Waiting for Barry

It’s Wednesday afternoon, and I’m sitting at home waiting for Comcast to fix my TV messes and hopefully install a high definition DVR. This will allow me to record the latest episode of American Idol while watching the Giants.

The past two days may be the key turning point days of the season for the Giants. Monday night they returned from their ugly road trip simultaneously with the return of Noah Lowry from the DL. He pitched a fine game, coupled with timely hitting by a Barry-less offense to beat the Astros.


Last night Jason Schmidt pitched his second consecutive complete game, a five hitter over the hapless Cubbies, who dropped their 8th straight. It would have been his second straight complete game shutout, except for one bad pitch to Pickled Catcher Mike Barrett, who launched one 20 rows up above the Chevron car in left.

These solid (Lowry) and superb (Schmidt) outings by the two guys who are supposed to anchor the staff are critical if the Giants are going to right the ship. It’s not all they need, but they are nowhere without these two guys.

Of course, it should be 3 guys, but Matt Morris has been headed down a black diamond slope since his first two starts. His last five outings were painful, literally and figuratively. 24 Innings, 33 Hits, 11 Walks, 4 Homers and 22 Earned Runs. That makes for and ERA of 8.25 and a WHIP of 1.833, not exactly all-star caliber numbers. If he can step it up, then maybe they can fake there way through the rest of the staff, fix up the bullpen (finally, Fassero is history), and compete against the weak western division.

Schmidt looked like the Schmidt of old last night. He was throwing 95 in the 9th inning, and he has good movement, placement, and variety. He only threw 112 pitches last week and 95 last night. It’s not all about speed with him anymore, and he looks like he has finally matured as a pitcher. Just in time.

Meanwhile, last night’s game was all about Barry and Babe. Barry got good wood on 3 balls last night, lofting one just a little high, then being robbed of #714 by Pierre above the centerfield fence (nice catch, but not one of the all time great ones), and then a rope into left center for a single that would have been a double for most players. Every at bat is an event, and he really looks like he’s starting to groove his swing. Pulling the inside pitch does appear to be history. It’s all about center field and left center now.

The crowd was really into every moment of every at bat. I’ve been to games when he hit or was trying to hit significant homers. I saw his game winning #500, as well as #’s 71, 72 and 73. I saw #599 and #601, though I did see him try for #600. At the night games, the camera flashes around the ball park are intense, and you would think it is distracting to the batter. Some of the Giants are ready for the hoopla to be over, but Schmidt was quoted yesterday as saying the quasi-playoff atmosphere charges up the team.

I saw last week’s Bonds on Bonds, or most of it. It was great, and I was shocked. I’m going to Tivo the rest of them, if I can figure out what time it is on. It’s certainly better than the 14th repeat of the 2nd day of the 2003 World Series of Poker. Anyway, I’ve got tickets on Thursday, Friday and Sunday this week. It hasn’t been too hard finding people who want to be there this week, with the exception of getting people to blow off Mother’s Day on Sunday. Geez, get over it. This is history.

A few fantasy notes. I had a dreadful feeling all day yesterday, with Hensley and Seo pitching. As it turned out, the dread was justified. They both got knocked around yesterday, with Seo almost earning a Bullinger. When you base your strategy around ERA and WHIP, days like yesterday are beyond painful. We can only hope Glavine and Webb continue their pristine pitching tonight to fix the mess that was left.

Combined with that horrid pitching performance, we got one of our best hitting days of the season. We had 4 homers, including one by Matt Lecroy. We picked him up because he qualifies at catcher, which might come in handy later this season. Meanwhile, Bigbie came back last night, finally, but he didn’t improve his batting average. I see his competition, John Rodriguez, is 1 for 3 so far today, dropping his average to .396.

We all expect Izzy to go down somewhere along the way this season. We grabbed Looper as his backup and successor in the future. Kenny 9 purchased Brad Thompson for the same reason. Both of them have been pretty good. But I’m ready to put my money on another St. Louis closer of the future: Adam Wainwright. So far 16-2/3 innings, 7 hits, 3 walks, 1 Earned Run, 15 strikeouts. A pretty impressive start. He was their 1st round pick in 2000, and will turn 25 in August. We’ve got him…it was all the Doc. I had no idea who he was.

It just occurred to me that not only do we have 3 Brandons, but we’ve got a Braden. We’ve got to make Looper an honorary Brandon.

Final note: I’m glad we didn’t extend Col. Luis Gonzalez. We like the Colonel, but this season, he psucks.