Giants find new way to lose in the pocket of a jacket they hardly wear anymore

If you think about it, there had to have been incredibly shitty Greek playwrights. They wanted so badly to be Aeschylus, to write an epic that would last millenniums, to speak to the human condition and remind us why we're all alive. They ended up writing the 450 B.C. equivalent of Pearl Harbor.

This was one of those epics. The set fell down in the second act. Fires broke out large and small. Whenever the main character wasn't talking, he was standing upstage, looking to see if he knew anyone in the audience. A horrible, turgid mess.

People will focus on Brandon Belt for his 0-for-8 in his first start as a #3 hitter. Four strikeouts and two hard-hit outs that counted for absolutely nothing. It was the Brandon Beltiest game ever.

People will focus on the Brandon Crawford error, after he made one of the better plays I've seen from a shortstop. He giveth, he taketh.

People will focus on the 18 runners left on base and the 1-for-15 with runners in scoring position.

People will focus on all that because they hate themselves. All of that was awful, alright. Pick one. Make it a scapegoat. Blame that one aspect of the game in isolation. Because your alternative is to roll around in all of it like it's an acre of poison oak.

Me? I'm going with the sixth inning. That should have been a 3-0 game. Tim Lincecum should have won with eight strong innings and 11strikeouts. He kept his pitch count down. He made the Mets look awful. More so. Then in the sixth inning, the fielding died on the way back to its home planet.

Andres Torres misplayed a single into a double into a triple. There was a security guard running around on the field as it was happening, no joke. Then Torres misplayed an out into a run-scoring single.

Torres was an absolutely magic all-around player in 2010, but he was at his best in the field. He roamed center with a grace that the Giants hadn't seen since Darren Lewis. He was a plus, plus defender, an unquestionable asset. Now he's Glenallen Hill, perpetually waking from a nightmare where he looks down and his mitt has been replaced with flippers.

Then Pablo Sandoval made a mistake on a grounder, throwing to second when he didn't have a chance. Then Marco Scutaro related that to first when he didn't have a chance, throwing it away and sending a runner to third with no outs. The Mets scored the go-ahead run on a double play.

Mittfuckery concentrated in one inning like we've never seen. And they were all earned runs for Lincecum, of course. His fastball wasn't at its best, but his curveball was befuddling. His changeup was lively. He pitched as well as had this season. He didn't get the win. And he had to watch the rest of the game, just like you. Now he's sterile because he watched it. Just like you. That game, man. That game will have effects that we just don't realize yet.

But, hey, let's talk about trade rumors. The Giants are only whatever back with who cares to play. They're still in it, baby. Where are you going?

Do you want the list of players with zero hits and five or more strikeouts in eight at-bats or more? Sure you do.

Remember that Chris Davis was given the full Belt for years with both the Rangers and Orioles. What I'm saying is that Belt is going to hit 30 homers before the All-Star game next year.

George Kontos pitched a heckuva game. He also took the loss. Baseball is basically pulling the wings off flies at this point.

Of course, if Kontos had one of these games at the right time, and had one of his hanging meltdowns at the right time, the Giants would be a game closer to first. Timing!

Like it matters.

hi im the giants with runners on base

The Giants scored three runs off Matt Harvey. Tim Lincecum pitched one of his better games of the year. The Giants lost in a humiliating, deflating fashion.

God, how we'll laugh about all this before the NLCS.