Month: August 2014

By Jeremy Harness

Oh, how quickly things can turn around.

The night before, the Giants must have felt that the baseball gods were working against them, but less than 24 hours later, they were feeling the exact opposite.

They filed a protest with Major League Baseball following the incident on Tuesday night, which saw a 20-minute rain storm turn into a four-hour rain delay due to the fact that the grounds crew at Chicago’s Wrigley Field could not get the tarp down in nearly enough time.

As a result, the game was called, which was ruled a 2-0 win for the Cubs after only four-and-a-half innings of play. The odds were stacked against them, since the last time a team had won a game protest was way back in 1986.

However, moments before first pitch Wednesday, the Giants got word that they had won their protest. As a result, the loss has come off the record for now, and that the two teams will play the remainder of that game on Thursday before their regularly-scheduled contest.

The Giants used that positive momentum by going out Wednesday and burying the Cubs, 8-3, as starter Jake Peavy continued to pitch very well and now has a two-game winning streak.

Unlike the better part of his Giants tenure, the Giants’ offense gave Peavy plenty of support. They pounded starter Edwin Jackson for seven runs on eight hits in only 2 2/3 innings.

Peavy took it from there. He went seven solid innings and, although he surrendered 10 hits, he minimized the damage very effectively and gave up only two runs while striking out eight hitters and not walking a single batter.

Joe Panik, who is quickly establishing himself as the team’s possible long-term solution at second base, had three hits to increase his batting average to .295. Meanwhile, Travis Iskikawa, long considered to be a 4-A player (too good for Triple-A but not quite good enough for the big leagues), also collected three hits while driving in three runs.

To make things even better, the Dodgers fell to the San Diego Padres Wednesday night, which narrowed the Dodgers’ lead in the National league West to three games.

BY PAUL GACKLE

OAKLAND — The Jon Lester trade drew immediate skepticism and criticism of the Jeff Samardzija deal is sure to gain momentum in the wake of the A’s 8-5 loss to the New York Mets at the O.co Coliseum on Wednesday.

Samardzija surrendered seven earned runs to the Mets over 3 2/3 innings as the A’s dropped their sixth game in seven outings.

Despite the trades for Lester and Samardzija, the A’s trailed the Los Angeles Angels by a full game as their AL West rivals took the field in Boston on Wednesday night.

“It was a big game today and I didn’t do my part, so it stings,” Samardzija said.

The A’s struggles at the plate minus Cespedes have been well documented, but now the team’s starting pitching is struggling, too. The rotation is 2-7 with a 5.54 ERA over its last nine starts.

The rotation’s woes are concerning because the A’s gave up Cespedes and top prospect, Addison Russell, in hopes of boasting the most potent staff in baseball.

But Jason Hammel, acquired from the Chicago Cubs in the Russell deal, is 1-5 with a 6.75 ERA in seven starts with the A’s while Samardzija is 3-3 with a 4.34 ERA in nine starts with the club.

Samardzija pitched well in his first month with the team, becoming the first A’s pitcher since Jesse Flores in 1943 to toss seven or more innings in each of his first four starts with the club. In recent weeks, though, he’s struggled, surrendering 18 earned runs over his last five starts.

Despite his recent struggles, Manager Bob Melvin said the A’s are confident in Samardzija’s ability.

“He’s pitched some really good games for us,” Melvin said. “Today was really the one tough game that he’s had overall as far as his numbers go, so it’s kind of a short sample what he’s done for us. But he’s a killer. He wants to be out there, he wants the ball and we’re confident when he takes the mound.

After retiring the first six batters, Samardzija gave up five earned runs in the third — a solo home run to Eric Campbell and then four two out runs, including a three-run shot to Lucas Duda.

The trouble started when Curtis Granderson poked a two out single to left field with the shift on and Daniel Murphy reached base with a single of his own. After David Wright walked, Granderson scored on a wild pitch from Samardzija and Duda supplied the fireworks with a three-run shot to center.

The A’s battled back with a pair of runs in the bottom of the inning, but the Mets tagged Samardzija for two more runs in the top of the fourth, regaining a five-run lead.

With the Angels coming to town for a three-game set over the weekend, Melvin said the A’s need to move past the loss.

“We have an off day tomorrow to clear our heads and we know it will be an exciting series and a big series,” he said.

By Jeremy Kahn

In one of the strangest games of the season, the San Francisco Giants saw their brief two-game winning streak come to an embarrassing end.

After a four hour 34 minute delay, the Chicago Cubs defeated the Giants 2-0 in a game that was called after four and a half innings.

The game was called due to a malfunction with the tarp at the 100-year ballpark on the North Side of Chicago.

Ryan Vogelsong pitched an outstanding game despite the fact that he took the loss on this mist bizarre night at Wrigley Field.

Vogelsong gave up a two-run home run to Anthony Rizzo in the bottom of the first inning, a home run that scored accounted for all the runs needed.

On the evening, Vogelsong went four innings, allowing two runs on three hits, walking two and striking out four.

Tsuyoshi Wada pitched five innings to get the win, as he did not allow a run on six hits, nit walking a batter and striking out three.

It was the 29th home run of the season for Rizzo, who drove in Javier Baez, who walked just prior to Rizzo’s home run off of Vogelsong.