Goodbye Gabe!

Mark, you think free agents didn't sign with the Giants because of Kapler? That's not fake news, it's just ridiculous.

But then you thought it would have been smart to outbid the Yankees and resign Rodón for more than the 6/$162,000,000 he got. Yeah, his 13 games started this year and his 3 - 7 record would have made all the difference.

And definitely, they should bring in Melvin, because look what he did with a team that had Soto and his 35 HRs & 108 RBIs, Machado and his 30 HRs & 90 RBIs, Tatis with his 25 & 78, even Bogarts and his 19 & 57 and about as much pitching as the Giants had.

Oh, wait, that talented team lead by Melvin will finish with the same record as this year's Giants, who had nothing but a good bullpen and.......... Wilmer Flores?

How this team, with virtually nothing, won 79/80 games is amazing to me. How last year's team, which was just as lacking in talent won 81 is amazing. How the team two years ago won 107,  even with a resurgent Buster (the only season Kapler had Posey) and an obviously juiced Crawford is remarkable.

But of course coaching had nothing to do with any of that. They should have won 90, 90 & 115!!!

Like virtually all fans, I have no idea what went on behind the scenes, where managers really earn their pay, and maybe that was the issue here, but whatever one may think of Kapler, after four years he leaves with a winning record with rosters almost completely lacking in any top tier talent.

IMO it was Zaidi choosing/almost being forced to resign Crawford & Belt two years ago that is the razor that sliced the Giants achilles, not Kapler and his rosters of dreck. I think this year's team, even with just the two(!) starting pitchers they had all season, the zero they got from Haniger and the next to nothing they got from Conforto might have been just a little better with Trea Turner at SS and Matt Olson or Freddie Freeman at 1st, and their outlook moving forward would also have been significantly better.

Based on the circumstances, it's hard to blame Farhan for those two completely disastrous signings, but ultimately a winning team always has winning players. Who exactly were those on Kapler's teams?

Unless there was something SERIOUSLY bad going on behind closed doors, Kapler looks like a scapegoat here. IMO Zaidi should have stuck with him another year, tried to upgrade the talent (which he's going to have to do anyway, desperately now) and see what Kapler could do with some top quality players who could actually play every day and pitch six innings without giving up nine runs. 

But unless five - seven of their young players suddenly become stars it's pretty unlikely that Zaidi will be able to dramatically upgrade the roster, so hopefully the next guy can figure out how to manage a team to 90+ wins with J.D. Davis, Joc (midnight room service) Peterson, Mike mediocre Yastrzemski, an often injured shortstop a who hit .197 when he did play, a bunch of rookies called up too soon, a variety of "starting" pitchers who routinely give up five runs in three innings and the rest of the flotsam & jetsam that was this year's team.

I'm looking forward to seeing that.

I'll keep it short, as always. Agreed - Kapler is getting the blame and/or shaft when he did a decent job during his tenure. One more year would have been fair- but how do you compete in the NL West against the billion dollar babies of LA & SD?

Giants pitching was pretty good this year- kept them in it I guess but when they stopped scoring runs in August it all tanked. What do you expect.

They need a POWER HITTER .....or two. One that won't spend half a season on the IR. There are plenty out there - but do they want to play in Oracle Airport. . . .?

Go Giants - see ya next year.

Sorry....I thought this wa a Welcome Back Kotter related thread.

Did I mention the Orioles are in the playoffs? We could see the orange and white fireworks at the stadium during the Weir and Wolf Bros show last night. 

Stupid season with the stupid new rules, and John Fisher begging to have his ass dragged around the Coliseum parking lot.

Major League Baseball appears hell-bent on ruining our beloved national game.

tupid season with the stupid new rules, and John Fisher begging to have his ass dragged around the Coliseum parking lot.

Major League Baseball appears hell-bent on ruining our beloved national game.

Kind of confused by these statements, Roarshock. 

Pitch clock is a godsend, games are much swifter on the whole now. Base stealing is up with the bigger bases and the lack of shift gets the game back to its roots, sort of.

"games are much swifter on the whole now"

It was the uneven pace of baseball that was always part of the charm. A lazy afternoon at the ballpark and never sure how long the game might last.

These changes towards more rigid timing are just to appease television advertisers, in my opinion.

In fairness to Kapler, it must have been a challenge for him to pilot a team of assorted River Cats with damaged, aging Giants this season.
I was never a fan of his management style and it seemed like he may have not adapted well to some of the new rules that put constraints on manager strategy.
I would like to see his replacement bring back some consistency in the batting line-ups with better attempts at manufacturing runs by staying out of double plays and leaving so many runners on base. Of course, the Giants also need to assemble better talent for that, especially a solid every day infield. Dead last in team errors per game this year.

Not a Kapler comment, but I still don't understand why baseball needs to speed up. If baseball is supposed to the national pastime, the very definition of that, according to Merriam-Webster, is "something that amuses and serves to make time pass agreeably." What's the hurry?
It was a bit painful to watch Cobb struggle in the late innings against the pitch clock while trying to finish out an almost perfect game, marred only by a rookie error, who was brought up too soon.

Next year. Go Giants!

I wasn't a fan of the new rules at first, but I sure don't miss the shift any. Does anybody miss the shift?

raise your hand if you miss the shift.

the most jarring thing for me to adjust to is the pinch runner in extra innings thing. I still don't like it. Doesn't "feel" right.

I think the pitch clock has made batter/pitcher exchanges more equitable all around, and I also suspect that any increase in stolen bases this season has really been more the result of the new pickoff rule (engagements/disengagements) than a mere four inches of baseline has had

Major league baseball (especially national league ball) has been flat out more exciting and interesting with the pitch clock. I don't think it was a scheme to add advertising minutes, they added whole games to the postseason to do that part.

Kapler was okay, did the best with what he had. Not sold that he would have done better if he had better players to work with though. He pretty average/ho hum overall.

ymmv

go A's

>> It was the uneven pace of baseball that was always part of the charm. A lazy afternoon at the ballpark and never sure how long the game might last.

>>  These changes towards more rigid timing are just to appease television advertisers, in my opinion.

>> I still don't understand why baseball needs to speed up. If baseball is supposed to the national pastime, the very definition of that, according to Merriam-Webster, is "something that amuses and serves to make time pass agreeably." What's the hurry?

I find it strange that here on philzone, where so much bandwidth is spent praising the halcyon days of the past, I am reading comments by folks presumably outraged that the pace of MLB play has returned to the place it was in 1985:  https://twitter.com/MLB_PR/status/1707831279708696816

The pitch clock has been a godsend not because it is actively destroying the charm of baseball - but because it is doing what several generations of baseball players couldn't: return the game to the proper pace that everyone grew up with and enjoyed.

I don't think anyone misses batters constantly stepping out of the box and adjusting their batting gloves, or pitchers stepping off the mound to retaliate against a batter who just stepped out to adjust his gloves, or the repeated throws over to 1B because you can't come to decision on what pitch to throw to the catcher.  No one in their right mind misses any of that crap.  Go call up a MLB game from the early 80s on YouTube and you'll quickly see that they didn't need a pitch clock to make the game move along as it should.  Again, multiple generations of ballplayers (and umpires) proved they were unable to rectify the slow but consistent creep towards 3.5 hour games so we have the pitch clock which has fixed 30+ years of wothless, time eating, crap in one shining season.

But the true American pastime is bitching about change of any sort and the fact there is a digital clock on the field of play is enough for some folks unending disdain I suppose.

Anyhow, the game has been ruined.  We're back in 1985.  The horrors!

You guys are neglecting to give props to one of the guys that made baseball what it was when the sport was the Great American Pastime: Orioles third baseman, Brooks Robinson. Sadly, he died this past week at age 86. "From 1960-1975, he played in at least 152 games in 14 seasons and in 144 games the other two years."

"Variously known as the “The Human Vacuum Cleaner,” “Mr. Hoover,” or “Mr. Impossible,” Brooks Robinson set the standard for defensive wizardry at third base, winning a record 16 consecutive Gold Gloves thanks to his combination of ambidexterity, supernaturally quick reflexes, and acrobatic skill. He was an 18-time All-Star, a regular season, All-Star Game, and World Series MVP, and a first-ballot Hall of Famer.

More than that, he was “Mr. Oriole” for his 23 seasons spent with Baltimore, a foundational piece for four pennant winners and two champions, and a beloved icon within the community and throughout the game. In 1966, Sports Illustrated’s William Leggett wrote that Robinson “ranked second only to crab cakes in Baltimore.” He may have surpassed them since."

RIP

I think there was another thread(s) sometime back about the 2023 rules, using the designated hitter in the national league, etc.
Even though this is a Gabe Kapler/Giants thread, I'll digress just once more. First, no one ever said I was in my right mind and I rarely get outraged when it comes to any professional sports. Change is always inevitable, especially with technology being exponentially prolific. Use of video replay, measurements and data tracking that make for new statistics, etc.
While the pitch clock may be a godsend for the viewer, it certainly appears to be an issue for a pitcher trying to throw a complete game. He's more apt to make mistakes after throwing 90+ pitches and trying to make it to the end without being able to slow things down a bit. Maybe, a graduated pitch clock as the game goes on? The complete game has already dwindled since counting pitches began in the late 80s. I guess on the plus side, complete games may become as rare as someone hitting .400.
Whatever changes happened and whatever will happen, I promise not to bitch. Mainly, because I've loved the game since I was a child and still find it a pleasant way to pass the time, however long a game might be.
PS - Alan, Brooks Robinson was one of my all-time favorite third basemen and the most fun to watch.

>>>These changes towards more rigid timing are just to appease television advertisers, in my opinion

Disagree. In fact, with shorter games and shorter breaks between half-innings, there is less time for commercial slots.

The people I feel for most are the vendors. Your beer guy is making way less cash with the time-shortened games. I only got to Citifield once this season, and it was weird to be out of there and home in NJ by 10:15

Years ago, vendors got very screwed by no beer after 7th inning.  What a shame

From Twitter last night....

Grant Brisbee  @GrantBrisbee          The Giants and Dodgers finished with the same number of postseason wins in 2023.

This one is perfect.....DΛVΣ (мя.тωιттєя) @DoyersDave·       Dodgers would be a dangerous team in the playoffs if they had Mookie Betts on the roster

i want a new manager and pitchers that don't rape people.

Last time sf poached a manager from their division rivals, it worked out pretty well. IMO and with dusty baker retiring, bochy and Melvin are the top dog managers in their respective leagues. Melvin is a Bay Area OG, his fit is obvious. He can hit the ground running and with any luck he'll bring Matt Williams back to SF with him too. He's also not someone who will be pushed around by an uppity GM. I really liked varitek as a player but agree he and any others with no experience would be a crapshoot at best.

the giants have a mostly young and very well put together coaching staff, I think bob melvin is a solid guy to move them forward where kapler possibly faltered. agree this move also puts sf in a stronger and more serious position to bargain for a guy like ohtani this winter. Or maybe Juan Soto when he comes up. 

Spot on.

Matt Williams hired as 3B coach

https://www.si.com/mlb/giants/news/sf-giants-hire-former-all-star-slugge...