Giants (4) vs Japan (6) 3-11-09

Interesting game against Team Japan yesterday. The first thing you notice is the press coverage. There must have been 200 members of the press on the field before the game. I remember when Keiichi Yabu first reported to the Giants camp last year. He had an "entourage" of about 15 members of the Japanese Press following him everywhere.....and that was for a 39 year old who really wasn't very good when he was younger. Also the fans are very into this WBC stuff. About half of the people of Japanese decent in the crowd had a Japanese Flag drawn on their face and there were numerous signs written in Japanese throughout the crowd. My seats are right on the aisle behind the visitor's dugout. My view of the game was disturbed almost continuously by Japanese fans running down the aisle to the dugout and snapping photos of the players.....especially since Yu Darvish spent most of the game on the dugout railing right in front of me.

Tim Lincecum started the game and while he kept his spring ERA at 0.00, he was not as sharp as he has been in his other 3 spring starts. Timmy's problem was control related. He did strike out 5 batters, but he also walked 3 in 2.1 innings. He only allowed one single, but left 2 men on base when he left the game with 1 out in the 3rd. Tim threw 49 pitches in 2.1 innings as compared to 28 pitches in 3 full innings in his last start. In addition to the 3 walks he went deep in a lot of counts. Jesse English relieved Lincecum and helped Tim out by stranding both runners.

The Giants took a 4-0 lead after 3 innings and hit the ball pretty well off of the first 2 Japanese pitchers. The problem was that the Giants went hitless after the 4th inning. Their only offense from the 5th on was 2 walks and 1 hit batsman by submariner Shunsuke Watanabe. Giants' starters: Randy Winn (o for 2), Bengie Molina (0 for 3), Aaron Rowand (0 for 3 not to mention a GIDP), Rich Aurilia (0 for 2) and Eugenio Velez (0 for 4) all went hitless.

Although they did hit 3 doubles, it is obvious the Japanese Team lives on the principle of "small ball". Lots of dinks and bloopers fell for basehits, they stole 3 bases and 2 of their 6 runs scored by way of the sacrifice fly. The Japanese players are also more into the game than their American counterparts. The entire team was up on the dugout railing for the entire game and any player who scored went the entire length of the dugout receiving congratulations from his teammates. It actually reminded me a little of a high school game because of the level of enthusiasm from the players.

As I said......a very fun game to watch. It's always interesting to see the differences amongst cultures.......even when they are playing the same game.


Note: The Giants have an off day today and are playing the Rockies in Tucson tomorrow. Since I go to so many games these days, I have avoided the 2 hr one-way drive to Tucson for the past couple of years. So the next game I will be going to will be against the Padres on Saturday. It's supposed to be 75 degrees here the next couple of days. It will be hard to find something to do in weather like that.......but I will force myself.