San Francisco Giants Roundtable: First Half Surprises and Disappointments

The All-Star Break is upon us and not many people would have thought the San Francisco Giants would be 10 games over .500 and leading the National League Wild Card.

There have been plenty of things to smile about if you're amongst the Giants faithful—Matt Cain's emergence as front-line starter behind Tim Lincecum, Pablo Sandoval taking hold of AT&T, and a no-hitter from the least likely pitcher on the pitching staff, Jonathan Sanchez.

Above all else, the success this team is having is something that not many of us expected to happen in 2009.

With the 2009 All-Star Break coming to a close, it was the perfect time to catch up with the top Giants writers on Bleacher Report to discuss not only the surprises in the first half of the season, but also the disappointments.

EVAN ACZON

There are a few entries that could the biggest surprises of the season for me.

First off, I could put Pablo Sandoval, but as we talked about in an earlier Roundtable, he is hardly a surprise.

I could go with Nate Schierholtz, and rightly so, but after getting off to a fast start he has definitely cooled down.

So, for biggest (positive) surprise of the 2009 first half, I'm going to have to go with a combo of Juan Uribe (and the rest of the offense) and Justin Miller (and the rest of the bullpen).

Uribe made the team as an afterthought after being invited to spring camp as a non-roster invitee. He didn't get much playing time at the start of the season.

But once injuries and slumps started taking their toll, Uribe became the first one off the bench for Bruce Bochy. He was the one that jump-started this Giants offense in Seattle, and from then on he got consistent playing time with the demotion of Emmanuel Burriss and the short-term arm injury to Pablo Sandoval.

In July, so far he's hitting .342 with a .579 slugging percentage. Remember, this guy hit 20-plus homers in three different seasons with the White Sox, and has the ability to be a starter on the infield. After a fall from grace, he has definitely found his niche here in San Francisco and is shaping into an integral part of the offense.

For the rest of the offense, the 63 home runs still ranks third to last in the National League, but run production in the past month ranks eighth in the majors, ahead of the Brewers (12th), Dodgers (14), and even the Pujols-led Cardinals (26).

On the other side of the ball, Justin Miller, after his outing Saturday, deserves a lot of praise for what he and the rest of the bullpen have done this year.

Miller, another non-roster invitee, was called up after Joe Martinez was hit in the head with a line drive in the opening series of the season. Since then, he's thrown a bullpen leading 41.0 innings and has a 1.98 ERA. He is also sporting a 1.10 WHIP, and has 24 strikeouts to 14 walks.

A former starter with the Marlins, Miller has made a great living as a middle relief mean in this deep Giants bullpen, which also features off-season signing Jeremy Affeldt (1.32 ERA), former All-Star closer Brian Wilson (23 of 27 in save opportunities), and returning young gun Sergio Romo (16 strikeouts in 13 innings).

Relief was one of the main reasons that the Giants couldn't close out games a year ago, and this year's bullpen ranks among the best in the league.

For me, the biggest disappointment I'm going with is Fred Lewis.

The promise he showed last year just isn't there anymore. Last year, he was slugging the ball and playing a very good left-field. In 2009, he has little-to-no offensive numbers, with way too many strikeouts, and his defense has been spotty and insecure. No one has really figured it out yet, and Bochy has sat him down for the last couple weeks.

On the bright side, the couple times that he has come off the bench to pinch-hit he's looked pretty sharp, cranking out some clutch hits.

I was looking for Lewis to bounce back after the bunion surgery shut him down as he was peaking last year, but it definitely has not happened. The emergence of Nate Schierholtz as an everyday player is comforting, and the ability of Randy Winn to play wherever the Giants put him is amazing.

But for the man who was in line to kind of plug the hole that Barry Bonds left, a .250 average with four homeruns and 63 strikeouts in 212 ABs is not the way to go.

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