Giants better off without troubles Ohtani could bring

The San Francisco Giants have a new manager and apparently an improved pitching staff. What they don’t have is Shohei Ohtani. Thank heaven for small favors.

Ohtani may be the best player in baseball. He may hit 60 homers this season. May pitch several no-hitters. And he may be a problem as big as one of those Sumo champions. Come to think of it, he already is. So many of us, who are Giants fans (guilty your honor), rued the day Ohtani bypassed the Giants and signed what? A 100-zillion-dollar contract with the despised Los Angeles Dodgers.

Drat, the good folks up here north of Fresno and west of the Sierra, were thinking, those wealthy Dodgers, that celebrity audience and endless success. They did again to our sad little group from the ballpark by the Bay.

Is there no justice in the sporting world? There very well might be, and it’s named Ippei Mizuhara.

He was the interpreter and friend (some friend) who has worked with Ohtani all these years since Shohei came from Japan in 2018 to win two American League MVP awards with the Angels. Ippei is alleged to have bet millions on sports, bringing to the game nightmares of Pete Rose and placing Shohani in a situation of which he contends he was unaware.

In a prepared 12-minute statement Monday, ESPN properly thought it was so newsworthy it unpardonably interrupted the “Pardon The Interruption” show, Ohtani said he never bet on sports or anything else nor been asked to make bets for others. Ohani accused Mizuhara of “theft and fraud”  related to payments made from Ohtani’s account to an illegal Orange County bookmaking firm.  

Just think if the Giants had been unfortunate enough to sign Ohtani. They’d be dealing with all the legal mess along with the unpopular departure of longtime public address lady, Renel Brooks-Moon.

How much agony can a fan base take?

As this Ohtani drama unfolded I kept thinking of the film “Lost in Translation,” where a faded American movie star, portrayed by who else, Bill Murray, and a neglected young woman form an unlikely bond after crossing paths in Tokyo. It has nothing to do with baseball, gambling or theft, but in part offers a window into cultural differences between two societies on either side of the Pacific.

On this side where the Giants and Dodgers are based — is it ironic the Dodgers opened their season last week in Asia, albeit Korea, not Japan? — Ohtani will be hounded and pestered even more than when he merely was a superstar.

The Dodgers, players and fans, probably are better equipped to handle the Ohtani mess than others, we’ll learn in time. He’s a great athlete, but after what’s happened and considering what might happen, the Giants can do without his baggage. Although they would like his bat.

Did Giants really have any chance for Ohtani?

San Francisco Giants fans have to look at it this way: In 10 years Shohei Ohtani again will be a free agent, and the team can make another worthless attempt to sign him.

Deep down where your frosty memories of a night game at Candlestick Park are hidden, you probably never really thought the Giants would get Ohtani.

That this whole come-on was a creation of some imaginative screenwriter.

The best attraction in baseball leaving southern California, with all those movie stars, sushi restaurants and LeBron James? No way.

This was just another case of the Dodgers finishing ahead of the Giants, which except for that rare year, 2007, has been a constant. And a pain.

The Dodgers didn’t need Ohtani, and the woebegone Giants did. As if in the game of baseball or the game of life, need is taken into consideration.

The L.A. media already are lording it over the unfortunate Bay Area, which in a matter of weeks has lost both a baseball team, the bewitched Oakland Athletics, and now any chance hopes for a man who pounds balls into the seats when he’s not pounding fastballs past confused batters.

“Can you believe it?” was the headline on the L.A.Times internet page minutes after the signing. “Shohei Ohtani, baseball’s new Babe Ruth is a Dodger.”

What we can believe is the Giants are headed for a season, when they’re doomed to be crushed by the Dodgers and stuck without any attraction.

When supposedly the Giants were a legitimate candidate in the Ohtani sweepstakes if ranking behind the Dodgers, Blue Jays and Cubs, new San Francisco manager Bob Melvin said the team needs star power.

But who do they acquire, and how do they acquire him? They made failed attempts to sign, in chronological order, Bryce Harper and Aaron Judge and now another, Ohtani. It’s like the boy who cried wolf (Ruth?) colloquially, ain’t nobody there.

Giants president Farhan Zaidi is well versed in analytics, but the people in stands — or the ones you’re attempting to get into the stands — are more interested in personalities, ball players with a tang, you might say,

That’s what made Ohtani so valuable. Not only could he perform, but he was fascinating, having come from a foreign land to dominate America’s pastime.

When Tiger Woods was a regular on the golf tour you needed to be in front of the TV screen any time he came to the tee. Same thing now with Ohtani, who can hit a home run with any swing.

Shohei is the showman, the guy every ball club wishes it had on the roster and now the Dodgers do

Tough luck to every other team in the National League, especially the Giants.

Sporting changes: Clocks and no cuts

Major League Baseball has changed, apparently for the better. No wasting of time. You’re on a clock

At some tournaments, the PGA Tour is going to change. No cuts meaning everyone plays the full 72 holes. Whether that will be for the better is still uncertain.

And who knows what the next moves might be in NFL and NBA rules? 

Still, three strikes and you’re out and first down and ten. Or were those altered by some committee to keep us guessing?

Adaptation, we’re told, is the only way to survive. Baseball adapted, with time restrictions and — unfortunately — a runner on second to start extra innings.

The issue is our impatience. If something doesn’t appear to be happening, we’ll switch channels. Or walk out of the ballpark. Or off the course.

The wonderful part of sports is the unknown.  There’s no script, only possibilities.  You invest your time and hope for the best, like rolling the dice or turning over the cards.

Sometimes you hit the jackpot. A buzzer-beater by Steph Curry, other times the Warriors are down by 15 going into the fourth quarter. And they keep throwing the ball out of bounds instead of into the basket.

We need every game to be exciting, rewarding and quick; need every match to be for a championship, even a contrived one; need the stars on the ice or fairway or floor, or court. 

What we don’t need are all these injuries. Curry’s out, although almost ready to return. LeBron’s out. Rafael Nadal’s out, missing California (Indian Wells) and Florida. The Dodgers’ Gavin Lux is out for the season, and we’re a month away from the season even starting.

Golf’s problem, if you want to call it that, and the players don’t, is that the only injuries are to egos and bank accounts. Or is that not unique to that competition?  

In the early 1960s a few people with a lot of money wanted to get into pro football and, unable to be accepted by the NFL, formed their own group, the American Football League. They waved bankrolls and promises around, stealing (figuratively) NFL vets and draft picks and forcing a merger. Yes, there was this game that came to be known as the Bowl.

This generation’s AFL is the LIV. The difference is it's golf, not football (LIV is the Roman numeral for 54, the length of tournaments, rather than the PGA Tour’s 72.) The similarity is that some individuals are determined through millions and millions of Saudi Arabian dollars to bring about a merger.

What they have brought about is a decision by the PGA Tour to emulate the LIV and not reduce a tournament field through a halfway cut as has been done seemingly forever. 

Maybe not as momentous a switch as bringing a clock to baseball, until now a timeless game, but nevertheless a change.

Did someone say “Good old days”?

For Scully, there were no borders on baseball broadcasts

Red Barber, who made one of the more memorable calls — describing Al Gionfriddo robbing a frustrated  Joe DiMaggio, “back, back, back” — often said there was something special about listening to a baseball game on the radio.

The nature of the sport, with its dimensions — 90 feet between bases is the closest man has come to perfection, it was written — allowed us to perceive what we couldn’t literally see.

So the men who announced the games became an integral part of our sporting lives. Go back, back, back to the Pacific Coast League, to Don Klein and Bud Foster, and those who sat in front of microphones always seemed as much a part of the game as those who stepped to the plate.

A familiar voice in the evening hours, relishing a great catch, lamenting a regrettable strikeout, was just what we needed before the lights were turned off.

The virtually unprecedented response to the passing of Vin Scullly, who died Tuesday at 94, is hardly a surprise.

He was employed by the Dodgers, from the 1950s, when he left Fordham and joined Red Barber. Yet there are no borders on airwaves. Or on respect.

It was 1958 when baseball changed, the New York Giants moving to San Francisco, the Brooklyn Dodgers shifting to Los Angeles. There was nothing at all wrong with the Giants’ announcer, Russ Hodges.

There was something fortunately right with Scully, who teamed with Jerry Doggett.

It was my junior year in college at UCLA, and for a summer job I sold concessions at the L.A. Coliseum, hardly the old ballpark but a 90,000-seat football stadium converted to baseball, where the left field screen was 250 feet away and the right field fence was 400 feet away.

Blithely I scrambled through the Coliseum, the cries for my wares — “Ice cream here” — all but drowned out by the classic voice of Vin Scully.

Did the good folks in Los Angeles not have enough confidence in their ability to watch a major league ball game without being told what they just saw? This was the new age of transistor radios, and those little babies were everywhere.

Finally Dodgers management succumbed to reality, erecting small loudspeakers in right field. No, it wouldn’t have worked in Boston, but this wasn’t Boston.

Up in the Bay Area, we’ve had Lon Simmons, Hank Greenwald and Jon Miller, clever and astute. But lacking the elements that contributed to the attractiveness of Scully — a base population in the millions, a then clear-channel radio network and an audience trapped in southern California traffic.

In L.A., you grew up listening to Scully almost more than you did idolizing Sandy Koufax. Northern Cal didn’t have that sort of problem. There was only Willie Mays.

It’s hard to say which was a better baseball area, Los Angeles or San Francisco. For sure, the Bay Area never set up speakers to hear what you were watching.

The sudden and explosive acquisition of Juan Soto by the Padres brings to mind the Jim Murray line about the troubles of a baseball team in San Diego: “the Pacific to the west, Mexico to the south and Vin Scully to the north.”

The man was great, even if his calls overwhelmed my yells to sell ice cream. Baseball will miss you.

Of the Giants, McEnroe and officiating

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — What happened at the final pitch of that agonizing Giants-Dodgers playoff, the arguable call on the last pitch that left fans outraged and players bewildered, wouldn’t happen in tennis.

But it used to happen. Or have you forgotten John McEnroe?

John’s not down here in the desert at the BNP Paribas tournament, but his spirit is. When McEnroe played, and he was great — as he still is as a TV commentator — John would challenge virtually every line call with his inimitable observation, “You cannot be serious.”

Now, at least at this BNP, the calls are made electronically. No lines people, no Serena Williams blistering a cowering female official with language that wouldn’t pass a censor.

But tennis is absolute. The courts are painted on the surface. The ball is either in or out. And the replays prove it to the fans, in attendance — clapping rhythmically as the picture comes into view — or watching on TV.

We can be serious.

Baseball is more judgmental.  Did the Giants’ Wilmer Flores check his swing on what would become the ultimate pitch of the 2021 San Francisco season?

He thought he did. Thousands of Giants fans thought he did. But with two outs, the Dodgers leading 2-1 and the tying run on base, first base ump Gabe Morales raised a thumb.

Game over. For the Giants, year over. Outrage beginning. But why? Was there outrage over Mookie Betts’ four hits?

The Dodgers were the better team, are the better team. They’ve got all those Cy Young Award winners and MVPs. Their payroll reflects the quality of the roster.

I’ve said it before: Cars, wine and ballplayers — you get what you pay for, with exceptions.

The Dodgers are paying around $200 million for their roster, the Giants around $140 million. Questionable calls by officials? They will be a part of all sports, until as has happened in tennis, humans are eliminated from the process, which you hope is never. Every human errs.

Henry (Red) Sanders, the football coach at UCLA half a century ago, insisted, “When my team makes as few mistakes as the officials, we’ll win every game.”

The Giants won more games than predicted, but in the end they couldn’t win the game they needed against the dreaded Dodgers, who if it hadn’t been for a comparable situation in reverse would have finished the regular season a game in front of the Giants instead of a game behind.

Not that it matters now, except for the health of Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, who became apoplectic over the call. In that game, on July 22 at Dodger Stadium, L.A. was ahead 3-2, with two outs in the ninth. The Giants had the bases loaded. Dodgers reliever Kenley Jansen threw a 3-2 pitch at which Darin Ruf seemed to swing and miss to end the game.

Not so fast. The umpire decided it was not a swing and the game was tied. Roberts screamed and was ejected, and the Giants eventually won.

Good teams, good players somehow find a way.

When there was an obvious missed call against Roger Federer, he would shake it off and win the next point.

When the 49ers were collecting Super Bowl trophies, earning the label “Team of the ‘80s,” nothing appeared to bother them, whether it was flight problems, officiating or the opposing team. But when the losses grew in the ‘90s, so did the complaints — excuses if you will.

The pressures in big-time sports are enormous. Failure is never far away. Then again, neither is success.

A month ago, Daniil Medvedev won the U.S. Open over Novak Djokovic. A few days after that, he was upset by Grigor Dimitrov here at Indian Wells.

Whatever the game, you hit the shots or throw the pitches and do your best to ignore the line calls.

Whether they’re made by an electronic device or by man.

Giants-Dodgers: All we could have wanted

The games have been all we could want. Not the Olympics, although they’ve had their moments. The Dodgers-Giants games. Plenty of history, very little mystery, and baseball that on some nights seems to last forever — and even that’s not long enough. 

This may not be as good as it gets, yet it’s better than anyone would have imagined. At least Giants fans.

You look at the lineups, for L.A, World Series champion and still the favorite to be champion again, all those big hitters — especially the two Giants destroyers, Max Muncy and Justin Turner

The Giants? Yes, Buster Posey is batting like it’s 2010, not 2021, but where did Tahir Estrada come from? And LaMonte Wade Jr.?

So this isn’t quite the Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff, when in 1951 the New York Giants came from far behind the Brooklyn Dodgers and won on Bobby Thomson’s home run. In its own way, it’s part of history that goes back 131 years. Perhaps we label it the Surprise of Oracle Park. (The Miracle of Oracle has a nice ring, but that would be misleading.)

The only thing we know after L.A.’s rout on Wednesday is that by the time this three-game series closes on Thursday afternoon, the Giants still will be ahead of the Dodgers and everyone else. 

Things seem to be scripted in San Francisco’s favor, putting it mildly. Last week when the teams met in L.A., the Dodgers’ reliable closer, Kenley Jansen, suddenly became unreliable. Dodgers fans booed. The only thing Giants fans boo are the Dodgers.

After that series, the Dodgers played the Rockies. Trailing in the first game, L.A. tied it up and then, with nobody out, loaded the bases. No way the Dodgers could lose that one. But lose they did.

Then the Dodgers headed north. And you start to sense that the gods, if not the odds, were all for the Giants.

Every team has injuries, too many these days. Too many games? Bad luck? Who knows for sure? Hey, the Giants had been without three-quarters of their starting infield, Brandon Belt, Brandon Crawford and Evan Longoria.

Among the missing Dodgers was Cody Bellinger, just the 2019 National League MVP. He’s a first baseman, but Dodger manager Dave Roberts thought Bellinger would be safer in the outfield, away from a possible infield collision.

He was back at first on Tuesday night, and for whatever reason — a lack of familiarity at his old position, possibly — in the top of the eighth flung the ball into the left field box seats trying to get the runner at third base, who scored the winning run in the 2-1 game.

“Yeah, yeah, I think you have to be honest with yourselves,” manager Dave Roberts told the Los Angeles Times, when asked if the Giants are doing “the little things” better than the Dodgers.

“It’s two evenly matched clubs, and if you look at how we’ve played, whether it’s an at-bat here, or an execution on defense, a missed play, a walk, they’ve been better than us. So, on the margin, they’ve been better.”

That would please Giants manager Gabe Kapler and his staff, who from virtually the moment he took over two seasons ago have emphasized fundamentals.

Since they’ve been permitted to return to the ballpark after the easing of Covid-19 restrictions, what the fans have emphasized is a return to the fun they used to have.

As would be expected, the majority of the crowd of 32,878 on Tuesday night was Giants fans, although not by much. You saw Giants jerseys — not the bizarre City Connect uniforms, thank goodness — and Dodgers jerseys.

But at times, you also heard the chant “Beat L.A.”

At Oracle, co-existence doesn’t go as far as a wild Cody Bellinger throw.

For Giants, June once meant swoon

SAN FRANCISCO — Yes, June — and to those who have followed the San Francisco Giants through the years, that brings the most painful of rhyming words — swoon.

April and May were great. And then? Well, as Jim Murray wrote way, way back in 1965, “A falling figure shoots past a window, and a man says, ‘Oh, oh. It must be June. There go the Giants.”’

The month has a long way to go. Truth tell, so do the baseball pennant races, but after beating the Angels, 6-1, Monday at Oracle Park — not to be confused with the way they whipped a different L.A. team, the Dodgers, three in a row at the same place — June doesn’t seem like it’ll be a swoon.

There’s a saying that you shouldn’t pay attention to the standings until Memorial Day, which of course was Monday, meaning all restrictions are off. But very much on are thoughts that the Giants, with their undersized payroll and oversized dreams, might get to the postseason.

No less important, baseball is fun again by the Bay. Fans able to show proof of vaccinations once more can jam together in the bleachers, as in pre-pandemic days, shouting, or in the case of San Francisco starter Johnny Cueto when he walks off the mound after the top of the seventh, giving a standing ovation.

“I love it when the fans are behind me,” Cueto said through interpreter Erwin Higueros. Cueto knows the drill. He’s an athlete who’s an entertainer. He also helped the Giants to a third straight win and sixth in seven games.

“Johnny is a little bit different from the other starters we have,” said Gabe Kapler, the Giants manager, meaning he shimmies and shakes and keep batters off-balance in his unorthodox manner.

After the departure of Barry Bonds a decade ago, Giants home runs became rare, because of Oracle’s dimensions — there was a reason centerfield was nicknamed “Death Valley,” although the franchise prefers the euphemism “Triples Alley.”

The distances were moved when bullpens were built into right center, and no one needs a degree in physics to know that on a warm afternoon (it was 67 degrees at first pitch) a ball flies farther than it does on a chilly San Francisco night.

The Giants, acting as if they were the boom-boom Dodgers, hit three home runs on Monday, one by Evan Longoria, one by Mauricio Dubon (who took over after Longoria felt a twinge running the bases) and one by Donovan Solano.

This is not to suggest in any way that the Giants should be compared to the powerful teams of the early 1960s when they had Willie Mays, Willie McCovey and Orlando Cepeda, and an L.A. sportswriter named Bob Hunter called them “the big boppers of Bridgetown.” But at least they can get more than singles.

“I don’t see Dubon as a home run hitter,” said Kapler, in response to a question. “He’s more of a grinder, and with his speed he can get the extra base. He works the gaps, and he’s a quality defender.”

Kapler said the two victories over the Diamondbacks in Phoenix set up the wins over the Dodgers in L.A. and the one over the Angels, confidence builders.

San Francisco lacks people like Mookie Betts and Fernando Tatis Jr., two of the game’s better — and better-paid — players, but it isn’t lacking in quality or sense of humor.

Photos have been adorned with painted mustaches, as opposed to actual mustaches some players have attempted to grow with varying degrees of success.

“We get along very well,” said Cueto. “We’re having a lot of fun.”

Winners usually do.

But then the Dodgers showed up

SAN FRANCISCO — Days and a night of reckoning. Those were the real Dodgers. The question is whether those were the real Giants.

That was great, living large against the Rockies and Reds, scoring big, thinking big. Hey, first place. It doesn’t get any bigger or better, particularly for a team some suggested should be closer to last place.

But then the Dodgers showed up. And how. Three games at Oracle, where the crowd was large — 13,446, the largest of the spring, and maybe a third cheering for the dreaded Dodgers.

Three games, and three wins for L.A., the last one Sunday, 11-5; the Dodgers, who were beat up and getting beat, turning into the dominant World Series champions they are.

What the young, low-payroll, overachieving Giants will turn into will be learned quickly enough.

Which is the more accurate representation of the Giants, the team that until Friday had pushed the right buttons, made the timely swings and won five in a row? Or the team that was stymied by the L.A. pitching until it was pummeled by the L.A. hitting and has dropped three in a row?

For sure, the Giants understand why the Dodgers won the championship, not that they didn’t previously.

“We got beat every which way in this series,” was the candid assessment of Giants manager Gabe Kapler. “They made more pitches than we did. They got more big hits than we did. They played better defense, converted more plays and outs than we did. 

“When that happens, the only thing to do is get back up quickly off the mat and quickly turn the page and get ready for the next game.”

Yes, a bit of a mixed metaphor, but when you’re behind 11-0 in the third inning against your historic rival at your home park, one is allowed a grammatical slip or two.

At least the Giants made it competitive, if they couldn’t make it close. Had they not scored at all and had a few runners on base, the manager was going to bring in outfielder Darin Ruf to pitch, saving relievers who, with starter Anthony DeSclafani not making it through the third, were overworked.

DeSclafani conceded he was awful, a bad combination when your hitters, facing Julio Urias, also were awful until it didn’t really matter. That a major league team would have an occasionally terrible game isn’t the worst thing — if the game is occasional and not against the team you need to beat.

Particularly since after two games at Arizona, the Giants play four more against the Dodgers in L.A. Three losses down there would pretty much delete the joy out of what until days ago was a joyful beginning.

The Dodgers have those two Cy Young Award pitchers, Trevor Bauer — who won Frlday night — and Clayton Kershaw. On Sunday, it was Urias. But no matter who’s on the mound, it’s the guys in the batter’s box who destroy the Giants, notably Max Muncy and Justin Turner.

The truism in baseball is good pitching stops good hitting. So the Giants were upbeat knowing DeSclafani was going be facing L.A. on Sunday. When the Dodgers’ Gavin Lux lined the first pitch of the game for a hit, that was an omen of what was about to come. Whoosh.

“I actually felt pretty good today,” said DeSclafani, an observation that couldn’t be repeated by Giants partisans. “It’s weird to say that, giving up 10 runs.”

It was weird to say that for a couple of weeks the Giants were ahead of the Dodgers. But as we know, weird things happen in the game, not always the way you would choose.

“At the end of the day,” DeSclafani said of his unexpected performance, “sometimes that’s baseball, just the way the game goes. It’s just important to forget about this game as quick as I can ... I’ve had a good season to this point.”

Before the Dodgers.

Giants: No runs in two games, but maybe a barrier crossed

By Art Spander
For Maven Sports

No runs for the Giants, but maybe progress for society. Two games without anyone from San Francisco crossing the plate. One brief series in which young athletes may have crossed a barrier.

Read the full story here.

Copyright 2020, The Maven

At spring training, anger from past crushes hope for future

By Art Spander
For Maven Sports

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The weather is fine enough, the low 80s. Perfect for spring training, perfect for baseball. But what a terrible time, and that’s beyond the jolting reality that Don & Charlie’s, great ribs, great history — Babe Ruth’s autograph among the dozens — has closed.

Read the full story here.

Copyright 2020, The Maven

Baseball gods, Longoria team to get Giants a win

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — This one goes to the baseball gods. And to Evan Longoria, who wouldn’t have been in the game if Pablo Sandoval, a switch hitter, hadn’t hurt his leg the day before and felt he couldn’t swing righthanded.

“Sometimes it works out,” Bruce Bochy, the Giants' manager agreed, “sometimes it doesn’t.”

In a convoluted sort of way it worked Monday night against the Dodgers, and for the Giants, who had lost three in a row, there could be nobody better against whom something would work.

It was Longoria, “Longo” as everyone calls him, who delivered what arguably was the biggest hit of the year and a month he’s been with the Giants, a bases-loaded double in the bottom of the seventh that scored all three runners and beat the Dodgers, 3-2.

“He needed that hit,” said Bochy. “We needed it.”

Let’s back up to the sixth inning, where the Dodgers scored their two runs in the top half — Cody Bellinger, naturally, drove in one, and his 37 RBI are the most before May in major league history.

In the bottom of the inning, Buster Posey doubled, and with Sandoval coming to the plate, the Dodgers brought in a new pitcher, Scott Alexander, a lefty, which wouldn’t have mattered it Pablo could swing righthanded comfortably.

But he couldn't, so Bochy pinch hit another righthanded batter, Longoria, who plays third base, as Sandoval has been doing in the game.

Longoria, struggling — he’s hitless in his previous 10 at bats — flied out to no one else but Bellinger, a.k.a. Superman. But at least Longo was in the game, and when he came up in the seventh he doubled off Dylan Florio.

Like that, the chants of “Dodgers, Dodgers,”  from what liberally might be called a crowd — only 32,212 fans at the place now called Oracle Park — were replaced by shouts of “Beat L.A.”

“I’ve been waiting for that hit in a Giants uniform,” said Longoria. “It’s been a year. It’s not for a lack of opportunity. I’ve been in situations. I was feeling good. I just haven’t been able to come through.”

Although he grew up in Southern California, Longoria had spent nine years with the Tampa Rays.

“Dodgers-Giants is a huge rivalry,” said Longoria, “but it’s new to me. It gives me chills when you’re out there and hear that kind of enthusiasm from the home crowd.”

Well, the temperature was in the high 50s and a Candlestick-type wind was blowing, but Longoria said that had nothing to do with the chills.

“I know my average is not good, but that doesn’t take away from my mentality in those situations. A bases-loaded double is cool.”

So, he said, is Sandoval starting at third, which is where Longoria normally is positioned.

“Pablo’s been swinging the bat good. I’m here to win. I’m ready off the bench. I’m happy to wait. I’m hitting .200 (actually .210). I can’t go into the office and ask why I’m not starting.”

What some of the media asked was why Bochy took out Giants starter Jeff Samardzija for a pinch hitter in the fifth inning of a 0-0 game. The manager had a quick response.

“We needed to score runs,” said Bochy.

They didn’t immediately, but Samardzija said he had no problem being pulled.

“After losing three in a row (to the Yankees) we needed to do anything to score runs. Another time I’ll go seven, eight innings. Anytime you win a close game, it’s awesome. It builds confidence.”

The Giants still are last in the National League West, hitting is poor and the pitching not what was expected — and now Derek Holland is on the injured list, Ty Blach having been called up from Sacramento.

“This is a game of momentum,” Samardzija said of baseball in general.

Whether the Giants have it is unclear, but they do have a victory over the Dodgers.

Something finally went right.

At the A’s, the talk was about the Giants — and Bryce Harper

By Art Spander
For Maven Sports

MESA, Ariz. — The game meant little. At least the game on the field. The other game, the battle for Bryce Harper, might mean a great deal. Then again...

Read the full story here.

Copyright 2019, The Maven

Giants ahead of last year — and ahead of the Dodgers

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — Bruce Bochy had his own vision. ”We’re not where we were hoping to be,” said the Giants manager. But they’re ahead of last year and ahead of the Dodgers, which isn’t all that bad.

Especially considering the start — two weeks ago, they had lost four more games than they had won. Especially considering the injuries — no Johnny Cueto or Jeff Samardzija for a while, and still no Madison Bumgarner.

But there they are after Sunday’s 4-2 win over the Dodgers, winners of three straight series, winners of six of 10 from Los Angeles — ridiculous that two teams play each other 10 times in April, even historical rivals — and at .500 for the season as May approaches.

Oh yeah, for those whose vocabulary consists of two words, “Beat L.A.,” a chant heard frequently among the sellout crowd of 42,020 at AT&T Park, although a sizeable percentage was heard cheering, “Let’s go Dodgers,” the Giants, supposed also-rans, are 14-14, compared to the 12-15 of the defending National League champion Dodgers.

It’s early. That’s the baseball mantra whether you’re off to a good start or a poor start. But this start has to be encouraging, with Evan Longoria doing what was needed when they got him in a trade over the winter, and Brandon Belt showing patience (that 21-pitch at bat against the Angels) and power (a run-scoring double Sunday and six home runs).

The Giants are getting the long ball. The Giants are getting solid pitching, Ty Blach going six innings, giving up six hits and two runs; then competent work by Sam Dyson and Tony Watson, and then Hunter Strickland, the closer, going 1-2-3 in the ninth.

That’s what the Giants couldn’t do a year ago, burst with a big home run, then cut off an opponent’s rally. You’ve got to hit the ball out of the park these days. You’ve always had to shut down the other team if you’ve had the lead in the ninth.

On Saturday, the Giants and Dodgers had a long day’s journey into night, a makeup of a rainout and then a scheduled game, a day-night doubleheader. And in the afternoon, the Giants gave up 15 runs for the second time in three games.

The argument could be made then that the win in the second game, a true nightcap as the announcers used to call them with play not starting until 7:30 p.m., was San Francisco’s biggest game of the spring.

Down early, the Giants won. They had a chance Sunday to get to .500, and they made good use of the opportunity. Being even is so much bigger psychologically than being one game below.

“Both teams were tired,” said Bochy of the Saturday marathon. “Longoria’s homer gave us a jump start. We wanted to get on the board first. You always want to score early. That home run was big.”

So was Blach, who had that opening-day shutout of the Dodgers, then lost to them and has now beat them again.

“One of those things,“ said Bochy of Blach’s effectiveness against L.A. “I’m sure he gets caught up in the tension. The fans get into it, here or down there. He just seems to pick it up against them. He’s getting back to who he is.”

So is Longoria, who was struggling, perhaps trying too hard to prove that the Giants made the right deal in acquiring him. He was fifth in the batting order Sunday, behind Buster Posey, who was third, and Belt. In the first inning, with two outs and nobody on, Posey doubled, Belt walked and Longoria hit his sixth homer of the young season.

“It’s always up to the heart of the order over the course of a season to drive in runs,” said Bochy. “That’s what they’re there for, what they’re paid to do. Sure the table-setters get on, but those guys ... you lean on those guys.”

Those guys give the other guys, the pitchers, the ability to throw the ball without worrying that every run will be critical, even thought with the Giants it’s usually the situation.

“When we have a lead, like we had, we can attack,” said Blach. “We don’t have to be as fine. A lot of guys are contributing. There’s depth in the lineup.”

And success, if minimal, on the field.

Only an exhibition game? Not Giants-Dodgers

By Art Spander

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Only an exhibition game? Not when the Giants play the Dodgers. Not with the image of Marichal and Roseboro still hovering in the mind. Not with the memories of Reggie Smith climbing into the stands at Candlestick to try and attack a fan. Not with the Dodgers finishing 40 games ahead of the Giants last season.

“You wake up,” said Giants first baseman Brandon Belt, “you know you’re playing the Dodgers and everything changes inside of you.”

What didn’t change was the Dodgers pummeling the Giants, 9-3. Wait, a week ago the Giants pummeled the Dodgers by the same score, 9-3. So that’s it. They end the Cactus League at 1-1. But in truth that’s not it.

Not when a century of history, beginning back when they were the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants, shadows them. Not when tales of Bobby Thomson’s pennant-winning home run, the “shot heard ‘round the world,’ are revived. Not when thoughts of the brawls and the boos never die.

Steven Duggar, the rookie centerfielder, who may or may not be on the roster when the Giants break camp, who Sunday, with Scottsdale Stadium packed to the extreme (12,141) hit his third homer of the spring, sensed that this was no ordinary exhibition.

“There was more buzz,” he said. “You could feel the vibe.”

Once they were in neighboring boroughs in New York City. Then they shifted to California, some 400 miles apart. But for spring training, ever since the Dodgers moved into their complex at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, the clubs are probably separated by only 25 miles.

And their fans are everywhere, attired in Giants black or Dodgers blue — and aren’t those two colors symbolic of the brawling between the teams, and unfortunately occasionally between the fans?

“Beat L.A.” is the normal chant from a Giants crowd. You didn’t hear that Sunday at Scottsdale. What you did hear were boos when Yasiel Puig’s name was announced and after he doubled in the first inning to drive in a run for the Dodgers, one of his two hits.

You also heard, “Let’s go Dodgers.” How did those people get in?  

How Chris Berman, the retired ESPN announcer, a professed Giants fan — you don’t have to be impartial in television — got in was through the Giants. He was invited by team management and even went out to the mound to change pitchers in the seventh inning

“A bit of levity,” said Bruce Bochy, the Giants’ manager.

After last season, the Giants can use some. Last place. The Dodgers in first, en route to the World Series. Spring games are not supposed to mean much — other than Giants vs. Dodgers — but a study of the starting lineups for each team indicates L.A. is far superior.

The heart of Dodgers' order, three through six, is Cody Bellinger (who Sunday had a hit); Puig (who had two hits and an RBI); Yasmani Grandal (who had a home run and two RBI); and Joc Pederson (who was hitless). Puig is batting .400.

The Giants' strength, if they have one, is pitching. Jeff Samardzija started Sunday for San Francisco and was decent for his third start. He did yell at home plate up Mark Ripperger in the second after a pitch was called a ball. The crowd picked up his displeasure and hooted a bit, but that was about it. Other than Samardija’s three walks in the inning.

Samardzija said he enjoyed the reactions of the crowd, which lifted the game from the ordinary. “They had a good turnout,” said Samardzija, of the Dodgers fans, “and we had a great turnout. It gives the game a little more excitement when the fans are into it more.”

Most spring games, Bochy is unconcerned with what occurs. He cared about this one. “We didn’t play that well,” he conceded.

“The rivalry? Look at the sellout. We wish we had played better, but we did beat them at their place. There’s always added interest when these two teams play, a lot of noise.”

Baseball as it should be. The games don’t show in the standings, but they certainly do to the fans.

S.F. Examiner: Giants need to prove magic of spring isn’t lost in fog of summer

By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner

Bruce Bochy was telling the truth. A game in April is no less important — critical, was the word he used — as a game in August. But April is gone. So is the Giants’ lead. They are in second place now, behind the Dodgers, a team hailed and by some — Giants fans — hated.

A team against which San Francisco tonight begins a three-game series at Dodger Stadium.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

Samardzija on Giants-Dodgers: It’s a rivalry for sure

By Art Spander

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — They were booing the announcement of the other team’s lineup. Before an exhibition game. Before what, in effect, is a workout, if with a lot of accoutrements. But it was the Dodgers, and for a sellout crowd of 12,127 at the Giants spring ballpark, that fact transcended everything else.

As one of new kids on the block, and on the mound, understood full well.

“It’s a rivalry for sure,” said Jeff Samardzija. “I love it.”

The majority of the fans at Scottsdale Stadium did not love the result, the Dodgers winning 5-2. It wasn’t a good day overall for the Bay Area against L.A., with the Lakers throttling the Warriors.

Of course, that one mattered, in the standings and in the records. This one mattered only for the emotions of the spectators. Not that they should be ignored.

When people are chanting “Beat L.A., Beat L.A.” in Arizona, in early March, one grasps the significance of what, other than the individual performances, is a contest of insignificance. Except for the people who buy the tickets and buy into the idea that beating the Dodgers makes their lives better.

“It’s to be expected,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy. He didn’t need to add that the Giants and Dodgers have been facing each other since 1890 when the Giants were in one New York borough, upper Manhattan, and the Dodgers in another, Brooklyn. They’ve played more than 2,400 times, not including exhibitions.

“The booing, the fans, probably adds a little excitement for the players,” said Bochy.

As usual this time of year, Bochy doesn’t get too excited or depressed, other than for a serious injury. He was upbeat about Samardzija, in his second Cactus League start, going three innings, striking out five and allowing just one run. It’s what the Giants need from a man signed as a free agent for $90 million who is supposed to be No. 2 or No. 3 in the rotation.

If Giants relievers Clayton Blackburn, who was the loser, and Jake Smith each gave up two runs, well, nothing to be worried about. Even if it’s against the Dodgers.

The Giants' lineup was without Buster Posey, taking a day off, and Hunter Pence, who’s been out with soreness in an Achilles tendon but is supposed to be ready on Wednesday.

Brandon Crawford again was the designated hitter — even when two National League teams meet, the DH is in effect in the exhibition season — because of a sore throwing arm. He should be back at shortstop the middle of the week. Crawford’s swing is fine. He homered in the sixth.

The Dodgers' Yasiel Puig, who singled and drove in a run, was the main target of the derision. Giants fans simply do not like the man. And Chase Utley, who reportedly has won the appeal of a two-game suspension he received for taking out (and breaking the leg of) Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada in the World Series, also was booed loudly.

“You’ve got two passionate fan bases,” said Samardzija, “and they’re going at each other more than the players are. That’s good.”

Although he’s new to the Giants, Samardzija is not new to rivalries. He pitched for the Cubs, who couldn’t escape the presence or success of the Cardinals. Before that, he played football for Notre Dame.

“It could be USC or Michigan,” said Samardzija. “Those were big games for us. We could have a down team or they could have a down team. It never really mattered. There was so much at stake.”

A wise man would say that virtually nothing is at stake in baseball during the first week in March, but when the opposing team has LA on its baseball caps, logic is secondary. Memories of Tommy Lasorda lording it at Candlestick Park remain, even with Lasorda retired and Candlestick destroyed.

For years, the Giants were the Dodgers' foils. As the lyrics went, paranoia strikes deep, into your life it will creep.

Giants fans cannot forget or apparently forgive.

“For the players, these games are just workouts,” said Samardzija. “But we have to understand the people take these games seriously. You don’t want to go out there and be too loose.”

To borrow from Samardzija’s thoughts, don’t we just love it?

Newsday (N.Y.): Dodgers coach Bob Geren looks at Chase Utley slide from other side now

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

GLENDALE, Ariz. — This wasn’t exactly joining the enemy. Baseball people change teams and uniforms all the time. And yet ... “Yes,” acknowledged Bob Geren, “one of the players said to me, ‘Now that you’re on the other side ... ’ ’’

Neither the player nor Geren had to finish. He knew. Everybody knows.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2016 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Even Dodgers applauded Tim Hudson

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — He was walking off a off a major league mound for a final time, and in the other dugout, the opposing dugout, the Dodgers dugout, players were standing and applauding, joining a last hurrah for Tim Hudson.

His Giants teammates, of course. The more than 40,000 fans, indeed. But the Dodgers, the historic rivals of the Giants, also taking part? More than anything, that was proof of the respect Hudson had earned in a career now coming to a close.

These are strange days for San Francisco baseball. The Giants’ chance for the postseason, the opportunity to repeat as World Series champions, was halted earlier in the week by the Dodgers. The games no longer mean anything.

It is a time for reflection, for farewells, in the case of 40-year-old Tim Hudson, for a cameo and an ovation that Thursday afternoon shook AT&T Park. You can’t win every year, but you can be appreciative of the years you did win, and the players who contributed to those wins.

For Hudson, the appearance amounted to a victory lap, even if there would be no victory, the Dodgers edging the Giants, 3-2. Hudson lasted 2 1/3 innings. After a single by Howie Kendrick in the top of the third, Bruce Bochy stepped onto the field to replace Hudson. The time had come.

“It was a special moment,” said Bochy of Hudson taking his leave. “It’s been an honor to have him on our team.”

Brief as that might have been. Huddy was with the Athletics for six years, then, joining as a free agent, the Atlanta Braves for nine. He came to the Giants before the season of 2014 with the express purpose of pitching and winning a World Series, a goal that was achieved and one that Hudson quickly asserts remains the highlight of a 17-year career.

“I never would have dreamed things would have unfolded the way they did,” said Hudson.

Sport emphasizes the passing of time. One day you’re a rookie, the next you’re nearly finished. Always someone is arriving — the Giants' catcher Thursday, the man to whom Hudson pitched, was Trevor Brown, 24. Always someone is departing.

These were an exciting few days for Brown, as they were for the other rookies who were in the Giants’ starting lineup, Kelby Tomlinson, Matt Duffy, Mac Williamson, Jarrett Parker and Nick Noonan. These were bittersweet days for Hudson, as they would be for any retiring athlete. The tributes confirm the reality that life is about to change.

“I’ve had so much fun the last 17 years,” said Hudson. “This was a special day for me, the way the fans responded, my teammates responded.”

When someone wondered if this curtain call was easier than the one he shared last Saturday in Oakland with Barry Zito, Hudson said, “It’s always easier in front of the home fans. These are the best baseball fans, the best sports fans there are. I just wish we would have won the ball game. This is a classy town, a classy organization.”

We have seen so many come and go through the seasons, Willie Mays, Joe Montana, Rick Barry, greats all. Whether Hudson is in that category is debatable, but he did win 222 games—the most of any pitcher active through the end of 2015 — and struck out 2,080.

Bochy mentioned the Hall of Fame, and when Hudson was asked if he thought about the possibility of being elected — he won’t be eligible for five years — he said, “It’s tough for me to get my head around that now. I feel very lucky to have played as long as I have.

“It kind of makes me laugh. This year has been pretty tough.”

Hudson missed time because of a hip problem and finished with an 8-9 record, after 9-13 last season. Not the way he would have wanted, but that old guy, Father Time, has a reputation for ruining all sorts of plans.

Hudson was relieved by Jeremy Affeldt, who a day ago announced he also was retiring, at age 36. It was also a goodbye appearance for Affeldt. He pitched only two thirds of an inning before Ryan Vogelsong took over.

The Giants' pitching wasn’t bad. The Dodgers' pitching, mainly starter Brett Anderson, who went 7 2/3, was spectacular.

“Huddy wanted to be out there,” said Bochy. “I’m sure a lot was on his mind. He had a wonderful career. I hope he takes time and looks back on what he accomplished.”

For certain, everyone else will.

A painful but inevitable end for the Giants

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — It hurt. Don’t doubt that. To have the Dodgers, the team that infuriates Giants fans even more than their own team enthralls them, clinch the division at their home, was painful. And, sadly, inevitable.

Finally, emphatically, the Dodgers, with all that talent, but with all those questions, ended the chase and for the Giants the hope. It was a rout Tuesday night.

It was Clayton Kershaw in full domination. It was an 8-0 victory that had the message board at AT&T Park offering L.A. congratulations — imagine that, and telling us to “#respecttherivalry” — and the defending World Series champion Giants staring in dismay, if not disbelief.

“You have to remember that in the off-season,” Madison Bumgarner said of the opposition celebrating in what in effect is his house. “You don’t want to be part of that. It’s always tough.”

Even tougher when your own fans began departing as the score built, and in the stands behind first base there were only spectators in blue jackets or jerseys shouting, “Let’s go Dodgers.”

Infuriating. And to the Giants, unacceptable.

Bumgarner was the San Francisco starter this fateful night by the Bay. He was the World Series hero last fall and the one reliable pitcher this summer. But the game and the moment — and the Dodgers — got to him, while the Giants couldn’t get to Kershaw.

Thirteen strikeouts for Kershaw. One hit for the Giants, that by Kevin Frandsen, who spent most of the season with Sacramento, the Triple A farm team. And, after seven straight defeats at AT&T this year, a momentous Los Angeles victory.

Bumgarner, trying to win his 19^th game of 2015, more significantly trying to save the Giants, understood the task and the difficulty, maybe too well. “I don’t want to say it got the best of me,” said Bumgarner, a standup guy as well as a brilliant athlete, “but I was a little more emotional than I like to be. I didn’t have what I wanted to have.”

The Dodgers scored in the first, which it turned out was all they would need but not all they would get. Kike Hernandez homered in the third, Justin Ruggiano and A.J. Ellis homered back-to-back in the sixth. Mad Bum had thrown 112 pitches but would throw no more.

The game was over if there were innings left to play. The season was over, if there were five games left to play.

Yet, properly, there was little remorse from the Giants. “Four concussions and two obliques,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy, reminding of a year too filled with injuries and trips to the disabled list. “And yet here we were on September 29^th finally getting knocked out.

“It’s always tough when it happens, but with everything, the new kids, the injuries, to go to the last week of the season you still have to be proud of these guys. Bumgarner had a tremendous year. He had good stuff today.”

Until he wore down. Until the weeks and months caught up with a man who a year ago pitched through October and surely must have felt weary, not that he ever would suggest as much. He wanted the ball, and the Giants, who had watched him outduel Kershaw earlier this season, wanted him to have it.

“There was a lot at stake,” said Bochy, stating the obvious. There also was an uphill climb. The Giants had three long losing streaks during the season, and after allowing leads to get away last week, twice against San Diego and once against Oakland, were eight games behind the Dodgers. They cut the margin to five, but sooner or later L.A. would stop losing. Sooner happened on Monday night.

“We had no margin for error,” said Bochy, repeating a theme of the past few days. Now they will have an autumn without the playoffs. Now there will be no more pennants or paraphernalia.

It’s hard to fault a team that didn’t have Hunter Pence except for a few games, that had Brandon Belt and Nori Aoki get concussions, that for a while lost Jake Peavy and for most of the time didn’t have Matt Cain or Tim Lincecum.

In spring training gleeful Giants fans wore T-shirts that read, “We like the odds,” a play on words noting the team had won titles in even years. But the odds were not on the Giants’ side. And the Dodgers were too strong.

“We were very competitive,” said Bumgarner. “We were there to the end.”

And now it’s the end.

Giants stay alive and unbeaten against Dodgers at AT&T

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — Still alive. “We can’t lose a game,” said Bruce Bochy. Not if the Giants want to keep themselves in the dying pennant race. Not if they want to keep the Dodgers from ending it. And Monday night, late, very late, they didn’t lose a game. They beat the Dodgers, and they’re still alive.  

Twelve innings, a minute short of four hours. Dozens of deep breaths. What seemed like dozens of relief pitchers, but in actuality was only 12. A crowd that seemed overloaded with Dodger partisans who came to watch their team clinch a division but in the end a crowd that reaffirmed its loyalty to the home team, chanting, as always, “Beat L.A., beat L.A.”

And because Jake Peavy was brilliant as a starter and Kelby Tomlinson at second turned a wicked grounder with two runners on into a double play in the 11^th and pinch hitter Alejandro De Aza’s sacrifice fly scored Marlon Byrd from third in the 12th, the Giants did beat L.A., 3-2.

We agree. The lead is too large, now five games for the Dodgers, and the magic number too small, still two, meaning an L.A. win Tuesday night, Wednesday night or Thursday afternoon closes the deal. But the water drips slowly and the streak continues.

Monday was the seventh time the Dodgers have played at AT&T Park this season — and the seventh time the Giants have won. Things like that don’t happen in baseball. Or do they?

“A great game,” said Bochy. “A great outcome. Well played, entertaining. A lot of good things happened, and that starts with Peavy.”

Sunday, in the clubhouse at the Oakland Coliseum, Peavy was talking about the thrill of the chase, how being able to pitch against the Dodgers in a must-win situation was the challenge he embraced, the moment of truth, if you will, when you a man finds if he’s equal to the task. Peavy was more than equal.

“As an athlete,” said Peavy, “you want to face the best in league, knowing you have to win.”

Peavy faced Zack Greinke, who if he isn’t the best (he came in with an 18-3 record) is one of the three best, along with teammate Clayton Kershaw and the Giants’ Madison Bumgarner — who pitch against each other Tuesday night.

Peavy went seven innings, giving up a run and three hits. Greinke went seven, giving up two runs and four hits. Neither was in on the decision but both were in on the trend of the game, which was the sort of pitching battle one might have predicted.

Peavy’s catcher, Trevor Brown, was the guy who drove in the two runs off Greinke, in the second. “Ten days ago,” said Peavy about Brown, “he was sitting on a couch.”

Maybe not literally, but Brown was finished with his season at Triple-A Sacramento and had gone home to the Los Angeles suburb of Valencia.

He got a phone call at 1:30 a.m. on September 15 from Giants GM Bobby Evans and headed to the Bay Area. Then, with Buster Posey taking over at first base for the injured Brandon Belt, Brown steps behind the plate and also steps up to lash a double off Greinke.

“What a great performance,” said Peavy of Brown. “A huge hit. As great as he was behind the plate, he was just as great with the bat.”

When Peavy was on rehab at Sacramento he threw to Brown, so the pair communicated well against the Dodgers. Brown said he let Peavy dictate the pitches and pattern.

Greinke had two strikes on Brown in the second with Brandon Crawford — like Brown a one-time star at UCLA — and Tomlinson on the bases. “I was just trying to be as calm as I could.”  Calm or frantic, he powered a ball deep to center to get the runners home.

“And Kelby saved our neck a couple of times,” said Bochy of Tomlinson, another rookie, if one with a few more weeks on the Giants. “All around, this was a well-played game, then De Aza gets the hit that wins it.

“They tied us in the ninth, and that might have been discouraging, but we have fighters on this club. We’re tired, but we know what’s at stake.”

Just the season, that’s all.