Molina trying to pick off Lofton is amusing, but not very productive. I
like to see catchers who try do that, though. Makes for more excitement.
These guys are obviously concerned about Lofton.
Aurilia strikes out ugly but Lofton gets to second on a bang-bang play
because he was running on the full count as McCarver properly observed.
Replays seem to show Lofton was out twice in that session, but he's
standing at second with a grin and that's ultimately all that matters.
I wonder about the wisdom of sending Lofton to second with Bonds likely
to hit. With first base open, they'll be more likely to walk him
intentionally or pitch around him. I've thought often this season that
the Giants should think about tuning their base-running strategies to
that reality.
Kent at the plate. Skip Baylesss in the Mercury-News this morning
challenged Kent to step up to the plate and be what he should be -- and
what the Giants need him to be. He's sure been a disappointment in the
World Series so far (1 for 9). This is almost certainly his last year in
a Giants uniform.
Not exactly an overpowering at-bat for Kent, but he moved the runner.
Will the Angels dare to pitch to Barry here? No way. Of course.
Think of the respect that means: bases loaded, one out. World Series.
Man, this guy is changing the game in so many ways!
Giants 1, Angels 0
5:54:59 PM
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Top of First
My friends Dick and Sandi Golden are at the game tonight up in View Box
327, where I had season tickets with them until I moved to Monterey a
couple of years ago. There are times -- and this is one of them -- when
the beauty and lifestyle of living in a wonderful seaside resort pale in
comparison to the drama of living in a major city.
First pitch: 5:31 - Strike 1
Tim Salmon has been so hot that we need to think seriously about walking
him strategically throughout the rest of the Series, or at least
pitching around him. He's not a Bonds but when guys get hot, they can be
really hard to cool off.
With the temperature in the 50's, whether the ball will carry or not
tonight is going to be a function of humidity and wind. Too early to tell.
Nice job, Livan. Great first inning.
Angels 0, Giants coming to bat
5:38:28 PM
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How This Will Go...Here and at the Park
Over on his side of the fence, Dave Winer in his interactive outliner
suggests that perhaps in a world of blogs, a document is a game rather
than a half-inning as I've been doing. I don't know. The whole notion of
a document seems to lose some of its impact in places like this for me.
Anyway, we're on the verge of the opening pitch and I'm champing at the bit.
On Sunday, I reported every hitter in my blog rather than confining
myself to what I thought might be interesting observations. For me it
didn't seem to work as well and since I doubt very many people are only
reading my blog to get the game "story," I'm reverting to just making
notes when I think I have something worth saying.
Still, I will have something to say at the end of each half-inning.
I don't expect a high-scoring game tonight, but I expect it will
be close like the others have been. Look for a final margin of no more
than two runs, with the Giants on top.
OK, enough of this crap. Play ball!
5:25:48 PM
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Before the Game
The Giants win tonight. Livan Hernandez on the mound with not a single
post-season defeat to his name. Back in the friendly confines of Pac
Bell Park. Barry up and ready to crush one into the Cove. No way we can
lose.
Or so it says here.
Of course, Tony Bennett would be the opening singer at the park. He was
great once, and even though the voice is gone, the symbolism is important.
Minutes from the opening pitch.
Woohoo!!!!!! World Series in my home town! (Well, almost.)
5:18:48 PM
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Blogging Game Three
I'll be blogging the World Series, Game Three, at my beloved Pac Bell Park this evening, starting in about 15 minutes. I'll also be participating in Dave Winer's interactive notepad of the game just to see how the flavors of these two approaches to real-time logging of a sporting event differ.
I'm gonna be one busy guy!
GO, GIANTS!
5:12:58 PM
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Same Old Battle, Revisited: Does Open Source Kill Markets?
Yesterday, industry guru Mitch Kapor and his team announced an Open Source initiative to create world-class desktop applications. Their first product, code-named Chandler after the famed detective, is a Personal Information Manager, or PIM. This is an area in which I have a strong personal interest.
The news was only a few hours old before Don Park raised the question of whether such an effort would have negative economic consequences for the software business. Soon after that post, my buddy Chuck Shotton chimed in with a vote dissenting from Park's concern.
Last week while I was at the Online Community Summit in California's Wine Country, I heard the usual "Nobody makes money off Open Source software" whine. The fact is, that isn't necessarily true. There are viable economic models for making money from Open Source. But even if it were true, the presence of a low-end product without BigCo documentation and support will never threaten a viable commercial product.
So I'm with Chuck on this one in large part because it's the side of this debate I've always found myself on. Open Source and/or free software is A Good Thing. It's not a pancea. I choose to use some commercial products where there are decent Open Source equivalents, sometimes because of a key feature I need, sometimes becaue of interoperability concerns with clients and publishers. And there are some Open Source packages I might use if there were any support (even support I had to pay for) available outside the user community. (User support can of course be great but it can also be spotty, inconsistent, and wrong.)
1:00:47 PM
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Latest Fixes from MS Make Word Usable on OS X
I've complained here vociferously about the way Jaguar broke Word. I blame Apple for this, by the way, even though my usual approach would be to bash MS (they're so much fun to bash, aren't they?).
Well, MS has come up with an updater that seems to fix every single complaint I had about Word prior to this release and after my installation of Jaguar.
Kudos to Microsoft for fixing their product with such alacrity. I'm happier with Jaguar now, too. Apple should doff its cap to the Redmondites.
12:29:24 PM
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© Copyright 2002 Dan Shafer.
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