End of the Regular Season-- Almost

National League West Standings
Colorado	91	71	--	Can win first-ever NL West title today.
LA	91	71	--	Can win 6th straight NL West title today.
Arizona	82	80	9	Lost 19 of 27 games in September.
GIANTS	73	89	18	Lost 21 of 26 games in September.
San Diego	66	96	25	This is getting to be an annual event.

A month ago, we wrote off the Giants' chances to make the postseason. We take no pleasure in being right about that, but there's no possible way we, or anyone, could have expected what a dreadful, nightmarish month was about to follow. Standing at a respectable, if overmatched, 68-68 at the end of August, the Giants went 5-21 in September, averaging less than three runs per game, and ended up closer to last place than to third. We certainly claim no predictive power for this, the most unpredictable of sports, but a few statements we made at that time bear revisiting at this time.

Regarding the Giants' division-title chances, we wrote, "Sure, one team might collapse, but three won't. "  Indeed, one team did collapse-- the Arizona Diamondbacks, who were seven games ahead on September 1 and, as we see above, lost 16 games in the standings, going a Giants-like 8-19 as both the Dodgers and Rockies heated up and roared down the stretch to a photo-finish that will be decided by a one-game playoff this afternoon, to determine who gets the division title and who has to play in the wild-card elimination game tomorrow. 

The Diamondbacks are a better team than their record; their Pythagorean record is 86-76 and was no doubt skewed a couple games further as their late-season depression set in. So too with the Giants, who estimate out at 70-92. Well, a .192 winning percentage in the season's last month will do that. Which leads us to our next comment from a month ago: "They're a .500 team now, and that is unlikely to change over the final month. They won't win, but they aren't embarrassing themselves either."  

Ho ho. It sure did change, big time, and they sure did embarrass themselves, with yesterday's season finale ending in almost poetic fashion, a 15-0 blowout loss to the arch-rival Dodgers. The only saving grace on the afternoon was LA's inability to celebrate anything on the Giants' home field. (Well, there was also Hunter Pence's farewell to the fans, but we'll get to that later.)

We still think that, when reasonably healthy, this is a .500 team. The shattering extent of the Giants' injury parade will be documented later, but even with an abnormally large amount of DL time, the Giants were 68-68. Then it became off-the-charts ridiculous. Suffice to say that, at season's end, only one Giants starting pitcher, and two Giants position players, have played enough innings to qualify in the league statistical rankings. We ain't gonna count 'em all, but we'll all but guarantee that no other team in the major leagues is so under-represented due to injury.  We said the 2018 Giants were a major improvement over the 2017 train wreck, and while nine more wins is not "major," we'll hold to that statement and stubbornly claim that, all things considered, this team is better than its record and its Pythagorean projection. Throw all the tomatoes you want.  

Andrew McCutchen, whose Giants tenure lasted seven months and sixteen days, remains the team's most valuable position player, leading the club in runs, RBI, walks, stolen bases, and OPS despite spending the last month with the Yankees. That last-minute trade happened moments after we referred to him as "Andrew McCutchen, who could be traded tonight." Indeed he was, and we wish him every success in the postseason with New York, though we doubt they can get past either Houston or Cleveland and reach the World Series. But we digress. Again.

The Giants' only other qualifiers are Brandon Crawford, who led the team in hits, and Evan Longoria, who led the team in homers with 16 (tied for 56th in the league). Buster Posey, top Giant in OBP and average, just missed the cut thanks to his hip surgery, as did Brandon Belt, who gave it up and had knee surgery during the September free-fall. Alen Hanson, the super-sub who played half a dozen positions and hustled everywhere he went, slugged .425 and hit a team-leading 5 triples in 110 games. Gorkys Hernandez, who was a regular in the outfield through the All-Star break, hit a career-best 15 homers, most of them in the first half, before tailing off badly in the last two months. Nick Hundley hit ten home runs in just 284 at-bats, slugging .408, and his September backup, Aramis Garcia, was .308/.492/.800 in 19 games, the only Giant player to reach .800 in OPS. (Well, there was Ryder Jones, who belted two homers in five games before landing on-- all together now-- the DL. For the rest of the season.)

That's about it for the Giants' next-to-last-in-the-league offense. Along with the Marlins and Padres-- not at all coincidentally, two of the three teams to lose more games than the Giants-- they averaged less than four runs per game. They were next-to-last in homers, too, and dead last in walks. (That must change, management!) To cap the climax, they struck out more than anyone except the Padres and the Phillies, who took a similar September nosedive, from 72-62 and in contention on August 31 to 80-82 and ten games out at the wire.    

Giants pitching was more or less league-average across the board: seventh in ERA, eighth in WHIP. They were fourth in fewest hits allowed, but only ninth in fewest walks, and 13th in strikeouts.   Giants pitchers led the league in one category-- most double plays generated-- and were tenth in number of pitches. Compared with the playoff qualifiers, their pitching was consistently ahead of Colorado's and about even with that of the Chicago Cubs. 

The one Giants starter who pitched enough innings to qualify for the ERA title is Derek Holland, who came aboard as a reliever, was pressed into starting duty, and ended up leading the team in starts (30), innings pitched (171.1), and strikeouts (169). Holland's ERA (3.57) was 15th in the league, and his 1.29 WHIP was 22nd, same as Jake Arrieta. At $1.75 million, "Dutch Oven" may be the most valuable starting pitcher in the league. He compares almost exactly to a much more celebrated lefthander, Chicago's Jon Lester. The two are almost identical in IP and ERA (slight advantage to Lester), and WHIP and strikeouts (advantage Holland). Of course, Lester had a team behind him that scored 760 runs, a full run per game better than the Giants, and he finished 18-6 to Holland's 7-9. Lester also made $27.5 million this year, fifteen times Holland's rate. 

Rookie Andrew Suarez (1.30 WHIP, 130 K, a team-leading 13 losses) was one inning short of making the cut. For the second straight year Madison Bumgarner did not qualify due to injury, his numbers (3.26, 1.24, 109 K in 130 innings) are right in line with his career levels.  And certainly the brightest light in the darkness is Dereck Rodriguez. He made his first of 21 starts on June 3, and finished with a 2.81 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, and .223 batting average against, all tops for Giants starters. His K/W ratio is similar to Bumgarner's (good if not exceptional), as is his 7.5 K per IP ("Bum" is at 8.4).  The team leader in wins, Chris Stratton with 10, has much more worrisome numbers-- 5.09 ERA, 1.43 WHIP. We can't help but think "Chris Heston 2.0".

Three new pitchers transformed the Giants' bullpen this year-- Will Smith, who came aboard in 2016 in deposed GM Bobby Evans' most (only?) successful trade and recovered from Tommy John surgery, free agent and fellow lefthander Tony Watson, and rookie Reyes Moronta. Smith, who took over as closer midseason following Hunter Strickland's latest emotional outburst, posted a 0.98 WHIP, better than a lot of guys-- Wade Davis, Brad Boxberger, Felipe Vazquez-- who had more saves than he; adjusted for appearances, his numbers were a lot like Kenley Jansen's, whose WHIP was also 0.98. Smith did blow 4 saves in 18 opportunities (Jansen blew 4 in 42), but we wonder how many times Jansen or, say, Davis, were able to give up a run or even two and still get the save, while Smith likely had a one-run lead almost every time.

Watson (1.03), Moronta (1.09), and holdover Sam Dyson (1.08) had WHIP numbers similar to Smith's, and the four had almost identical ERAs (2.49, 2.55, 2.59, 2.69).  Moronta struck out 79 men in 65 innings and held hitters to a .154 average, but he also walked 37 men (more than 5 per nine innings). He showed great capability to come in cold with men on base and get out of the situation, but starting an inning fresh he had a disturbing tendency to open with a walk, with predictably unhappy results.   

One of our favorite stats is "Wins Above Average By Position", which is compiled by the good folks at baseball-reference.com.  The Giants' bullpen, in the aggregate, stands at -1.7 wins below average, which is not all that awful in context. The Dodgers, with Jansen, for instance, are at minus 3.3, and only three teams (Cubs, Phillies, Nationals) are above zero. Looking at individuals, we see Watson (1), Moronta (0.9), Dyson (0.7) and Smith (0.5) combine for 3 wins above average in 254 innings; the problem is the other guys, including bit players like Pierce Johnson, Roberto Gomez, Derek Law, and D.J. Snelten, who in comparatively few innings manage to drag the aggregate way, way down.  The Giants have a decent "Core Four." Filling the other spots should not be too much of a chore. 

Overall the Giants' WAABP is ten wins below .500, or 71-91, right about where their Pythagorean number stands. They are above average (barely) at catcher, first base, and shortstop; below average everywhere else. The outfield is minus-4, which is not good, though far from last year's crater. Starting pitchers are about average, bullpen a little below, as noted, and position players almost seven wins to the bad. Again, take these numbers with a long, long look at the disabled list:  Buster Posey, Steven Duggar, Joe Panik, Brandon Belt, Evan Longoria,  Pablo Sandoval,  Ryder Jones, Mac Williamson, Madison Bumgarner, Johnny Cueto, Jeff Samardzija. That's five starters and three starting pitchers. Of these eleven injuries, seven were season-ending, three are career-threatening, and all were major, costing each player at least a month on the DL.  This simply can't be ignored when evaluating this ballclub.

Defensively, the Giants were league average, except in double plays turned, where they were second in the NL, one behind Colorado. Buster Posey, despite starting only 88 games, remains one of the best catchers in the league in fielding average and stolen base percentage, and especially in fewest passed balls and wild pitches. At first, Brandon Belt's errors were up and fielding percentage down, though he continues to rank high in assists and range. Joe Panik's issues with the bat have not affected him in the field. His range and DP count were among the highest and his errors among the lowest, as usual, though he started only 94 games. Brandon Crawford, of course, outranks everyone in range at shortstop and was the only one to turn 100 double plays, though his errors were up (16). But Evan Longoria fielded only .950, was tied for second in errors despite missing 40 games, and his range was no better than average. The good news? Giants outfielders-- Duggar, Hernandez, Slater, and McCutchen-- were all above average in range. The outfield that couldn't get to balls in 2017 got to a lot more of them in 2018. Giants pitchers still gave up too many hits, but the team's DER was league average instead of league worst.

The Giants' WAR rankings: Posey 2.9, Belt 2.7. Crawford 2.6, Bumgarner 2.5, Rodriguez 2.3, McCutchen and Longoria 2.0, Watson and Holland 1.8, Moronta 1.5, Dyson 1.3, Cueto 1.2 (in nine starts!), Duggar 1.1, Smith 1.0, Suarez 0.5, Hanson, Hernandez, and Williamson (!) also 0.5, Slater 0.2, Hundley 0.1.  The worst contributors were Samardzija (-0.7 in only ten games), Strickland and Johnson -0.4, Pence, sadly, at -0.9, and the winnah, Austin Jackson at -1.2 in a lot fewer at-bats than Pence.  Overall, the Giants project to finish 20 wins above the Sacramento River Cats. 

The Playoff Picture

As we type, the Milwaukee Brewers and Chicago Cubs are tied 1-1 in the sixth inning of their one-game division playoff at Wrigley Field. The winner will host the wild-card elimination game winner later this week, which means the same two teams could certainly meet in that division series. Coming up in a bit  is a similar clash between the Dodgers and Rockies at Chavez Ravine for the NL West title, with the loser taking the second wild-card spot and playing the NL Central playoff loser on the road. Keep in mind these are not postseason games; they are the 163rd game of the regular season for each team. The yearly statistical roll we post this time every year will wait until tomorrow to make sure all totals are final. 

The Atlanta Braves are above all this special-playoff fuss; having won the NL East going away, the new-look Braves, under third-year manager Brian Snitker, already know they will play the NL West winner.

Over in the American League the Boston Red Sox left the competition in the dust about four months ago; they finished 108-54, eight wins ahead of the 100-game-winning wild-card Yankees. The defending world champion Houston Astros won 103 games and beat out a late surge by Oakland; this means the A's will play at New York Wednesday for the wild-card elimination game, with the winner going to Boston. The Cleveland Indians ran away with the AL Central and their upcoming ALDS against the 'Stros is by far the most intriguing matchup of this postseason.

What do the numbers show? Good ol' Pythagoras maintains Houston is the team to beat; their projection is for 109 wins, six ahead of their actual total, while Boston comes in at a still-impressive 103, five games off their finish. The Yankees, Indians, and A's follow in step, at 99, 98, and 95. In the National League the Dodgers, whether or not they end up the wild-card, are top dog with 101 projected wins, ten ahead of their total. The Cubs, Braves, and Brewers are clustered eight, nine, and ten games back, right about at their actual win totals, while the Rockies, the stat suggests, are playing over their head. They are six games better than their projection of 85-77. This 16-game statistical disparity between the Dodgers and Rockies is striking, and will be ever so much more so if Colorado wins their first-ever NL West division title today.

Pitching, pitching, pitching. Four of the five NL playoff teams are in the top five in team ERA; the Diamondbacks are fourth while the Rockies are 12th, well behind even the Giants, as we noted. It's just as pronounced in the American League, where the Tampa Bay Rays join the Playoff Five as the only teams with ERA below 4. The DH be damned: note that Houston is the best in all MLB at 3.11, more than half a run lower than their nearest AL competitor. 

When it comes to scoring runs, the Red Sox and Yankees are 'way ahead of everyone else, while the Dodgers and Rockies lead the NL postseason qualifiers. The Yankees hit 267 home runs this year-- it seems like that team record gets broken every season now. The highest-scoring "bad" team looks to be the Texas Rangers, who put up 737 runs to go with a team ERA of 4.92 and 95 losses. The long-suffering Seattle Mariners, by contrast, scored 60 fewer runs but won 22 more games, with a team ERA of 4.13, seventh in the AL. Also on the outside looking in are the Tampa Bay Rays, who won as many games as did the NL East champion Braves (90), but got no closer than 7 games to the last AL wild-card spot. Tampa was second in the league in ERA.

We'll have more, a lot more, to say about all this tomorrow once the postseason schedule is set and the final statistics are in.