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Wednesday, November 13, 2002 |
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Friday, November 8, 2002 |
Maybe I'll Forgive the Giants. If... The sadness of Dusty Baker's departure from the Giants lingers. The bad taste in my mouth for Giants ownership will cloud my admiration for the team. Friends and columnists who called for his departure and who are now gloating over same make me sad because they are, to a person, wrong-headed. They wanted Dusty to go because of his (needed) arrogance and/or his (inevitable) tactical mistakes. No new manager will satisfy. But perhaps such is the reality of life as a major league baseball manager.
Now if the Giants:
- Fill the position quickly
- Fill the position with someone of serious baseball stature (and that decidedly does not include pitching coach Dave Righetti
- Make the right trades to beef up the roster so we hae a legit shot at the World Series again next year
then I might be able to find some forgiveness in my heart. But if they let Dusty go and then allow things to deterioriate into a Florida Marlins kind of low-level inertia, I'm so outta here.
2:20:54 PM 
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Thursday, November 7, 2002 |
Baker's Gone, More's the Pity. The San Francisco Giants, proving that owners' egos can be and usually are, bigger than those of players and managers who actually are the product, fired Dusty Baker yesterday. The move was not unexepcted. And contrary to the stupid spin put on the move by majority owner Peter Magowan, it was a firing, not a "failure to renew an agreement."
Dusty has an ego. Big deal. You expect anyone to be a successful major league manager -- let alone of the five most successful of the past decade -- without an ego? Most owners (notably excepting George Steinbrenner) swallow their pride and work for the good fo the team. Not Magowan. He was pissed off at Baker and he wasn't going to hire him back no matter what. The only guy to win NL Manager of the Year three times. Manager of the team with the best cumulative record in baseball over the last 10 years, a team that finished first or second in eight of those 10 years. Nice move, Pete!
Some of my friends are happy Dusty is gone. They didn't agree with some of his on-field decisions. I guess winning is less important to that crowd than that their manager make decisions they agree with. And on the flip side, San Jose Mercury-News columnist Skip Bayless in his column this morning said letting Baker go was good for the team and all Dusty deserved. What a jerk Bayless is.
A team takes a guy like Baker, who's been the heart and soul (if not the arms) of the team for the past 10 years, a guy who's been with the club 15 years, and tosses one of the finest managers in the history of baseball on the scrap heap because he finally demands what he's been worth for some time. Forgetting that he agreed two years ago to a much smaller deal than he almost certainly could have gotten elsewhere, the Giants demonstrate their loyalty. And we wonder why players jump ship for millions of dollars. Exhibit A.
I think I'm done with the Giants. Great ballpark. Great superhero. Great GM, in fact. Shitty ownership. I'm not sure I'm not done with baseball altogether. That would be hard for me to do. I guess I'll look around for another team I can support. Maybe the A's (though I have serious reservations). I started out this piece prepared to comment on who I thought Baker's successor should be. Changed my mind. I don't give a crap. The mystique of the Giants is gone for me. It may not be recoverable.
Bastards.
12:50:08 PM
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Tuesday, November 5, 2002 |
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Monday, November 4, 2002 |
Maybe the Niners Are Better Than I Thought. Gee, after the Niners finally won a road game against a team with a winning record by nudging cross-Bay rival Oakland yesterday, maybe I'll have to conclude that they are better than I thought they'd be.
I sort of felt like this would be a 9-7, maybe 10-6 wild card kind of season for the Niners this year. But here they are 6-2, tied for the third best record in the NFL, two games up in the division race with the Rams not a real threat even if they revitalize themselves.
It sure looks like they could win the division. They could win 11 or 12 games this year. That would be a wonderful surprise to me!
1:45:15 PM
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Sunday, November 3, 2002 |
Mariucci, Cortez to Blame. The Niners were in complete control
coming to the final seconds of the game against the Raiders. No sweat.
Third down at the Raiders' 5. About 15 seconds left. Remember, third
down. Mooch has Garcia wait until there are only three seconds on the
clock to call time-out for the field goal try. Bad move. If you miss a
FG try on third down, it's still your ball. You can try again. But not
if you start the play with three seconds left. Chris Collinsworth
pointed this out from the broadcast booth. He was right.
Of course, he was also right that Cortez should never have missed
that chip shot. That's a PAT. No excuse. Cortez has to go. He missed two
FGs and kicked a kickoff out of bounds today that led to the Raiders'
tying score in regulation.
Release him.
(Late Addition. I don't care that Cortez finally made one and kicked the game-winner. He's lame.)
4:15:44 PM
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Poor Officiating in Raiders-Niners Game. Late in the second
quarter, the officiating crew in the San Francisco-Oakland game blew
three calls in about 30 seconds.
First, they missed a clear case of roughing the passer against the
Raiders. Jeff Garcia had been thrown to the ground roughly after having
clearly thrown a pass. The rushing defender had two or three steps to
stop and didn't.
Second, on the next play, the Niners tried a screen. The Raider defender
pushed the receiver while the ball was in the air. He knew it. He threw
his arms in the air. No flag.
Then the Niners punted and got called for illegal touching. The call was
right; Rumph touched the ball first after having been forced out of
bounds on the return. But to miss two calls with significant potential
impact only to call one with no meaning at all -- a really stupid
techical rules violation which in thse case wouldn't have mattered
because there were three other Niners within touching distance of the
ball -- just shows a poor sense of priority.
Halftime as I write this and the Raiders are up 13-10. The Niners' D is
holding the highly rated Raiders' offense nicely. But the Niners aren't
scoring, either. Everyone expected a high-scoring game here. Not so far.
2:49:22 PM
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Saturday, November 2, 2002 |
Raiders Over Niners. Tomorrow's a big NFL game day in the Bay Area as the 49ers visit the Raiders for the first time in a lot of seasons. I participate in a friendly little NFL picking contest every week (and have for four or five years) made up mostly of 49ers fans. I've become more a follower of the Raiders in the past couple of seasons, though I'm still much more a Niners backer. Tomorrow, though, I expect the Raiders to beat the Niners. Jerry Rice and Charlie Garner, two ex-Niner superstars, are motivated to play hard. The Raiders' home field advantage is at least intimidation. And the Raiders have something to prove here, having lost three straight after opening the season 4-0 and drawing Super Bowl speculation. The Niners, meanwhile, are coming off an important win in their division and have four very tough games immediately ahead against the Chiefs, Chargers, Eagles, and Seahawks. I don't think the Niners will look past the Raiders so much as they'll be hard-pressed to focus intensely on that many games in succession.
11:08:35 AM
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© Copyright 2002 Dan Shafer.
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