In only mid-July, Giants and A’s seasons are effectively over.
Bay Area celebrating 50 years with two teams in a dubious manner
In the golden anniversary year of their Bay Area co-existence, the Giants and A’s have produced a baseball season made of lead.
Lead as in dead. Both teams have been mostly dreadful almost from Day 1. The season is essentially over on both sides of the bay here in mid-July, and the bitter upshot is that fans of each team still have 70-some games to suffer.
Is this any way to celebrate the 50th year of our status as a twoteam baseball market? This could be the worst baseball season ever in the Bay Area.
The A’s and Giants are on pace for a combined total of 192 losses — 101 by the Giants, 91 by the A’s. That would rank second only to 1979 when the teams combined for 199 losses. The A’s lost 108 that season. To underscore that team’s wretchedness, it even had a player named Mickey Klutts.
This season has been a more shared stumble of futility, compounded by the mortifying indignities of Madison Bumgarner taking a tumble off a dirt bike and Stephen Vogt getting his walking papers. Both teams are in last place.
When was the last time the Giants and A’s both finished in the cellar over a full season? At least in the Bay Area, would you believe never? It’s true. Yes, in 1995, both teams did wind up at the bottom of their respective divisions with identical records of 67-77. But it was a shortened season due to a labor dispute.
As the teams stagger out of the All Star break, the Giants are 27 games behind the Dodgers, and the A’s are 21 games behind Hous-
ton. Wild card prospects? Nope. The only race might be against each other. The A’s are 5 ½ games better than the Giants, but the teams square off for four games starting July 31. Oh, boy.
Giants pitchers have given up the most hits in baseball. Their batters have hit the fewest home runs.
The A’s have made the most errors of any team in baseball. Their batters have struck out 852 times, producing nothing but breeze in more than 25 percent of their plate appearances.
At least everyone stays cool in the mostly empty Coliseum.
In virtually every statistical category, traditional or newfangled, the A’s and Giants rank in the bottom third of baseball.
In many of them they’re in the bottom five, and in some instances, dead last. Actually, the Giants do lead the majors in one offensive stat: sacrifice flies. That should make you laugh, albeit through clenched teeth. Maybe there’s a promotion to be had there: Wizards of the Warning Track!
Yikes, it can’t get any worse, can it? Wait. Sure it can. The A’s could trade Jed Lowrie and Yonder Alonso, two of their best hitters, along with one-time ace Sonny Gray. In their place will be even more kids who don’t yet require shaving cream.
The Giants would like to get out from under the monstrous contract of their best healthy starter, Johnny Cueto. And aside from Buster Posey, Bumgarner and Brandon Crawford, there are no untouchable Giants at this point, not even Brandon Belt. Belt’s 2016 contract extension really kicks in starting next year, to the tune of $17.2 million in each of the next four years.
It’s those kind of salary numbers that make the Giants’ situation far more embarrassing than the A’s, who are clearly in reload mode.
With a payroll of right around $180 million, the Giants might wind up the most expensive 100- loss team in baseball history. At least the A’s are losing for roughly $100 million less, even despite paying $11.6 million to long-gone Billy Butler this year.
The A’s only have around $25 million in committed payroll for 2018. The Giants? If they can’t find a taker for Cueto and he elects not to opt out, they’ll be on the hook for more than $150 million right out of the 2018 gate.
Then again, the Giants are still filling their cashcow ballpark in China Basin, or so they say — 530 consecutive sellouts, despite a conspicuously growing number of empty seats during June and early July. How long will that streak last if the losing trend continues?
Good question, but since nobody anticipated this kind of jaw- dropping free fall — least of all the Giants themselves — they’re in a bit of a pickle with so many players locked into expensive free- agent contracts.
The A’s, despite their renewed commitment to Oakland and all the fan-friendly goodwill and improvements under new president Dave Kaval, are 29th in MLB attendance and lagging behind their own gate average of last year, even with top draws Boston and New York already having come through town for four games each.
The A’s did draw a 40,000- plus crowd for a July 3 fireworks show, but capitalized by losing 7-2 to the worst team in the American League, the Chicago White Sox.
And therein lies the problem: This could be the third consecutive season of 90plus losses for the A’s. That hasn’t happened since 197779, when Charles O. Finley was in full dynasty demolition mode.
So an upswing needs to start happening in Oakland — and fast. That will be the charge for all the kids in the second half.
In fairness, it should be noted that the A’s and Giants have been pretty good to us in the 21st century, and really, through most of their time together here. They haven’t had joint losing seasons since 2008 — nine years.
And it’s only happened 10 times in the previous 49 years. Moreover, there have been 17 seasons when both teams had winning records. And there have been seven World Series championships — four by the A’s, three by the Giants.
So it could be worse. Really, just ask Chicago, it could be worse. Bay Area baseball fans can only hope this horror show of a 2017 season represents the worst of simultaneous strife for a good long while, and that the next 70 games go down easier than the first 90.