Search results for ‘brian giles

Here’s to Humble Foundations

That was satisfying. We took the in-laws out to the ballgame — sprung for Toyota Terrace seats, first time this year. They picked a good time to visit. Mom is from the old country, but I was heartened to see that she chose to root for the home team rather than Hiroki Kuroda. She digs [...]

IGD: Padres vs Mets (6 Jun 08)

Padres (25-37) vs Mets (30-29) Randy Wolf vs Johan Santana 7:05 p.m. PT Channel 4SD AM 1090, FM 105.7, XM 188 MLB, B-R The last time Johan Santana faced the Padres, he served up a homer to Dave Roberts (the last time Roberts took a southpaw yard) and lost to Darrell May in what appears [...]

Hit or Be Hit

I had some computer issues this morning, and I’m still wading through draft material, so I’ll save my thoughts on how the Padres did until Saturday or Monday — then we’ll have the entire draft to look at anyway. Based on the information at my disposal (which obviously is much, much less detailed than what [...]

Peace, Love, and Delusion

Sometimes you can get away with making stupid mistakes against lousy teams. Unfortunately the Cubs aren’t a lousy team, and they saw to it that the Padres paid for their transgressions. Carlos Zambrano is a terrific pitcher when he’s on his game. He wasn’t at his best Monday night, but the Padres let him off [...]

Unraveling

That sucked. In case you’d forgotten how 2007 ended, the Padres gave a nice little encore Sunday afternoon in San Francisco. They battled back from a deficit, took the lead in extra innings on a two-run homer, then watched Trevor Hoffman give it back, with the game ending on a bizarre defensive play. As was [...]

When Projections Go Bad

What the heck, now is as good a time as any to revisit pre-season projections. I know, OPS and ERA aren’t the end-all and be-all, but they’re good enough for government work… Projections vs Reality: Hitters   OPS Player BJ CH MA MI ZI DS Act Statistics are courtesy of FanGraphs and are through games [...]

Reshaping the Padres: Let’s Make a Deal (or Three)

On Thursday, we examined what the Padres have and what they need. Now we turn to the question of which teams might make good trade partners and then consider some possible scenarios. As of this writing, about half the teams in baseball appear to be in contention. Some will fall of the pace, although it’s [...]

Reshaping the Padres: What Have We Got?

With hopes for 2008 all but gone, I’ve turned my focus to reshaping the Padres so that they can return to the competitive levels we’ve grown accustomed to since the club moved to Petco Park in 2004. I attacked the problem as follows: Take inventory of organizational strengths and weaknesses Identify potential trade partners based [...]

Those Who Snooze Don’t Always Lose

We were walking west along J Street, just past Fire Station 4, when the crowd erupted. Cardinals fans seem to travel with their team, so we assumed that the visiting team had extended its seemingly insurmountable 2-0 lead. I was in a lousy mood before we even got to the ballpark — I forget why, [...]

IGD: Padres @ Cubs (15 May 08)

Padres (15-26) @ Cubs (24-16) Greg Maddux vs Ryan Dempster 11:20 a.m. PT no television AM 1090, FM 105.7, XM 183 MLB, B-R The Padres showed some good fight at the end of Wednesday evening’s game. Unfortunately they spent much of the early part digging themselves into a deep, dark hole. Still, I liked the [...]