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San Francisco Giants Knocking On Postseason Door, Probably Won't Let Colorado Rockies Get In Way

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The San Francisco Giants used a series victory over the Colorado Rockies last week, as well as two wins over the Arizona Diamondbacks over the weekend, to increase their lead in the National League West to 7.5 games -- a full two games more than it was a week ago. Things look good for the Giants in terms of being able to build on that this week as well, as they host the last-place Rockies in a four-game set at AT&T Park starting on Monday night.

Perhaps the best thing the Giants have going for them in this series, other than the fact that the Rockies are terrible, is that Ryan Vogelsong will miss it. Over the last couple of trips through the rotation, Vogelsong has clearly been the weak link, posting a 12.34 ERA in three September starts. August wasn't much better, either; despite winning four games, Vogelsong's ERA was 6.32. He has allowed more runs in August and September (35) than he did in the first four months of the season (34). So, obviously there's an issue there.

Luckily for the Giants, they have four other pitchers who are holding down the fort, including Monday's starter, Madison Bumgarner. Bumgarner has been hit hard in September as well, but he was terrific in August and at least has been able to back up his last couple of poor outings by swinging the bat well (against Colorado, at least). He's a much likelier candidate to bounce back than Vogelsong, so his struggles shouldn't be as worrisome.

The Giants also have this guy, who is usually a nightmare for opposing hitters:


Matt Cain

#18 / Pitcher / San Francisco Giants

6-3

230

R

R

Oct 01, 1984


W-L ERA WHIP K BB
2012 - Matt Cain 14-5 2.93 1.05 177 45


Matt Cain is nothing if not consistent, as he'll surround a 5 ER stinker with a stretch of starts where he doesn't allow more than two runs. And, it's one thing to allow two runs when you only pitch four innings (which qualifies as a great start in the Rockies' rotation), and it's a completely different thing to constantly do it while going 7-8 innings in every start. Matt Cain is awesome. He's a dick, but he's awesome. Now let's ta ...


Rich Aurilia

#35 / San Francisco Giants

6-1

200

Sep 02, 1971

Record vs. Bryan Kilpatrick on Twitter: 0-1

... Wow. I'm sorry for that interruption.

Where was I? Oh ... now let's talk about Tim Lincecum. Ol' LeRoy has had a strange 2012 campaign to say the least. He basically was a terrible pitcher from April through July in terms of earned runs and all that jazz, but he was still striking a ton of people out. However, in August, he put up a respectable 3.90 ERA (which was about a run and a half lower than his season ERA to that point), but struck out batters at a rate that would easily be a career low. Reading into that small of a sample size too much can be dangerous, but it appears that he resorted to more of a pitch-to-contact approach, and it looks like it may have worked in his favor. We'll have to keep an eye on that as the season winds down (note: his strikeout totals are back up over 10 per nine innings thus far in September).

Barry Zito. Ugh. He'll pitch in this series, and we already know how that is going to turn out. But strangely, he has been keeping a lot of opposing offenses at bay this season, which is something the Giants have to be thrilled about. Zito's walk rate is the lowest it has been since his days in Oakland, which certainly has been a key cog to his success in 2012.

As far as the Giants' offense is concerned, I'm not going to get into that because, let's face it: other than Buster Posey, there's nothing to talk about. And we already profiled him last week. I'm sure Giants fans are actually relieved about these developments.

Probable pitchers and more after the jump.

Game 1 -- Monday, Sept. 17 at 8:15 p.m. MT (ROOT)

Jhoulys Chacin (2-5, 4.86 ERA) vs. Madison Bumgarner (14-10, 3.32 ERA)

Game 2 -- Tuesday, Sept. 18 at 8:15 p.m. MT (ROOT/MLBN)

Jeff Francis (5-5, 5.68) vs. Tim Lincecum (9-14, 5.09)

Game 3 -- Wednesday, Sept. 19 at 8:15 p.m. MT (ROOT)

Tyler Chatwood (4-4, 5.65) vs. Matt Cain (14-5, 2.93)

Game 4 -- Thursday, Sept. 20 at 1:45 p.m. MT (ROOT)

Drew Pomeranz (1-9, 5.06) vs. Barry Zito (12-8, 4.21)


Batting

G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG
Santiago Casilla 65 2 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 .500 .500 .500
Melky Cabrera 113 459 84 159 25 10 11 60 36 63 13 5 .346 .390 .516
Marco Scutaro 47 191 27 66 12 1 2 31 9 13 2 1 .346 .364 .450
Xavier Nady 5 12 2 4 2 0 0 3 3 3 0 0 .333 .500 .500
Buster Posey 133 481 73 160 36 0 22 93 64 88 1 1 .333 .407 .545
Angel Pagan 139 549 84 160 33 13 8 55 43 89 25 7 .291 .341 .443
Joaquin Arias 100 292 28 81 13 5 4 33 13 38 4 1 .277 .312 .397
Pablo Sandoval 92 345 52 95 22 2 8 50 29 51 0 1 .275 .327 .420
Brandon Belt 130 369 40 100 25 5 6 53 49 97 11 1 .271 .358 .415
Ryan Theriot 95 334 44 89 14 1 0 27 24 44 12 4 .266 .315 .314
Hector Sanchez 66 191 17 50 12 0 2 32 3 49 0 0 .262 .273 .356
Nate Schierholtz 77 175 15 44 4 5 5 16 18 36 3 2 .251 .321 .417
Brandon Crawford 129 399 40 98 25 2 4 43 32 83 1 4 .246 .305 .348
Gregor Blanco 126 367 54 87 13 5 5 31 48 98 22 3 .237 .327 .341
Hunter Pence 43 165 21 38 11 2 4 34 14 45 1 0 .230 .301 .394
Emmanuel Burriss 55 132 15 29 1 0 0 6 10 24 5 2 .220 .278 .227
Brett Pill 46 102 10 22 3 0 4 11 5 19 1 0 .216 .266 .363
Aubrey Huff 41 67 7 12 3 0 1 6 13 10 0 0 .179 .309 .269
Madison Bumgarner 29 64 4 10 1 0 2 5 1 23 0 0 .156 .169 .266
Conor Gillaspie 6 20 2 3 1 0 0 2 0 2 0 0 .150 .150 .200
Matt Cain 32 67 5 10 2 0 1 5 2 31 0 0 .149 .174 .224
Charlie Culberson 6 22 0 3 0 0 0 1 0 7 0 0 .136 .136 .136
Eli Whiteside 7 8 3 1 1 0 0 1 1 3 0 0 .125 .300 .250
Justin Christian 30 54 6 6 1 0 0 2 5 3 2 1 .111 .186 .130
Tim Lincecum 30 42 2 4 0 0 0 3 4 24 0 0 .095 .174 .095
Ryan Vogelsong 28 49 4 4 1 0 0 0 2 29 0 0 .082 .135 .102
Barry Zito 29 47 2 3 0 0 0 2 6 10 0 0 .064 .170 .064
Francisco Peguero 8 9 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Eric Hacker 4 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Jose Mijares 21 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .000 .000 .000
George Kontos 38 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Steve Edlefsen 14 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Dan Otero 11 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Shane Loux 17 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Brad Penny 18 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Clay Hensley 55 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Jeremy Affeldt 60 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Tyler Graham 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Javier Lopez 66 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Dan Runzler 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Travis Blackley 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Brian Wilson 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Sergio Romo 62 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Jean Machi 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000
Guillermo Mota 19 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000

Pitching

W-L G GS CG SHO SV BS IP H R ER HR BB K ERA WHIP
Dan Runzler 0-0 3 0 0 0 0 0 1.0 1 0 0 0 2 1 0.00 3.00
Sergio Romo 4-2 62 0 0 0 11 1 49.2 34 11 11 5 10 56 1.99 .89
Javier Lopez 3-0 66 0 0 0 7 2 34.2 37 13 10 1 14 27 2.60 1.47
Santiago Casilla 7-5 65 0 0 0 24 6 56.2 46 21 17 7 21 51 2.70 1.18
George Kontos 2-1 38 0 0 0 0 1 39.0 33 15 12 3 11 39 2.77 1.13
Jeremy Affeldt 1-2 60 0 0 0 3 1 57.1 54 22 18 1 22 51 2.83 1.33
Matt Cain 14-5 32 29 2 2 0 0 199.1 165 70 65 20 45 177 2.93 1.05
Madison Bumgarner 14-10 29 29 2 1 0 0 192.2 170 78 71 20 41 175 3.32 1.10
Jose Mijares 1-0 21 0 0 0 0 0 12.2 11 5 5 0 7 14 3.55 1.42
Ryan Vogelsong 12-9 28 28 0 0 0 0 172.2 159 73 70 16 59 143 3.65 1.26
Barry Zito 12-8 29 29 1 1 0 0 166.2 164 84 78 20 65 99 4.21 1.37
Clay Hensley 4-3 55 0 0 0 3 1 46.1 43 27 23 5 28 39 4.47 1.53
Steve Edlefsen 0-1 14 0 0 0 0 0 15.1 20 8 8 1 6 9 4.70 1.70
Jean Machi 0-0 5 0 0 0 0 0 3.2 4 2 2 0 1 3 4.91 1.36
Tim Lincecum 9-14 30 30 0 0 0 0 169.2 169 99 96 19 82 177 5.09 1.48
Guillermo Mota 0-1 19 0 0 0 0 1 17.0 18 11 10 2 7 19 5.29 1.47
Shane Loux 0-0 17 0 0 0 0 0 23.1 31 15 14 3 8 9 5.40 1.67
Eric Hacker 0-1 4 1 0 0 0 0 9.2 14 6 6 2 2 8 5.59 1.66
Brad Penny 0-1 18 0 0 0 0 0 24.0 36 18 16 3 6 7 6.00 1.75
Dan Otero 0-0 11 0 0 0 0 0 11.1 18 11 8 0 2 7 6.35 1.76
Travis Blackley 0-0 4 0 0 0 0 0 5.0 7 6 5 0 2 2 9.00 1.80
Brian Wilson 0-0 2 0 0 0 1 0 2.0 4 2 2 0 2 2 9.00 3.00


San Francisco Giants Injuries

Questionable

Player Injury Type Injury Date
Angel Pagan lower-back 09/17/2012
Xavier Nady hamstring 09/17/2012

15-Day

Player Injury Type Injury Date
Dan Runzler other-excused 03/26/2012

60 Day DL / Out for the season

Player Injury Type Injury Date
Freddy Sanchez shoulder 03/26/2012
Eric Surkamp elbow 03/26/2012
Brian Wilson elbow 04/13/2012