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Wednesday, October 23, 2002 |
A Great, Battling Win
This was a big win for the Giants. They scrapped back against the scrappers.
They beat the Angels' best hot-shot pitcher straight up. And they turn a
major DP to end it.
This was a must win for the Giants and I am sooooooo glad they pulled it
out.
The Giants probably have a slight edge now because they are likely to win
2 of 3 at home and then get one of two in Anaheim.
Great Series. I think it'll go seven now.
8:46:40 PM 
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Giants Go Ahead; Nen About to Appear
Maybe extra-innings won't be necessary after all. Great breaks, good baserunning,
timely hitting, and the Giants are up 4-3 in the bottom of the eighth. That
leaves the Angels three outs facing Nen.
I agree with McCarver. That last move was stupid and unnecessary. One more
run could make a huge different. Nen always likes to make things interesting.
Nail biting time. Again.
8:36:10 PM
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The Power of the Bunt
My wife always asks me why guys bunt in some situations. You saw again in
the bottom of the eighth tonight a good reason. Reggie Sanders squaring to
bunt distracts Bengie Molina behind the plate, Result: passed ball and the
go-ahead run moves into scoring position with nobody out.
8:30:51 PM
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This Could Go On Forever...
Nobody can hit Francisco Rodriguez, so until he gets tired, this could be
a very long extra-innings night. Of course, the Giants should have stayed
with F-Rod another inning or so. Now they have only Nen left and he can only
go an inning or so.
Extra innings, anyone?
8:19:41 PM
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Ridding Ourselves of Excess Walks
I just posted this note over on Dave Winer's interactive outline of the game:
Limit a team to how many times they can walk a hitter in the World Series.
If they exceed that, the player gets an extra base for each additional walk.
So you can walk Bonds twice. Next time you walk him, he goes to second and
all runners move up two bases. Walk him again and it's a three-bagger.
This walk stuff is just silly. I think it makes Scioscia look like a real
coward.
7:49:51 PM
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McCarver Has it In For Bonds
I don't know why McCarver feels he has to bring Bonds down every chance he
gets. Maybe it's jealousy; McCarver was never a great baserunner. Maybe it's
an attempt to make up for his position as a sort of homer broadcaster because
he covered the Giants about 20 times this season.
Whatever it is, the criticism he leveled at Bonds' baserunning earlier this
evening was just wrong. That ball got to right field so fast and Bonds had
so little time to make the decision that he could not have gone to third
even if he had done the wrong thing and just planted himself for the tag.
McCarver is one of my favorite baseball commentators, as I've said several
times here. But the fact is, sometimes he has blind spots. This is clearly
one.
7:46:03 PM
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The Giants are Good at Comebacks
All season, the Giants were great at comebacks and wonderful with two out.
So it's clearly far too early to call this one over.
The difference tonight -- and in this entire World Series so far -- is that
our starting pitching flat-out sucks. It's the worst I've seen. I mean, you
have to give the Angels credit for a power offense but even I could hit some
of the crap the Giants' hurlers are throwing up there. It's garbage time.
6:43:51 PM
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Come on, Giants!
These guys are just not in the game again tonight. Half-hearted attempts
at fielding. Lazy pitching. Falling behind hitters.
Let's be really clear about something, ok? <b>We cannot out-slug these
guys.</b> The pitching has to get it together or this series will be
over before the Angels head home.
Glaus is not that great a hitter. He's been killing us. Almost tied with
Bonds in the post-season HR department? You gotta be kidding me.
McCarver just said, "The Angels are in a frenzy in this post-season." Yep
and playing <i>well</i> above their heads.
Woody has got to start getting ahead of hitters or this one is over.
6:40:22 PM
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Angels Score First, Unfortunately
The pattern so far is that the team that scores first wins. The Angels scored
first because Lofton didn't understand the situation on the sac fly. McCarver
said Bonds doesn't have a great arm, but it's a helluva lot better than Lofton's.
Doesn't anyone remember that Bonds threw out, what? - three or four? - runners
at the plate this season.
If Bonds makes that play, it's still scoreless.
Cheap run.
6:20:02 PM
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81% Say Let Pete Back In
The Fox Sports Virtual Manager poll showed 81% of fans who responded want
Rose back in the game if he apologizes and admits he was wrong.
Doesn't matter. Non-Commissioner Selig ain't budging, trust me.
6:15:28 PM
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Well, Crap
We can't beat these guys hitting into double plays like that one that ended
the bottom of the first. This pitcher doesn't look to me like he's got so
much stuff that he ought to be causing this kind of problem.
6:06:09 PM
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Kent an All-Star?
Time we all recognized that Kent is not a post-season player. Bonds never
has been until this year but Kent hitting ahead of Bonds makes Bonds less
a threat.
It really is probably time for us to trade Kent in the off-season. Or let
him go free agent.
This is really pissing me off. The Angels are gutless. Walking him intentionally
in the first inning? Bush.
6:02:21 PM
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No Smashes
In the first half-inning tonight, I'm encouraged a bit. Last night, the
Angels crushed everything they hit. Tonight, even the single up the
middle was a /relatively/ weak grounder. (Not too weak, but not like
they were hitting last night.)
Woody is much more difficult to hit hard because he stays on the edges.
5:54:48 PM
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Giants Even Things Tonight, 8-6
I'm not sure it's useful to make a prediction, though I am 3-3 so far.
But what the heck.
I look for the Giants to even things tonight with a win in the 8-6 balllpark.
5:44:21 PM
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Chat With Me!
If you're following this blog as the game unfolds, you can IM with me
any of three ways:
AIM where I'm alkaline420 (yep, that Al Kaline)
Yahoo where I'm dshafer
On Dave Winer's Interactive Outline of the Game at
http://static3.userland.com/mtweblog/archives/000035.html
Go, Giants! (But I'll chat with Angels fans, too.)
5:39:19 PM
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Cal Ripken Wins the 'Memorable Moment' But Rose Hits the Homer
I think we could have picked any candidate for the most memorable moment
at random and been right. They were all awesome.
Ripken's amazing streak of consecutive games played was as good as
any...and perhaps better than most.
But I had a soft spot in my heart and a tear in my eye -- literally --
for Pete Rose. The man who gave so much to baseball has been banned from
coming anywhere near a ballpark until tonight. It took a commercialized
"contest" to convince the powers that be to let him back on the diamond.
And it seems to me at one and the same time both deserved and
hypocritical. Deserved because I just don't buy the idea that Rose has
been punished within the constraints of fitting his offenses. He should
have been restored long ago. If we ever again have a real
commissioner of baseball, maybe he'll get back in.
Hypocritical because, let's face it, you couldn't have left him out of
the nominations without incurring a huge storm of controversy, and
that's something that folks like MasterCard avoid like the plague. So
Pete Rose gets to show up, not because we forgive him but rather because
a sponsor insisted.
Still, it's wonderful to see him on the field. He looked sad, didn't he?
5:34:31 PM
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I'm Trying a Different Approach to Blogging the World Series
Tonight
Rather than try to do an inning-by-inning report, I'm going to post
messages in real time as events and thoughts occur regardless of the
pace of the game.
I'm just experimenting with this exciting and malleable new medium. And
I'm having so darned much fun even though the audience has, of course,
been minuscule.
5:28:39 PM
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Lawrence Lessig Weighs in on OSAF Impact on Software World
This piece by Lawrence Lessig of copyright-defense fame makes some cogent arguments we need to factor into the debate about the potential impact of Mitch Kapor's new Open Source Application Foundation (OSAF) on the commercial market for software.
12:46:06 AM
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Well, That's ONE Way to Put It!
Lots of Web sites trying to contend with the stubborn continuation of certain older Web browsers, Notably Netscape Navigator 4, which is almost undeniably the most screwed-up browser ever foisted off on us, often try lots of tricks to get people to upgrade or at least to understand the problem doesn't lie with the standards-compliant Web site in question.
According to this piece in the Guardian Online, the Daring Fireball site has a somewhat unorthodox but quite direct approach to the problem: insult the user.
12:39:00 AM
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Gimme Back My Apple Decal!
I always liked Apple decals. I put them lots of strange places. This Wired News piece reminded me of those days. The last few Macs I bought didn't have decals in them, I don't think. Or maybe they did but they weren't very interesting.
12:31:23 AM
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© Copyright 2002 Dan Shafer.
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