Another day, another potential home loss. But! Johnny Cueto is on the mound today, and even though Madison Bumgarner’s presence there last night did absolutely nothing to steer the Giants out of their abject awfulness when playing at Oracle Park, today is a new day, and maybe what this ungrateful bunch of San Francisco haters need is a good ol’ shimmy-shake to un-suck at home.
Or maybe the Giants are just a bad team. Then again! They’re up against an equally bad team. You might argue an even worse team, but after the Marlins win today* it won’t feel like they’re worse than the Giants.
SS — Miguel Rojas
2B — Isan Diaz
3B — Starlin Castro
1B — Neil Walker
C — Jorge Alfaro
RF — Lewis Brinson
CF — Magneuris Sierra
LF — Jon Berti
SP — Elieser Hernandez
Hernandez is virtually a clone of yesterday’s starter, Robert Dugger, in terms of pitch arsenal and effectiveness. Why, yes, that should mean that he has no trouble taming the limp Giants lineup.
CF — Mike Yastrzemski
1B — Brandon Belt
3B — Evan Longoria
C — Stephen Vogt
SS — Brandon Crawford
RF — Mike Gerber
LF — Joey Rickard
2B — Mauricio Dubon
SP — Johnny Cueto
What was most impressive about Cueto’s season debut was, well, everything. 69 pitches in 5 innings. His stuff looked like his 2016 stuff — his first month of 2018 stuff. He picked up virtually where he left off. Now we get to see if it carries over to the next start.
Meanwhile, the Giants continue to raid their championship Triple-A team. Yesterday, it was a pair of position players. Today, it’s a fresh-ish relief arm:
Enderson Franco is a RHP who posted a 6.17 ERA in 23 starts for Sac before moving to the pen 8/27. In 5 innings of relief over 3 regular season outings he posted a 1.80 ERA. He set a franchise record this weekend with 3 saves for the River Cats in the PCL Championship. #SFGiants https://t.co/ITm4OA81Js
— Julie Parker (@insidethepark3r) September 14, 2019
It’s not impossible that with the off day tomorrow and the Triple-A championship on Tuesday that the Giants could option some players back just for that game Tuesday night. They’re about to get swept in Boston, so it might be more worthwhile to put those guys where they might have a chance to win something.
Anyway, let’s get this over with.