Pre-Game & Lineups: San Francisco Giants Look To Take Game Two From Colorado Rockies With Matt Cain

The San Francisco Giants will look to take game two from the Colorado Rockies today at AT&T Park, first pitch at 1:05pm PT.

Matt Cain will get the start for the Giants and is looking to rebound from a rough start this season. In his last game against the Dodgers on April 6, Cain went six innings (6 H, 5 ER, 3 HR) bringing his ERA to a 5.73. In Cain’s first start of the season against the Diamondbacks, he pitched five innings, allowing 7 H and 2 ERs.

Here is how Cain matches up against Colorado’s offense.

The Giants’ starting pitching has been disappointing so far this season. They’ve only had three quality starts and it’s been difficult for them to pitch more than six innings. The Giants currently rank 17th overall in the MLB with a 3.95 ERA.

The Giants offense has been impressive, they’re hitting .400 with runners in scoring position with two outs.  Angel Pagan is batting .442, Michael Morse .394, Buster Posey .351, Brandon Crawford .303, Brandon Belt .292. Hunter Pence (.156) and Pablo Sandoval (.143) haven’t started the season very strong but should see improvement as the season continues.

Pagan’s .442 batting average is currently fourth in the MLB. Belt is still tied with Mark Trumbo for the most home runs in the MLB with five.

Brett Anderson (0-2, 4.50 ERA) will start for the Rockies today. Anderson spent five seasons with Oakland so the Giants haven’t seen much of him in the past.

Charlie Blackmon will start in center field for the Rockies today and is currently leading major leagues in hitting with a .486 batting average. He is batting .333 against Cain.

Lineups

Team Competition

Hensley Meulens was on KNBR this morning and talked about a competition going on between with the Giants’ hitters. There are three groups led by Posey, Pence and Sandoval. They had a draft day in the beginning of the season and each team consists of six hitters, five starting pitchers and bench players. Each team is scored on a points system and Meulens keeps score every half inning.

Here are a few examples of how a batter can receive points:

• 1 point: advancing a base
• 1 point: RBI
• 2 points: a pinch hit
• 3 ponts: two-out RBI
• 3 points: two-strike RBI
• 5 points: home run

A batter can get up to 11 points for a home run when you include total bases and RBIs.

There are also points taken away for not-so-quality at bats. Meulens gave the example of Sandoval in last night’s game. There were batters at 1st and 3rd base with no outs and Pablo hit a fly ball to right field that didn’t advance any runners so he had one point taken away.

The competition is aimed to put more responsibility on the batters by making it fun while paying more attention at the plate. Meulens said Belt is over Pagan by 2 points but last night Pagan received 12 points and Belt 7 points.

‘Team Brandon’ is the current leader. The team is led by Posey (Buster means Brandon in Georgia State), Lincecum (Timmy means Brandon in Washington State), Adrianza (Ehire means Brandon in Spanish).

Let’s watch Madison Bumgarner‘s grand slam from last night again. It was so perfect.