Matt Cain Wins Game Against Rockies

Here are some quick notes from the Giants 8-6 win against the Rockies, who came in ready to battle!

This is Matt Cain's season in a nutshell. Here he is facing Josh Rutledge in the second innning. Grant Brisbee did a similar exercise to this at baseball nation in evaluating Matt Cain. Watch where the Posey wants it and where the pitch ends up. After the first pitch runs down and away, here is where Posey wants the 1-0 pitch.

 

This is where it ends up.

Result: Foul.

Dangerously away from the target, out over the plate and up. Luckily, Cain is facing Josh Rutledge whose cold spot is high and in the middle of the plate. Thank goodness!

Here is the 1-1 pitch. This is where Posey wants it.

This is where it ends up.

Result: Foul.

Right down the middle! Normally a terrible strategy, but this is yet another cold spot for Josh Rutledge. 

Now, here's the 1-2 pitch. Where Posey sets up:

Where the pitch goes:

Result: Foul.

Not egregious location but not very good at all and certainly not where Cain wanted to put it. Another pitch that leaked out over the plate. That's now three straight times that Cain has tried to bust Rutledge in on the hands with a fastball, and all three times he's missed back out over the plate. 

Luckily, Josh Rutledge all throughout his career has struggled with pitches out over the plate. 

Luckily, Josh Rutledge all throughout his career has struggled with pitches.

Here's the next 1-2 pitch. Where Posey positions:

Where Cain throws it:

Result: Ball.

Finally Cain tries the other part of the plate, to see if he can catch Rutledge expecting the inside pitch. Yet again, Cain misses location. 

Good take Josh!

Now the 2-2 pitch and where Posey wants it:

Where the pitch goes:

Result: Swinging strike out.

Cain finally gets the fastball under the hands that he's been trying to throw, and he gets the result he was looking for. It's a great pitch and it's exactly what Cain wanted to do. The issue here is that Cain hit his location just once in the at bat in six pitches (the first one I didn't show). If that's say, Troy Tuolowitzki instead of Josh Rutledge, three or four of those pitches are hit a very long way. It's pretty much been that way the entire season for Cain. When Cain is on, his command is impeccable and when he misses, it's by inches. This season, his command has been inconsistent, which is why he's struggled. It hasn't neccesarily been the walks, but the command inside the strike zone has not been good and has left a lot of fat baseballs in the middle of the plate.

I'm still fully confident Cain will snap out of it. Till then, lets just hope Josh Rutledge is the only hitter Cain ever faces the rest of his life.

*****

The last time the Giants came back from at least 6 runs: 

Batting	AB	R	H	RBI	BB	SO	OPS
Randy Winn CF	5	1	2	0	0	2	.819
Omar Vizquel SS	3	2	1	0	2	0	.692
Pedro Feliz 3B-1B	5	1	1	1	0	1	.739
Barry Bonds LF	3	1	2	1	1	0	1.349
Jason Ellison LF	0	0	0	0	0	0	.696
Moises Alou RF	4	1	2	2	0	0	.915
Ray Durham 2B	4	1	1	2	0	0	.791
Lance Niekro 1B	2	0	0	0	1	1	.747
J.T. Snow PH	1	0	1	1	0	0	.728
Julio Ramirez PR	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
LaTroy Hawkins P	0	0	0	0	0	0
Scott Eyre P	0	0	0	0	0	0	.333
Tyler Walker P	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
Mike Matheny C	4	0	0	0	0	2	.700
Matt Kinney P	1	0	1	0	0	0	.667
Brian Cooper P	0	0	0	0	0	0	1.000
Todd Linden PH	1	0	0	0	0	0	.629
Jeff Fassero P	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
Doug Clark PH	1	0	0	0	0	0	.250
Jeremy Accardo P	0	0	0	0	0	0	2.000
Edgardo Alfonzo 3B	1	0	0	0	0	0	.675
Team Totals	35	7	11	7	4	6	.785

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Pure beauty.

There was a player on the Giants named Julio Ramirez.

I think we're done here.