San Francisco Giants: A tale of two teams and predictions for the playoff push

Aug 15, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants first baseman Buster Posey (28) hits an RBI double against the Washington Nationals during the fifth inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

The 2015 season for the San Francisco Giants has been anything but consistent. It can be described as frustrating, promising, and even downright confusing, but definitely not normal. Heck, when has anything been normal when it comes to San Francisco?

This season has changed from confident to panic within days. One week, San Francisco will go on a winning streak and make fans say, “Repeat, baby! I’m saving my money for postseason tickets now.” All of a sudden the next week comes around and they get swept, leading fans to say, “WTF? What are we going to do now? Alright, we have to go trade for Chase Utley. Heck, lets ask Brett Favre to come and play because we all know he will never retire.” We are fans. It’s what we do.

Call to the Pen

The past few weeks have been a perfect example of what we have been dealing with all year long: inconsistency. It is as if the team is playing through Brandon Belt in that he is hot as anybody at times and can’t hit water if he fell out of a boat other times. Anybody catch that Bull Durham reference? I left out Crash Davis’s profanity for your own good.

As we take a look at the Giants results of each month, you will see that it is as if San Francisco couldn’t buy a win at AT&T Park, but more recently they can’t win anywhere but in good ‘ol home sweet home. It must be something in the water.

April:

After the first month of the 2015 season, the Giants struggled with the injuries to Hunter Pence, Hunter Pence, and Jake Peavy.

May 9, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants left fielder Nori Aoki (23) at the plate during the first inning against the Miami Marlins at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Bob Stanton-USA TODAY Sports

Longest Win Streak: 3 games

Longest Losing Streak: 8 games

Team Slash Line: .247/.313/.362

Top Performer: Nori Aoki

Month Record: 9-13

Overall Record: 9-13

May:

Through the second month, the return of Pence allowed the offense to come alive.

Oct 29, 2014; Kansas City, MO, USA; Mandatory Credit: John Rieger-USA TODAY Sports

Longest Win Streak: 8 games

Longest Losing Streak: 2 games

Team Slash Line: .291/.348/.439

Top Performer: Brandon Crawford

Month Record: 21-9

Overall Record: 30-22

June:

Through the third month, Pence heads back to the DL, along with Nori Aoki. The offense returns to first month form, but the returns of Jake Peavy and Matt Cain are close.

Jun 24, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey (28) hits a grand slam against the San Diego Padres during the third inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Ed Szczepanski-USA TODAY Sports

Longest Win Streak: 3 games

Longest Losing Streak: 5 games

Team Slash Line: .263/.323/.404

Top Performer: Buster Posey

Month Record: 12-14

Overall Record: 42-36

July:

Through the fourth month, Giants fans get a taste of the real team as Pence, Cain, Peavy, and Aoki all return from the DL around the All Star break. However, Tim Lincecum heads to the DL and Ryan Vogelsong is sent to the bullpen. Tim Hudson and Andrew Susac head to the DL after the acquisition of Mike Leake.

Jun 3, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants third baseman Matt Duffy (5) throws the ball to first base against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the sixth inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

Longest Win Streak: 6 games

Longest Losing Streak: 6 games

Team Slash Line: .283/.324/.414

Top Performer: Matt Duffy

Month Record: 14-10

Overall Record: 56-46

August:

Through the first couple weeks of the month, we have seen the worst and some of the best we have seen from the Giants all season long. Aoki heads back to the DL, as Angel Pagan and Joe Panik join him.

Jul 5, 2014; San Diego, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants first baseman Brandon Belt (9) hits a two run home run during the tenth inning against the San Diego Padres at Petco Park. Mandatory Credit: Jake Roth-USA TODAY Sports

Longest Win Streak: 3 games

Longest Losing Streak: 4 games

Team Slash Line: .257/.315/.451

Top Performer: Brandon Belt

Month Record: 7-7

Overall Record: 63-53

Tough to see where the Giants are going to go from here, as the inconsistency throughout the season makes it tough for experts to predict what will happen next.

I guess it could be consistently inconsistent, in that there is a pattern: “good month, bad month, good month, bad month, etc.” So if I were to predict August, I would say the Giants will struggle, and September will be perfect timing to have their best month of the season. All signs point to another postseason appearance. This is why we are called experts: because we are good at guessing.