October 2010
Delirium
“We will always have 2010.”
Those are the words that resonate with me now as I write this blog entry about four hours after my Giants won the NL pennant. The quote comes from KNBR host Marty Lurie, and while they may sound a little Casablanca-esque (‘We will always have Paris”), they sum up this unbelievable postseason run well.
How can I summarize this postseason, this game, this feeling? One word that’s stuck with me tonight is delirium. Webster’s dictionary describes it as a state of “frenzied excitement,” and that’s exactly how I felt throughout this game and especially when Brian Wilson got the strikeout against Ryan Howard to end the game. I was standing in a packed restaurant in Santa Cruz with close to a hundred Giants fans chanting, “Let’s go Giants!” and ‘Fear the Beard!” and when the umpire signaled the strike three call on Howard the place went ballistic. I screamed, you screamed, we all screamed for Brian Wilson, the best closer in baseball; for Uuuuuuribe, clutching up again; for Madison Bumgarner, coming in and shutting out the Fightin’ Phils at the mere age of 21.
I will never forget how I jumped up and down and went to hug the first friend who was next to me, Arianna, who isn’t a big baseball fan but was excited for us nonetheless. I was there with a small group of people that I work with on the UCSC campus newspaper, most of whom were casual to hardcore Giants fans. One of them, Blair, came over from across the table and gave me a big hug, followed by my friend Alejandro who practically lifted me up off the ground. I could barely breathe after those two hugs and the fact that my Giants had gotten through the torture and made it to the World Series still hadn’t sunk in–and still really hasn’t, several hours later. My friend Jandro then bought the bottle of champagne he’d been promising to get since the Giants made the playoffs (which we plan to enjoy after our meeting tomorrow) as we continued to talk animatedly in the CVS parking lot, high-fiving Giants fans that passed by and loudly calling our family members to talk about the game in the rainy October evening.
Sorry if I was babbling there; I just wanted to get my memories from tonight down in writing (more for my benefit than that of anyone reading this, I guess), just so I wouldn’t forget. It wasn’t quite as perfect as celebrating at the ballpark on Thursday would’ve been, but it comes pretty close. 
If any Giants fans who stumbled upon my blog want to comment below about where and how they celebrated, I’d be interested to read’em; I love swapping “where-were-you-when” stories.
I knew that my team was capable of having a magical season. I knew that our pitching staff could carry us to the postseason promise land…but I’d be lying if I said I knew they could win the National League pennant. I thought we could scrape by the Braves, but I knew the Phillies would be a more formidable challenge, to say the least. But our pitching staff and bullpen continued to throw strike after strike and just shut down every hitter from Jason Heyward and Brian McCann to Ryan Howard and Chase Utley. Our lineup–which guys like ESPN’s Tim Kurkjian have described as made up of “outcasts, misfits and waiver claims”–frustrated us at times by neglecting to move runners over or hitting into double plays, but everyone got a clutch hit and picked up the team when it was truly necessary: Cody “The Babe” Ross (the NL MVP that no one has heard of outside San Francisco, the guy my mom has dubbed “the f****** American hero”), Juan Uuuuuuuribe, Aubrey Huff, etc. It’s just such a contrast to our 2002 World Series team which was built around this superstar Barry Bonds, but it’s such a beautiful, hard-nosed team and I couldn’t love them more than I do now.
So for those of you who are now jumping on the Giants bandwagon, here are some tips by a Chronicle writer on what you should and shouldn’t do/say. There’s a little more room for you to squeeze on, but you’ll have to fit yourselves in the back somewhere and hold on tight, because it’s the hardcore fans that have control of this thing and it’s sure to be a rollercoaster ride.
Like I said in my last entry, I’ve been so lucky that I’ve been able to go to so many games this season, including four of the five playoff games the Giants have played at home thus far. I’ve shared this great, frustrating, nerve-wracking and awe-inspiring experience with people that I care about deeply–my friends on the newspaper, my parents and my brother in particular. It’s amazing that I didn’t know where my older brother was in the world about three and a half years ago, and now we’ve become closer than I ever could have hoped through baseball. It makes me love the sport so much more, and I’m grateful to my team for getting this far into the playoffs so I can share these memorable moments with him.
Here’s hoping that I’ll be able to add to my 22 ticket stubs from this season with at least one more. Here’s hoping to more thrilling one-run games, more beard sightings, more nights of losing my voice. Here’s hoping for more confetti, a ring and a parade.
Thank you, San Francisco Giants!
The Road to a Pennant is Paved with Torture
As I sit here watching the Texas Rangers get within three outs of the first World Series appearance in their franchise history and get their ginger ale on ice, I can’t help but think, “That could’ve been us last night.”
Because of course I got my hopes up as I made my way to 24 Willie Mays Plaza last night. The mantra, “Just one more win,” must’ve gone through my mind dozens of times in the three hours it took to get me from Santa Cruz to San Francisco via my usual two-buses-and-a-train routine. I kept envisioning how perfect it would be celebrating with my big brother after the game, standing in a downpour of confetti and high-fiving every person in orange and black on my way back to Foster City. I wanted that giddy, jumping-on-the-bleachers excitement that I got when I went to Game 3 back on Tuesday afternoon.
But hey, our tagline of the season is, after all, “TORTURE,” so of course I should’ve seen those defensive miscues coming. I knew regardless that it would be a close game, a long night of wringing my rally towel in my hands. It proved to be that as well as a holding-my-head-in-my-hands and throwing-my-cap-on-the-ground-in-frustration evening.
So what were the causes of last night’s loss? Well, I admit that the now 0-2 pom-poms crossed my mind (and apparently that of Santa Cruz Sentinel editor Don Miller), but when it comes down to it it has nothing to do with jinxes or a lack of rally rags. We stranded seven baserunners and could’ve done a lot more damage against Roy Halladay than we actually did. Obviously our defense was a key factor as well, as that Aubrey Huff error was a primary deciding factor, as well. What really stuck with me, though was when Pablo Sandoval fell asleep at third base and didn’t realize Halladay’s bunt was fair, allowing the runners to move up to second and third base and ultimately setting up that Huff error. I don’t want to be the 10,000th Giants fan to rag on Sandoval (because I know it’s as cliche as the disdain for Barry Zito or Aaron Rowand), but really I don’t want to see him out there in Game 6. I know he had an RBI double in that exciting Game 4, but other than that he’s done more harm than good in the postseason. I’d much rather have Uribe at third and Freddy Sanchez (or even Edgar Renteria) at shortstop. But hopefully that comment doesn’t come back to bite me sometime this weekend…
I know that this postseason has been a great ride; I’m really grateful that our playoff drought ended after eight long years and that we’ve been able to get as far as we have. I’m especially lucky that I’ve been able to go to four out of five Giants playoff games with my older brother Ryan (and one with our mom, as well–see below picture). But you can’t blame me for wanting the whole real deal after getting a little taste of it (forgive me, I couldn’t come up with an actual analogy. I’m pretty low on sleep right now).
Let’s hope the next time I’m writing in this blog it’ll be to preview Fear the Beard versus Fear the Deer.
Fear the Hippie-Hair, the Beard and the Bald
As cliche as it sounds, I feel like I’m on Cloud 9 right now (and no, I’m not smoking anything–put aside your Santa Cruz stereotypes, everyone).
Tonight was paired up as a pitcher’s duel for the ages, a David versus Goliath scenario, Leroy versus Leroy (Timothy Leroy Lincecum versus Harry Leroy Halladay).
And while neither pitcher was quite as sharp as I think we all expected, it was still one fantastic game.
I spent the entirety of it at Woodstock’s, a pizza place in downtown Santa Cruz, California with a bunch of friends from the campus newspaper (City on a Hill Press–gotta plug it when I can). The place was packed to capacity with all Giants fans (with the exception of one guy in the back donning a Chase Utley jersey who was booed a couple times), and the atmosphere proved to be almost as good as being at the ballpark in person. We cheered every Phillies out and a fan sitting behind us taped small pieces of paper with a ‘K’ on them to the edge of his table for every Lincecum strikeout.
And when scored runs…wow. There were screams and cheers, plenty of applause and chants of, “Co-dy! Co-dy!” “Uuuuuuuuu! Ribe!” and the obligatory “Fear the Beard!” (which apparently was started by two guys from Santa Cruz, according to an article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel today). I brought out my rally towel and managed to strain my voice without even being at Citizens Bank Ballpark.
This game was the epitome of our 2010 season. Our starting pitching was strong, we eeked out a few runs with our waiver wire, scrapheap pickups (Cody Ross! Pat the Bat!) and our bearded closer struck out four to finish off the Phillies (and give Giants fans a heart attack, as usual). It’s the opposite of the Giants teams of the early 2000s that were centered around Barry Bonds and Jeff Kent; this team has an eclectic cast of characters (The Freak, Shotgun Cain, Aubrey “Rally Thong” Huff, Pat the Bat, Uuuuuuuribe, Cody Ross the wannabe rodeo clown, Pablo “Panda” Sandoval, Brian “The Beard” Wilson, etc) that all contribute in their own way to pull off victories. While I won’t deny that it was exciting to have Bonds hit splash homers into McCovey Cove, I definitely prefer this crazy bunch over the teams where Bonds was the epicenter and we stuck overpaid, end-of-the-line veterans around him. But enough of that, because I don’t want to be negative tonight.
What I love most about this is that we proved the naysayers wrong. I can understand that logically, this was the Phillies’ game to win: they were at home with their ace on the mound, a guy who had pitched a no-hitter in his last start and who will likely wind up this year’s Cy Young award winner. But at the same time I feel like my team has been underestimated all season and continuing into the postseason, like we just fell upon this 92-win season or that we’re a ragtag bunch that managed to slip through the cracks and into the NLCS. I walked out of Woodstock’s tonight thinking some somewhat profane thoughts towards those people and the ESPN East Coast bias (because c’mon, we know it exists), but to keep it dignified here I’ll just say I’m glad that the Giants showed up tonight and proved them wrong.
I definitely don’t want to get too giddy or start pouring the bubbly already. But I have to say that the Giants are in a great position right now, and it’ll be even better if Jonathan Sanchez can continue what he’s been doing.
Time to close out the evening with the Giants’ official (and unofficial) anthems.
Looking Forward [to the NLCS] and Looking Back [to the NLDS]
Once again, I’ve been terrible about not blogging during the most crucial time in the baseball season, especially considering my team is still in it.
I guess after watching both champagne showers on TV, hearing more Lincecum f-bombs and going to both NLDS home games for the San Francisco Giants, it still hasn’t completely sunk in that my team is in the postseason, let alone in the National League Championship Series.
Before I move on to the Phillies and the much-anticipated Lincecum-Halladay (The Freak vs. The Doc) matchup this Saturday, I figure I should talk about the National League Division Series with the Atlanta Braves.
To preface, I was fortunate enough to be able to attend both these games with my older brother Ryan (see previous entries with the “For the Love of the Game” column link), and I know it was an experience that neither of us will soon forget. On the train ride over to the ballpark, my brother realized that he hadn’t been to a Giants playoff game since the 1989 earthquake World Series game, and I meanwhile had never been to one.
I could not have asked for a better atmosphere; there’s no way I can eloquently encapsulate it all. Instead I remember it all in little bits and pieces: the sea of orange towels waving; how when our PA announcer Renel Brooks-Moon said “Your 2010 National League West Division Championship San Francisco Giants” it finally sunk in with me that my team was in the playoffs; and of course, the strikeouts. I remember how often my brother and I turned to each other and high-fived, me standing on my toes to reach his outstretched palm and saying, “Oh my God!” and “Can you believe this?!” over and over.
This is my favorite scene from the night (besides the end of the game, of course): Tim Lincecum completely shutting it down in the 8th inning before coming off the field to “Dynamite,” playing in the background. At over 100 pitches for the night and with Bruce Bochy’s typically conservative managing style, I figured this game was now in the hands of The Cardiac Kid himself, Brian Wilson. But Timmy is The Freak, after all, and so he came trotting out of the dugout in the middle of the ninth to a collective standing ovation, rally rag-waving, screaming crowd and, of course, shut the Braves down one more time to end it. 9 innings, no runs, 14 strikeouts. At the last out I turned to my brother and hugged him, knocking my cap off in my exuberance. Later we would both say it was the best-pitched game we had ever seen in person, and definitely one of the best games we’d each ever been to.
I left AT&T Park that night with a scratchy throat and an unquenchable excitement for the next game.
Then came Game 2, and little did I know that I would be leaving 24 Willie Mays Plaza that night with the complete opposite feeling as I did after Game 1.
It started off well enough; Matt Cain had a good first inning, and then Pat “The Bat” Burrell hit a three-run homer into the left field bleachers to give us an early lead. I was screaming my head off again and waving my pom-pom (by the way: rally rags > rally pom-poms) and shouting, “Po-sey’s be-tter!” at the top of my lungs every time Jason Heyward came to bat. I had that, “What could possibly go wrong?” feeling, and of course whenever that happens Murphy’s Law pretty much dictates that something will go wrong.
Matt Cain was his usual workhorse self and pitched well enough to win (see <a href="'http://www.facebook.com/v/484205710738‘>this video of him leaving to a standing ovation–not great because I took it with my iPhone, FYI), and who could’ve expected the complete collapse of our set-up guy Sergio Romo and our closer Brian Wilson? And then for our potential Rookie of the Year Buster Posey to come up with 1 out and the bases loaded and hit into a double play?! It was just unfathomable, and I knew when we didn’t win it there that we wouldn’t recover. Call me negative if you want, but I was just being realistic, and I just didn’t feel that we would come back after that. And when Troy Glaus hit that towering home run into McCovey Cove…well, that cinched it right there.
Leaving that ballpark after the final out of Game 2…wow. I had never felt so dejected over Giants baseball before. The last time I remember having that pit-in-my-stomach, knocked-out feeling was the walk-off grand slam game in Colorado last year, and before that it was probably the Steve Finley grand slam game in 2004 (notice a pattern here with the grand slams?). I couldn’t help but feel like that would be the last time I walked out of AT&T Park for the 2010 season, and I would bet that many of the 44,000+ Giants fans leaving the ballpark that night felt the same way.
I was really grateful to my brother, though, for being optimistic and talking me out of my little bout of misery after that game. Usually I’m aware of the fact that baseball, of course, isn’t everything, even though it is a significant part of my life; however after that loss I couldn’t help but feel totally dejected. My brother helped me keep the faith in the orange and black, though and made me remember that the best part of coming to these games, win or lose, was to share this experience with him. Now, sitting here in Santa Cruz on a warm Thursday afternoon a few days after my Giants won Game 4 to move on to the NLCS, I couldn’t be happier that I’ll get another chance to wave my rally rag and scream my lungs out for my home team with my older brother–and my mom as well this time–by my side.
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…so now it’s time to turn our attention to the National League Championship Series. I’m definitely weary of having to face the Phillies (actually, weary is an understatement; I’m pretty concerned), but I feel like our pitching staff can definitely match up against theirs. Our offense? Well, that I’m not so sure about. We were lucky with several of the runs we got against the Braves in that series; the first and last games were all about errors and a couple crucial missed calls by the umpires that went our way (aka Buster Posey sliding into second in Game 1 and how he was called safe when replays showed he was out). We can’t depend on those kinds of gift plays against this well-oiled Philadelphia machine, who has proven themselves time and time again these past few years in the postseason. Our pitching staff and defense has to be near-perfect and we can’t strand runners in the few RISP situations I expect we’ll get.
I don’t want to get my expectations too high; I’m definitely not invisioning the parade down Market Street already or anything like that. But I feel like my team, which has been labeled this chippy, lucky-to-be-here underdog by so much of the national media, has a legitimate shot against the Fightin’ Phils.
Here’s looking forward to Saturday and what I hope will be a great series for the world to watch.
Euphoria
I’m supposed to be reading the adventures of Don Quixote de la Mancha in time for my two o’clock lecture tomorrow, but I think my professor will understand if I don’t quite get through it: he is, after all, a San Francisco Giants fan.
After jumping up and down and pumping my fists in the air in some uncoordinated, spastic dance over and over again in my Santa Cruz apartment this afternoon; after watching my team (MY TEAM!!! The one I adopted eight years ago and stuck with through the foggiest of nights and dreariest of days) run laps around the field and bathe in champagne showers (and drop f-bombs on the air), I sit here in front of my computer at close to two in the morning, unable to wipe the smile from my face.
We did it. I know some people scoff at the tendency of fans like myself to use the word “we” when referring to their team of choice, but I truly think the fanbase is the tenth man on the field. We don’t do any of the pitching or the hitting, but we coax them on from our couches, our barstools, our stadium seats. We may get frustrated at times (many times, in fact; after all, the 2010 adopted slogan for this team was “torture”), but us diehards stand by them.
I can’t remember being prouder than I am today to say I’m a San Francisco Giants fan, or just simply a fan of baseball for that matter. There’s so many lasting images that will stay with me from just today, let alone this week or this entire season, and I can’t possibly sort through them all in my mind or write them all down in an articulate manner. I won’t be able to hold onto every single memory from today no matter how hard I try. But I know I will always remember standing in front of my TV screen, wringing my hands together as Brian Wilson struck out the final batter and Buster Posey threw off his mask and ran towards our closer to congratulate him on winning the National League West crown.
I don’t want to get too negative or bitter, but I did have a definite, “Told you so” attitude towards the many “experts” who counted the Giants out this season, who had them finishing in fourth place–just in front of the San Diego Padres, of course–in the division. I guess I can’t blame them too much; none of us knew that this scrappy team of predominantly veteran hitters and guys labeled as “journeymen” or “wash-outs” would click so well, or that we would manage to pull all these guys off the scrap heaps who would contribute in such a big way. But after last year’s surprisingly good season, I knew that they could pull it off this year.
I could just wax poetic about today and my love of baseball for another hour or so; could talk again about how much I adore this game (for anyone who may have stumbled upon this blog today who hasn’t read my “For the Love of the Game” column that I keep reposting, I’m going to pimp it again, just because I’m pretty proud of how it turned out; read it here). I could talk about the playoff matchup against the Atlanta Braves starting Thursday (which I’ll be attending with my older brother, who I haven’t seen since Lincecum bobblehead day in July–aka way too long ago), but I can’t even think that far ahead yet. All I can do right now is sink my head into my pillow, listen to “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” one more time, and sleep soundly, now that Game 162 is in the books, to be followed by at least three more.
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