Giants Notes: Ishikawa Is An Automatic Out and Zito Is Now Dominant

have been one of the biggest critics of Barry Zito over the past two years, but I am very impressed with the 20009 Zito. It was a joy to watch him pitch last night against the Dodgers.His performance reminded me of his great days in Oakland where he was often very dominant.

Zito only gave up one run in six innings and struck out five batters. He got his first win of the year and is now 1-2 with a respectable 3.57 ERA.

Travis Ishikawa is now batting .191 and is basically an automatic out. How hard is it to play first base? Of all the infield positions, isn't first base the easiest position to play? Time to bring up Jose Guzman from Fresno!

The Dodgers are starting a lefty today so Ishikawa will more than likely get the day off. Bochy loves to play Rich Aurilia against lefties in place of Ishikawa.

Merkin Valdez has a great fastball but he won't succeed as a setup man if he continues to walk batters and get into hitter's counts. It seems like every batter is in a 2-0 count before they see a strike from Valdez.

The at-bat by Casey Blake last night against Brian Wilson in the eigth inning last night was fun to watch. Blake had a 13 pitch at-bat until he got called out on strikes on an inside pitch by Wilson. Blake kept on fouling off great pitches by Wilson throughout the at-bat.

The Giants have a great chance to sweep the Dodgers who are without Manny Ramirez for the next 48 games. They are 0-2 without him already.

Jonanthan Sanchez and Tim Lincecum should be able to shut down this Dodgers lineup this weekend. Sanchez is prone to giving up walks and having control problems but if he is able to throw strikes this afternoon, he has the stuff to pitch a quality game.

Fred Lewis should not be batting leadoff since he is a strikeout machine but he has looked a lot better the last two games.

The Giants bullpen will be much better when Sergio Romo returns from injury.

Giants Offense Is Pathetic: Bring Up Guzman And Send Down Ishikawa

I thought that the Giants would have a better offense this season than last season but I was very wrong. This 2009 lineup of the Giants is just plain awful.

I figured that the young players such as Fred Lewis, Pablo Sandoval, and Travis Ishikawa would boost the offensive production of this team, and that the veterans such as Edgar Renteria and Aaron Rowand would also help out.

Rowand is only batting .233 and Renteria is not doing that much better with a.253 average.

Lewis seemed to have regress and strikes out too much for a lead-off hitter. He has only one RBI this season and no home runs. Sandoval slumped during the beginning of the season but he has picked it up of late.

Ishikawa, on the other hand, is batting only .217 and has had some terrible at-bats of late. He looked terrible with runners in scoring position yesterday afternoon against the Rockies pitchers.

Ishikawa should be sent down to Triple A and the Giants should bring up Jesus Guzman to take his place. Guzman has six homers and 20 RBIs with the Fresno Grizzlies, and the Giants really need his bat right now.

The Giants are last in the majors in runs scored with only 82 runs in 23 games. They have no power hitters at all, and have only 13 homers this season. Barry Bonds is still not retired but we all know that Brian Sabean, the Giants GM, has no interest in Bonds.

So far this offense has made average pitchers like Jason Hammel, Eric Stults, and Shawn Hill look like Cy Young.

If the Giants continue to struggle at the plate, they should fire their batting coach, Carney Lansford. I don't know if Lansford is a good batting coach or not, but someone has to be accountable for the offensive struggles.

This team has some solid starters like Tim Lincecum and Matt Cain but they have to almost be perfect in order to win every time they are on the mound.

Fans enjoy watching runs being scored and powerful offenses, but the Giants are right now a very boring team to watch.

I am certain that I am not the only one who misses Bonds and also wished that the Giants signed Manny Ramirez last winter.