May 2011
4 posts
intermadrid:
San Francisco Giants
…………….MORE LIKE……………..
let’s not forget Santiago Casilla.
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Stress
I have been stressed lately. Getting finished with my finals, switching jobs, eating a lot of pizza, and watching the Giants….. all of these things stress me out. I want to say that my “magical vacation” to Chicago to see friends and the Giants play at Wrigley Field was a cloud of fun and relaxation, but it really was just more stress. I will fill those blanks in with a post...
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Walking Off
Last night my boss took me out to eat, we went out for burgers and he tried to convince me to not quit my job. We ate our burgers and had a couple of uncomfortable moments. Eating, drinking, me talking about “how money matters to me now”, as if I’m some sort of adult. After dinner we split ways, I went drinking with a friend, had a few too many and ended up running around SOHO...
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GMR Field Trip
The Mets have a scoreboard problem. They start playing the “Let’s Go Met’s” chant before their first batter even gets into the box, which leads to the inevitable scoreboard prompt burnout by the 5th inning. I say, only sounds until at least the 4th.
There was some pretty great banter back and forth between the Met’s and Giants fans during the game. And it went...
April 2011
14 posts
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Terribler Than Terrible
“These aren’t your father’s Nationals” That’s what Krukow said on the pregame show. I am assuming he was speaking about the endless futility of the Expos. At the same time Kruk might have a point. The Nationals are not terrible, but to say that the they are not terrible would be a lie. They ARE terrible, but the Giants are terribler. The Giants are the 111 loss...
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Last Week In Giants
High light of the game (and possibly the week)
To say that the only Giants game that I will be able to see at AT&T this year was a downer is a huge understatement. Here are the facts.
1. We lost
2. It was damn cold (I forgot how cold SF gets… yes I’m an idiot).
3. I had standing room only tickets
4. EVERYONE was there early. Gone are the days where I would show up 2 hours...
Spring break 2011
Reason for blogging hiatus: familial visit in California. Bad Internet connection, no Wifi. BE back in a few days.
Falling Down
This Zito story is sad. I want the bastard to win in the end… But he doesn’t. It’s as if you read all the Harry Potter books and in the last chapter it’s just Harry waking up in his small bedroom under the stairs cause it was all a dream. He grows up painfully awkwardly, never has a friend or a girlfriend. He eventually gets a sad job in some kind of cubicle, occasionally...
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Almost Too Easy
I don’t like Jackie Robinson day. I always turn the game on and think that the Giants have changed their jerseys. It always takes me about an inning to realize that everyone is wearing the same number. So here is Matt Cain, winning his first game as #42.
I am feeling something with Cain this year, as if he is going to do something great. I have felt this for about three years now. But the...
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Olberman's Giants Predictions
I browse other sites sometimes checking out what other people say about the Giants, as I suppose everyone else does. I came across this piece today on Keith Olberman’s blog called “Baseball Nerd” which, which I rather enjoy. He picks the Giants to win the West again. But he kinda puts it to the fans. Here is the whole paragraph he wrote.
San Francisco: The Giants would have to...
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The Meat Grinder
The meat grinder continues to grind. …..(wow, john miller just said meat grinder when I was typing that!) ….. I just think that Meat Grinder is the perfect nickname for Aaron Rowand. He is obviously a serious Lunk Head (aka.. he is dumb as the dirt that he is standing on) but he has some sort of strange Lennie Small qualities. He is admirable because of his single mindedness. Maybe...
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This is How to Lose at Baseball
This whole game wasn’t a total loss. There were some sweet moments. The only one I remember was Uribe crying when he got his ring. Which was a nice moment for him and the fans. But you have to think about this…. does Uribe get this moment if Stow doesn’t get beat up in the parking lot of Dodger Stadium last week? So… in that sense it’s kind of a manufactured...
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Don't Call Him Garbage
You can say a lot of things about Aaron Rowand, but you can’t say that he has given up. I seriously dislike the Giants association with Rowand, but I can’t fault him as a human. He just grinds……… sometimes he grinds a little too hard on sliders thrown outside and in the dirt. But the bastard just grinds. Here’s to you Rowand, keep grinding. Who knows, maybe we...
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Bummed-garner
How many more games will we lose like this? That is the real question. But the bigger question is, are the Giants playing with any kind of heart? Cause it doesn’t really seem like it. Are they playing with a fire on their asses? No. And for some reason, I feel like Tejada does not help…. I don’t know why I relate the signing of Tejada to a weird sense of complacency among the...
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Cleaning the Desktop: Beards, Golden Puppies, and...
Misc news day here as the Giants gear up to take on the Father’s later today.
1. So I guess I should have been paying more attention to www.brianwilson38.com because apparently at some point in the last two days they held the first round of the beard competition and I got blown out of the water. Even though I was the FUCKING 2 SEED in the whole 16 beard braket I got taken down by one of...
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Arbitrary Statistics
I have been thinking about statistics again…. It’s really something that I shouldn’t do. I’m not a statistician, I’m not even that good at math. The only A I received in my first two years of college was in Statistics. But that is not saying much.
Although I love what stats do, I cannot pretend to create a statistical category that has any kind of real factual base...
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To Live and Die in LA
Look how empty that stadium is…….
It’s hard enough to lose a game 4 to 3 when you straight up get beat. It’s even harder when you beat yourself. Tonight and last night we fucking beat ourselves. Tejada doesn’t turn well on the first leg of a double play…. we lose. Today… Sanchez drops a dribbler…… we lose. When you have 5 errors in your...
March 2011
16 posts
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Opening Day Call To Arms
My good friend…. who just happens to be a rabid Dodger fan sent me this today.
Very nice…. very nice…
The thing about rivalries is this:
If the Los Angeles Dodgers didn’t exist…… I would be kind of sad. This great rivalry does not happen without two teams.
I remember the year that I met said friend (let’s call him….. George Donkov) we were...
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NOT a season preview
Nothing like a Will Clark Mustache to start the year off right.
This year, instead of trying to make predictions, I will just tell you what I would like to see happen.
Players that I am unabashedly rooting for.
#1. Snap, Crackle and Pop
Otherwise know as the 5’10 (and under) crew.
Freddy Sanchez (“snap”… as in snap goes his fragile limbs…).
Andres Torres...
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There Will Be Blood
I tried…. I tried REALLY hard to save the Zito stache phenomenon until I could do a “This Week In Giants Facial Hair” post…. But it’s not possible, it was on full display tonight. This shapely “Nose Mullet” is THE nicest I have seen on a pitching mound since Clay Zavada. Can you attribute Zito’s future dominance to his new “Tom...
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Bring Thine Beard.. For I Shall Slay It!!!!
Just got a letter from the Brian Wilson’s website. Looks like I’m a finalist in the beard competition!
“Dear Jeff,
You are receiving this email because you have an AWESOME beard. YOU have been chosen to RAGE in the first ever BRIAN WILSON BEARD BRACKET with 15 other facial hair rockstars. For being selected, you will receive an official BRIAN WILSON BEARD BRACKET...
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This one...... means nothing.
Cain laughing on the mound…. after a year of taking screenshots, I have NEVER seen this.
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The Aaron Burr Award (hero) goes to Aubrey Huff who turned...
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Never Forget (Ex-Giants)
I’ve got midterms ok!!! geeeeeez. Plus no one offered to help with the blog!!! I’m a little tense at the moment!!!! Cody Ross’s calf just went BOOM and Moses’ oblique is sore, can you blame me for being a bit stressed.
Ok let’s cure all this misery and visit some of our old friends who have moved on.
...
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This Week In Giants Facial Hair. (#3)
What sets men apart from boys…. besides being able to buy beer? Men can grow facial hair, ok…. men can bring gnarly amounts of hair to the surface of their faces. Let us sit and celebrate, mock, and marvel over the facial hair of your San Francisco Giants.
Latest & Greatest
What’s going on in this picture? What Ishi is bringing to the table might just be a more molded...
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Dodger Blues
The Giants win the Pennant! The Giants win the Pennant! .. oh wait.. it’s just a spring training game….. oh.
Ya…. it’s getting to be that time. Even the fans want to start the regular season. Not much to say today. I’m going to a pizza party in Bed-Stuy tonight so I won’t get all flowery on this post. Just gonna say….. WE WON!
...
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See You Latos
Giants win 6 to 4….. BUT I don’t care what happened the rest of the game. We got Latos for four runs in the first. And that makes me happy.
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Last year while...
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Cardboard Gods -Josh Wilker-
Words really cannot describe how good this book is? I am 55 pages in and already it blows EVERY baseball book (and 90% of books in general) I’ve ever read, out of the water…. And not just a by a little, but by a mile.
Wilker breaks the book up into small chapters that talk specifically about a certain baseball card from his youth and about his semi-normal life from childhood to...
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Don't Feed The Velez
The Velez is a special creature, not unlike the spooky Thestrals of Harry Potter. While the similarities might stop at being made up of an odd assortment of sticks and skin. One could draw the parallel that only those who have seen death will see a Thestral, and only teams who are already dead would want a Velez.
In the cruel world of the Velez, teams with no real hope of contending will come...
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Minor Victories
Patrick hits one out opposite field.
There is something about spring training games that do not lend to television. The absence of the crowd, the lack of real lighting on the field, and the terrible black spring training jerseys that do nothing to help the viewer pick the player out of the background of sad local advertisements and night sky. There is something inherently not as exciting about...
4 tags
4 Out of 5 Omars
Last season I used a rating system called Neukoms to rate how the Giants played. This year I figured I’d switch it up a bit. There will be less coverage (because no one seems willing to help me out here), and therefore the Neukom rating system seems a bit antiquated.
This year I will cover as many games as I am able to watch (and keep up with my masters program). Which figures to be...
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Contemplating Fontenot
In 1st grade I had a friend named Nick Castillo. He was a runt, shorter than everyone, faster than most, and his clothes seem to fit him wrong even when they were new. He left or got kicked out of my school after an incident in 5th grade. As my memory fades of those hazy photograph years of my life, I am left with one memory of Nick. He was the only one of us that had seen boobs. Or at least he...
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Cody Ross In The Hall Of Smiles
I wonder how Cody Ross got his nickname.
Is anyone else tired of looking at Cody’s pearly whites?
Here is a slightly less happy cody……. slightly.
oooooooh my god… aahhhhhhhhh tooo many smiles!
Is this a smile?…… of a wince…….. or a fart?
ok ok ok, it’s genuine. If you are smiling...
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2010 San Francisco Giants: The Movie
The writer in me just can’t help but look back at the 2010 season and not see parallels of a perfect story. In my mind, the story of this team could not have been written any better.
They have the perfect elements of a movie.
#1. The Unlikely Hero - The Team
#2. The Hero’s Character Flaw - The Offense
#3. Enabling Circumstances - Good Pitching, Weak Division
#4. The Villian -...
February 2011
20 posts
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The Kevin Frandsen Memorial, Golden Puppy Award...
Last year I branded Kevin Fransen “a lovable puppy”. Now I want to make it a tradition. I intend to give the KFMGPA (Kevin Frandsen Memorial Golden Puppy Award) to a new player every year. The requirements are:
• They receive way more attention specifically from the female contingent of fans than is proportionate to how good they are. (aka. girls think they are “hot”)
•...
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Eugenio...... Always Missing Stuff
If you didn’t catch it (no pun inteded) Eugenio missed his flight to Dodgertown. Maybe he is having second thoughts about joining the evil empire….. or maybe it’s just Velez missing something….. I think we saw some of that when he graced us with his presence.
Without further ado…… my favorite screenshot from last year…. it just happens that it’s a...
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NY Love, At Dos Toros.
sfgiantslovelaugh:
I guess this is at Dos Toros Taqueria….. which is about the closest thing that us new yorkers have to a Mission style burrito. When I went in here after watching one of the World Series game in Finnertys the guy making my burrito asked me about the score and gave me a high five. Us San Francisco ex-pats have a couple places that make us feel at home…. even...
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Pablo Lost Three Cats
As someone who has recently lost 15 pounds in the last three months, I can fully appreciate Pablo Sandoval’s recent loss of 38 pounds and 11 percentage points of body fat. Altogether a rough estimate of his actual fat loss being around 45lbs. I assure you that this is almost impossible unless you have been pounding an extra 10+ Coca Colas or maybe eating another four Arepas per day. The...
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The Mat Latos Thing
There’s nothing like watching a young baseball player develop into a sincere red-ass before your very eyes. The first signs are always dismissed by the media as a player being green or immature. The second time something happens it might get talked about, but again the “he’s just an immature kid” thing comes up, but some media and older players start getting tired of it....
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This Week in Giants Facial Hair. (#2)
In a tragic turn of events, Tim Lincecum shaved his mouse-stache.
It looks like Jeremy Affeldt is still sporting the terrible soul patch which will probably negatively affect his pitching.
Brian Wilson recently said that he was not promising to keep the beard all season. Which I think bodes well for my mustache prediction. Until then it seems that the beard is dominating.
Our newest...
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It's Easy To Cheer For a Champion
Reaching the top of the shit pile is nice once in a while, it affords you the perspective to look back down the hill your team climbed and the emotional journey you took with them. So in tribute to myself and fans like me. I am going to take a look back to the “not-so-Championship-year” of 2008.
I have a nice wad of tickets in my dresser, sometimes I like to look back at them and...
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Dumpster Diving For Show Dogs
Seems like every day I see that the Giants have picked up some scrap heap special or FORMER major leaguer, possibly dominant arm, or random 5th starter that you might remember from some long hot mid-summer road Giants road trip last year. I feel like we have been through this before…..
It seems that the Giants love to grab a “big” (if you can call Tejada big) free agent...
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Rooting Strategies
Aside from last year there have not been too many years lately when I had anyone to root for in the playoffs. Let’s face it, your a baseball addict and when you find yourself watching a Brewers vs. Pirates in at 1pm on a Sunday in May you will be able to figure out who to root for.
First you have to assign all teams with a value of 0. This is a nice neutral starting point. Now for...
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Together, We're Giant (suckers)
The marketing team needs to be fired.
Game seven of what? Game #7 of the 2009 season?
2008 “All Out All Season”
2009 “Let’s Play”
2010 “There’s Magic Inside”
2011 “Together, We’re Giant”
Is there a common theme here? Yes… All of these slogans could have been picked by a 10 year old. Instead they were produced by...
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TWO WEEKS TILL.... well..... not much really.
Let’s face it the whole counting down every day till pitchers and catchers is the baseball equivilant to running towards the REALLY BIG LAKE… that is…… just over the next sand dune. You finally get there and you realize that there is really nothing there.
The Lincecum Mustache news broke at Fan Fest soooo that news story from pitchers and catchers is already cashed.
...
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This Week in Giants Facial Hair.
Well Fan Fest happened. Out here in Brooklyn I am still slipping on snow when I go running. But It was like this last year so I’m not worrying. Spring is peeking through with three consecutive days with the temp over 40 degrees which is practically a holiday over here. Women strut around in tights and low cut tops and guys walk around in only two layers trying to show-up the weather gods...
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Offseason Reading
When October is gone and all I have left to satisfy my baseball hunger is re watching mlb.tv and steroid headed men running around with a brown lopsided ball. I tend to skip both those and huddle up with a few good baseball books until the sun peeks out again and all the snow in Brooklyn is melted.
Here is a list of the books I read this offseason.
1. Baseball and The Media - George Castle
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