SAN FRANCISCO – This World Series is All About Barry. That’s why the Angels are pitching All Around Barry. That strategy is a flawed one, however, and Mike Scioscia is one Tim Salmon home run from being down 0-2.
Of course, Scioscia has one thing going for him with this plan of attack: The three Giants ahead of Bonds have been dreadful. If the Giants are going to win this series, Kenny Lofton, Rich Aurilia and Jeff Kent had better start hitting.
The three are batting a combined .115 in the World Series with one RBI, heading into Game 3 last night at Pac Bell Park.
The only time Aurilia got a hit, a double in the fifth inning of Game 2, Scioscia intentionally walked Bonds and the Giants produced a four-run inning. The only time Lofton got a hit, a single in the second inning of Game 2, the Giants produced a four-run inning.
There’s a pattern developing here, and you don’t have be TV detective Monk to figure out. If the Giants’ Three Amigos don’t hit, Scioscia will look like a genius.
Here’s the really fascinating part. In the first two games, Bonds did not take a swing with a runner on base. Not one swing. He wasn’t even thrown a strike with a runner on base. Instead of Barry Bonds, Home Run King he became Barry Bonds, Rally Starter.
The Angels’ strategy backfired in the second game because in each of those two four-run innings by the Giants, Bonds walked early in the inning and came around to score. No, it wasn’t a home run, but it was still a run scored. When you score 11 runs as the Angels did, it can hide some blemishes.
In the Giants’ 4-3 Game 1 victory, Bonds homered his first time up to lead off the second inning. At that point, the Angels gave up trying to get him out. Bonds struck out his second at-bat, but that was really his fault because with the count full, he swung at a high and way-inside pitch that would have been ball four. Bonds grounded out to lead off the sixth and walked in the eighth.
In the Angels’ 11-10 win in Game 2, basically your College World Series affair, Bonds walked to lead off the second against Kevin Appier even though Appier had a 5-0 lead. That ignited a four-run rally. Then in the third, after Kent led off with a home run, Bonds was walked again, but Benito Santiago lined into a double play, killing that rally. Two innings later, Aurilia doubled to lead off, Kent struck out and Bonds was walked intentionally, setting up another four-run inning.
The next inning Bonds was retired by Super Kid Francisco Rodriguez on a hard grounder to first with two outs and no one on base. Bonds had one final at-bat in the game with two outs in the ninth, no one on and the Giants trailing 11-9. Bonds launched his Mammoth Mountain home run off Troy Percival, the longest home run the Angels had ever seen, a shot well over 450 feet. But again, it was a solo home run, and there’s the problem for the Giants.
Until David Eckstein is traded to the Giants, Lofton, Aurilia and Kent had better be table-setters.
It doesn’t help matters for the Giants that No. 5 hitter Santiago, the MVP of the NLCS, is batting .222 over the first two games with no RBIs, but Santiago is that type of hitter. One hit can make up for a lot of sins. It’s the guys in front of Bonds that have been killing the Giants.
The Giants hitters will feel more comfortable now that they are home. They’ve been saying all along theirs is not a one-man team. Now they have to show it.