Giants Month in Review - August 2016

If the month of July was a bad dream for the San Francisco Giants who saw their division lead in the NL West drop to as low as 1-game, August was a nightmare with Buster Posey's head-first slide (shown above) being the lasting image of another disappointing month. Beginning the month by losing four of their first five series to the tone of a 5-10 record, the Giants' free-fall continued as August 16 saw the G-Men fall out of first place for the first time since the month of May. With the archrival Los Angeles Dodgers playing some of their best ball of the year despite being without their best player in ace Clayton Kershaw and the Giants doing the exact opposite, San Francisco would watch L.A. leap-frog them in the standings by as many as 3 games.

After a sluggish 9-game road trip in which the Giants lost back to back series in Philadelphia and Washington D.C. by dropping two of three before turning the tables in Miami to take two of three against the Marlins, San Francisco returned home where they would lose seven of ten. A heart-wrenching loss to the Baltimore Orioles in the series-finale which the Giants were 1-out away from winning, coupled with a 3-game sweep at the hands of the Pirates left a sour taste in the mouth of Giants fans. And though they would take the first two games at home against the reigning National League champion New York Mets, they would drop the next two to split the 4-game series. Even considering their month-long struggle, the Giants remained in striking distance of rival L.A. and had themselves a golden opportunity to recapture first place with a date with the Dodgers. Unfortunately, Bruce Bochy's ball club would fail to show up to yet another series as they dropped the first two games before salvaging the series-finale thanks to a career night from the newly acquired Matt Moore who came within one out of becoming the first Giants pitcher to no-hit the Dodgers in over 100 years.

Needing one more out to etch his name into the record books, Dodgers rookie Corey Seager fought off a 2-out single to end Moore's near perfect night as the Giants completed the 4-0 victory. Though Moore would fall just short, one Giants pitcher who did make history was All-Star Madison Bumgarner who recorded his 200th strikeout of the season against the Dodgers, joining some elite company (Christy Mathewson, Amos Rusie, Juan Marichal and former teammate Tim Lincecum) with his third consecutive 200 strikeout season and becoming the first left-hander in franchise history to accomplish the feat.

Following the brief three-game trip to L.A., the Giants returned home to AT&T Park for five games where they would play host to the lowly Atlanta Braves and Arizona Diamondbacks. After taking two of three against the Braves including a 13-4 shellacking in which the Giants matched a franchise-record (SF-era) with four triples in the same game which would also witness second baseman Joe Panik log his first career multi-home run game, San Francisco split the two-game set with the D-Backs, thanks to another strong outing from Matt Moore to closeout the month. With an 11-16 record in August, the Giants currently sit 1.5 games behind first place with an overall record of 72-60. And unless they wake up fast, the Giants could see the window of opportunity close as their first match-up of September will be no easy task when they hit the north side of Chicago for a four-game meeting with the Cubs who own the best record in all of baseball at 85-47. And with a 3-game stop at Colorado's Coors Field to follow, the first week of September will be challenging to say the least. With six games against the Dodgers remaining on the schedule, including four in September, the Giants have ample time and a fair chance to catch up and surpass L.A. in the standings, but not if Buster Posey and company continue to slump at the plate like they have been. With a slight edge over the St. Louis Cardinals for the first of two NL Wild Card spots, the Giants will need to finish September strong if they plan to maintain a playoff spot and continue their even year streak of being World Series champions.

Noteworthy: One of the brighter highlights in the month of August was the 7-hit performance by Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford who collected seven base knocks, including a go-ahead knock in the 14th inning of an 8-7 win over the Marlins. Crawford tied an all-time single-game National League record with seven hits in eight at-bats and has continued to be one of the better run-producers for the Giants, leading the team by more than 10 RBI's. With his 7-hit performance, Crawford joins the rare company of Rennie Stennett (1975) and Wilbert Robinson (1892) as the only players in the history of the National League to connect for seven hits in a single ball game. 


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