Giants' Most Important Game of the Season Tonight

The Giants play their most important game of the season so far tonight in Denver.  If they win, they are two games back in the wild card race with 37 left to play.  If they lose, they are four games back.

Four games is not an impossible deficit to come back from, but given the Giants’ clear weakness on offense, even after the deadline trades for Freddie Sanchez and Ryan Garko, I don’t see them making up four games on the Rockies.

The Giants are in the middle of a brutal stretch where they play from New York to California every day for 17 days.  If they lose tonight, it will be hard for them to get off the mat and play well for six games, even at home, against the Diamondbacks and the Rockies between now and Sunday.

Somehow it seems appropriate that Barry Zito will be on the hill for the Giants tonight in Colorado.  The Zito deal was the worst free agent signing the Giants have ever made, and they’ve had a few stinkers over the years (Anyone remember Renny Stennett?).

It’s also one of the worst deals of any kind the Giants have made since the 1960’s and 1970’s, when they traded off countless great hitters for very little pitching in return.

Zito has pitched extremely well of late, with a 2.36 ERA in his last seven starts (eleven earned runs in 42 innings pitched).  Nonetheless, he’s still Barry Zito, and after the way he’s pitched since the Giants signed him, he’ll still have to prove that he can win a big game as a Giant.

He’ll have his opportunity tonight.  Of course, it’s even more likely to come down to whether the Giants can score more than three runs off Jason Marquis and the Rockies bullpen.  No small task given how weak the Giants' offense has been this year.