Friday BP, 5/4/18

Alex Pavlovic’s review of April was far more comprehensive and interesting than the one I attempted and that’s, you know, that’s fine... but at least I didn’t make mine into a slideshow. I can’t promise we’ll never do a slideshow...

I won’t repost the whole thing here, I’ll just say that he notes the Giants are hitting for more power but striking out way more. One thing I failed to mention in last night’s article about the Giants and hard contact was that Andrew McCutchen looks like he’s going to be fine, which Pavlovic’s article covers in a bit more detail. Now, will the Giants be fine when this three-city road trip is over? When the month is through?

So, it’s the Braves, Pirates, Reds, and Rockies (at AT&T Park), off day, Astros, Cubs. The month ends in Colorado. They don’t really get a break against good teams until the middle of June, when they finally get to play the Marlins. But the Marlins have been playing well of late. Fact is, the Giants are going to have to keep doing what they’ve been doing, which is struggling to win yet still managing to do so.

If they’re not absolutely terrible for the rest of the month and can just make it to July maybe 5 games under .500, there’d still be reason for optimism. Bumgarner and Panik’s returns will coincide with a slightly easier schedule and I think you’d agree a good team near full strength against a slightly easier schedule means they can make up some lost ground.

Schedule prognosticating is a messy business, though. No team can ever really be at “full strength” and it’s all about how teams manage those valleys that determines the scale of their peaks.