San Francisco Giants: Off To a Slower Start Than Even Expected

When you're a team that finds it very hard to get hits and score runs you have to rely on other parts of the game. The Giants (other than the first and third games) have had a horrible time scoring runs, not going over three in their losses.

Now I expected them to be a little better scoring runs but still to have a difficultly getting across home plate. But more alarming to me is that in the four games in a row they have lost, they have allowed six or more runs, and not making defensive plays in crucial spots.

Now I know its early but pitching and defense were going to be the Giants' identity and they are not doing it well.

Here are some of the reasons they are of to this slow start.

Hitting

We all knew going in it was going to be a struggle to score runs this year but we hoped there would be some improvement. So far there is none. The Giants are hitting .250 as a team right now, ranking them 21st in the majors. They are 29th in home runs and 28th in runs scored with 3.9 per game as of April 14.

On top of them not scoring runs they young guys are struggling. Pablo Sandoval swings at every thing and any thing, as well as the whole team as they have struck out at least 11 times in back to back games, while hitting .192—fourth lowest on the team.

What happened to the guy that was hitting .400 during spring training?

Travis Ishikawa is still learning how to hit big league pitching, Edgar Renteria, who was supposed to be an offensive guy on the team, is also off to a slow start hitting .160. The only guys producing are Rowand, Winn, and Fred Lewis.

I know these guys are young, but they have to get better fast.

Defense

On a team like the Giants that can't consistently score runs, they have to rely on pitching and defense—two things they have not been doing lately. The defense on the field has not been very good.

Edgar Renteria has lost his range to the right and most of his other range, too. The defense is also not making plays in big situations—like in the Padres game where Velez could not make the big catch.

That misstep led to two of the Padres runs and with the offense struggling that's all the Padres needed.

Pitching

What was supposed to be the huge advantage for the Giants was their pitching. Aside from Matt Cain, who is right now doing all he can against the Dodgers, none of the Giants pitchers are doing very well.

I hope that the two starts by Lincecum are well behind him and he has gotten his control down, but the ERA is still high, although the strikeouts are there.

Randy Johnson, the second starter, is 0-2 but with a 11+ era. And Zito is being the same Zito the Giants have seen the last two years in his first start against the Padres.

All together the teams ERA is 6.1, ranking toward the bottom in the majors. They also rank towards the bottom in walks.

I don't know how long it will take for them to get back to these things, but if they don't soon it will be a long season for Giants fans.

This is my first ever article by the way, they will get better, so I hope you guys like it.