05/02/2006 8:00 PM ET
Bonds' homer not enough vs. Padres
Morris earns 1,000th strikeout, but takes second loss of year
By Tony Kuttner / Special to MLB.com
Barry Bonds connects on his 712th homer on a 3-2 pitch from Scott Linebrink.
(Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP)
SAN FRANCISCO -- Barry Bonds moved 440 feet -- the estimated distance of
career blast No. 712 -- closer to catching Babe Ruth on Tuesday, and Matt
Morris put career strikeout No. 1,000 in the books, but those accomplishments
were spoiled by the Padres' 5-3 win over the Giants.
It was the third straight loss for the Giants, whose offense has been
sputtering of late. During the mini-skid, San Francisco has been outscored
23-9.
"Whatever the reason, we've got to be better at home," said manager Felipe
Alou after watching his team finish an eight-game homestand with just three
wins.
The latest loss dropped the Giants to the .500 mark for the first time since
April 4 and gave the Padres a sweep of the two-day series.
There does seem to be some difference of opinion over the cause of the Giants'
woes of late.
For example, Alou had little bad to say about Morris' efforts.
"He threw extremely well, especially after the first couple of innings," Alou
said. "I liked him today."
Morris (2-2) reached an opposing conclusion.
"Overall, it was terrible," he said. "Any time you put the team in a hole like
that, it's hard to get out of, and we couldn't get out of it today."
The hole Morris mentioned was dug early.
San Diego's Dave Roberts led off the game with a sharp grounder that second
baseman Kevin Frandsen flagged down after ranging right, but Frandsen, with
time to make the throw, put the ball in the dirt short of Lance Niekro's glove
, and Roberts was on with an error.
Morris caught a bit too much of the plate with a fastball on the next pitch,
and Mike Cameron jacked it deep into the left-field seats for his first home
run of the year.
The Padres added two more after two outs in the second on an RBI triple by
Roberts and an RBI double by Brian Giles.
"It's frustrating not to go out there and put up zeros and let your team get
a chance to get ahead," Morris said. "You want to go out there and keep the
other team down and get your team in the dugout with some quick outs.
"Giving up that many runs is going against my plans."
And not scoring that many runs is certainly against the Giants' plans. They
did manage to push one across in the second, when Steve Finley tripled off
Woody Williams (2-1), then came home when Williams balked.
After the Padres tacked on a run in the fifth, Pedro Feliz answered with a
solo shot off the left-field foul pole for his third homer this season.
Then came the seventh, when, with Scott Linebrink pitching, Bonds crushed a
96-mph fastball to dead-center to finish off the Giants' scoring.
"Not very many people can hit that ball, especially 900 feet," said Williams,
who was a mere spectator by the time Bonds hit his blast. "That ball's chest
high -- he's that good."
"In the last at-bat, a 41-year-old guy playing a day game after a night game
-- that was an awesome pitch," Alou said. "Nobody else had a swing like that
off that fastball."
There weren't too many swings like that off Williams, either.
The Giants collected just five hits and one walk off the Padres starter, who
didn't appear overly dominant in his 5 2/3 innings.
"We just let them get by," Bonds said. "[Williams] made a lot of mistakes out
there. We didn't capitalize on anything. We just weren't swinging the bats out
there all day. We just didn't play good."
Again, others in the Giants clubhouse had differing opinions.
"By no means are we playing bad baseball," said Finley. "The pitching has been
good, and the offense will turn it around."
Finley said that he thinks the Giants offense is close to reawakening.
"It's a matter of us pulling together and getting good, consistent at-bats
from four or five guys," he said. "Not walking, necessarily, but seeing some
pitches and making the pitcher work for it. We're not doing that, especially
with guys on base."
Of course the Giants have to get those guys on base in the first place. On
Tuesday, they had just four plate appearances with a runner in scoring
position -- four more if you count Bonds as being in scoring position when
he's in the batter's box. Out of that, they got just one run, and that was
Finley coming home on the balk.
With results like that, all of the individual milestones lose luster. Finley
said that he's not too impressed about leading the league in triples after
collecting No. 5 on Tuesday, and Morris was even more dismissive about career
strikeout No. 1,000.
"Who cares?" he said. "I appreciate you recognizing it, but it's meaningless."
Tony Kuttner is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the
approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
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COBRAS.....只有三種......
嚴肅認真的COBRAS.......
幽默搞怪的COBRAS.......
還有.....溫柔體貼的COBRAS.......
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