Tag Archives: hunter pence

by | May 18, 2015 · 11:29 PM

Episode 86: The Reverend is Back!

No matter what he looks like doing the things he does, we like the things he does, because it helps others do thing better, and stuff.

You can download the episode here, or stream it below!

[audio http://torturecast.podomatic.com/enclosure/2015-05-18T23_24_45-07_00.mp3]

Hunter Pence is back. And not just on Twitch, but like hitting homeruns and throwing awkwardly from right field. Yes, all is right with the world.

Back when the Giants were 4-10, we didn’t panic. We said let’s wait until they have played 40 games, and if they’re at .500 and Hunter is back, they’ll be fine. Welp, they’re 20-18 now, so guaranteed to be at .500 after 40, and Hunter IS back, and had a huge hand in the last two wins, going 4-8 with a homerun and scoring five runs. The Giants have the best record in the NL since their bad start at 16-8, and have a great stretch of games coming to balloon that record.

Join Chad and Eric as they discuss the Giants’ recent success as they delve deep into numbers, including Casilla’s immaculate inning, only the 79th in recorded history. Belt is hitting .321 and shutting up his haters, Pagan’s back is acting up, and Bochy names coaches for the All Star Game. Plus, Jeff Loria named his cat as manager of the Marlins.

Enjoy episode 86 of the TortureCast!

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by | May 15, 2015 · 4:12 PM

Hunter Pence is back

Mitchell Leff/Getty Images

Mitchell Leff/Getty Images

 

The long nightmare is over. Hunter Pence is returning to right field fo the San Francisco Giants. This Andrew Baggarly tweet rolled across the ol’ Twitter timeline Friday afternoon.

That is great news for all of us. The world is just a better place with Hunter Pence in the starting lineup. His hustle helps the Giants get through soe rough times. It will be great to see him charging hard through first base and sliding around the outfield.

Hunter Pence is back.

The Giants did a great job of fighting to have a .500ish record while he was injured. Having him back for 2 in Cincinnatti and then a home series with the Dodgers could be a launching point for this team. Or it could not. But he’s such a positive force on that field and in the clubhouse that it has to be a boost for the team. Hunter Pence is back. So who gets sent down to make room for Pence on the roster? John Shea says it’s going to be a catcher.

If I had a vote. It be fun to have a vote, wouldn’t it? I’d send down Hector Sanchez. The addition of Andrew Susac catching to give Buster Posey some days at first is working out just fine. There’s no need to carry 3 catchers anymore. The bullpen is set right now so shuffling around isn’t needed. The real shuffle happens when “It’s Travis Ishikawa” comes back to the team. But that’s another day.

With Pence returning to the lineup Saturday night here’s the batting order I’d love to see on a regular basis. Brandon Belt has been in a funk with a lot of the swing and miss lately. Maybe moving to 6th and lenghtening the Giants lineup will get him going again. Make it happen Boch.

Aoki LF
Panik 2B
Pagan CF
Posey C
Pence RF
Belt 1B
Duffy 3B
Crawford SS
Pitcher

On Posey first base days you can just slot Susac in for Belt. You’ll also note that I have Matt Duffy in the lineup. He should be playing everyday. But that’s a whole other post I don’t have in me right now. Today’s news is all sunshine and roses.

Hunter Pence is back.

-Eric
@2outhits

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by | April 27, 2015 · 11:24 PM

Episode 85: Gotta Say It Was a Good Week

Justin Maxwell delivers a game winning RBI against the Dodgers to complete the sweep. Cuz, that’s cool.

Download the episode here, or stream the podcast below:

[audio http://torturecast.podomatic.com/enclosure/2015-04-27T23_03_01-07_00.mp3]

We got to talk about a winning week in episode 85. The Giants swept the Dodgers at home, and they went 4-1 for the week. We’ll ignore the fact that the Giants lost to the Dodgers tonight. That doesn’t count.

Chad thinks Sanchez will be DFA’d when Pence comes back, we love Maxwell and Aoki, hate Ventura, Twitter and Arte Mareno.

Come join this “less than 1 hour” episode of the TortureCast!

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by | April 3, 2015 · 7:43 PM

SF Giants preview: The regulars

Buster Posey of the San Francisco Giants

Photo via AP Images

Well here we are. The 2015 San Francisco Giants season is upon us. I thought I’d take this time to preview the season and throw out some predictions. I’m sure you’ve read the “big boy” publications and what they forecast for the season so I’m not going to even mention the fact that none of them are giving the Giants a chance to do big things this season.

Nope. Won’t mention it at all. That whole odd year thing? I won’t mention that either.

I previewed the starting rotation yesterday. Today I’m looking at the starting 8. Well, truthfully, it’s the starting 9. Even though Hunter Pence is out until sometime during April, I’m going to include him here. It’s not like he won’t be back and frankly we all love him.

So here are the starters. I’m not going to go by batting order because Bruce Bochy has already said that he will mix it up. Some days Angel Pagan will hit 3rd, others he’ll hit 5th. I’m going to go around the diamond starting with LF and ending with the catcher position. I’m choosing which stats from last season I want to highlight with each player because, well, I can do that. So sit back and enjoy a look at this year’s Giants starters. All slash lines are batting average, on base percentage, and then slugging percentage.

Nori Aoki

2014 (w/ Royals): .285/.349/.360, 132 G, 549 PA, 22 2B, 6 3B, 1 HR, 63 R, 43 BB, 17 SB

It looks like Aoki is the new leadoff man. He’s entering his 4th year in the league. Nori is 1 of 2 new starts for the Giants this season. If he’s going to be in that role I’d love to see those walks improve. After 2 years with the Brewers he was on the AL champion Royals last season. You may remember them. I’m not sold on his arm out in LF. In fact, “noodle arm” is a term I’ve used to describe him on multiple occasions throughout spring training. But he’s not here for his defense. Aoki rarely strikes out and can be a key if he shoots the gap towards triples alley. If he does that, he made lead the league in triples this season. Continue reading →

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by | March 24, 2015 · 12:19 AM

Episode 81: Can’t Have Sissy Hands

Stream this podcast below:

[audio http://torturecast.podomatic.com/enclosure/2015-03-24T00_10_18-07_00.mp3]

or, download it here

Spring Training has not been kind to the Giants. They own the worst record, by far, in all of MLB. Hunter Pence got broke, and Bochy is actually worried about his team’s performance.

Chad, Ben and Eric try and talk each other down from the ledge, and bring some levity to the foreboding results from the Giants’ practice games thus far.

Hey, it’s an odd year, afterall.

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by | March 6, 2015 · 12:13 PM

A “Black” Day for Giants Fans

Hunter Pence says he can’t come his hair now that his arm is in a cast. I don’t think we’ll notice. Photo: Matt Kartozian-USA TODAY Sports

Chicago Cubs’ minor league pitcher, Corey Black, feels absolutely sick about hitting Hunter Pence in yesterday’s Cactus League action in Scottsdale. In a tweet he sent out yesterday, Black said, “Lost for words. Hope you heal fast. Hitting someone is never a good feeling. Hurting someone is even worse.” Classy move. Even more classy was Hunter’s response, “It happens my friends. Thanks for the concern, it’s part of the game we love. No slowing down!” There’s been a lot of love and support from Giants fans thrown Hunter’s way, but apparently there have been a few Giants fans that aren’t too happy with Black.

I get it, knee jerk reaction. I for one, was pretty upset when I heard the news, as Hunter will most likely miss opening day and is expected to be out 6-8 weeks with a “non-displaced fracture of the left ulna bone.” In an interview today, Pence was pretty upbeat and even mentioned that the timing is right for this injury. He’s right from the perspective of “better now than in July.” He also said that he’s a “very fast healer,” and is hoping to be back before that 6 week timeline.

At least Hunter’s positive about the situation, and it’s not his throwing arm that’s injured.

Interesting note: Both Black and Pence share the same agent, but they’ve never met.

So, the Giants will have to rely more upon Blanco to fill in until Pence is one hunter percent. 🙂

Hunter has proven himself as the Giants’ “Iron Man,” but every superhero has his weakness.

Oh, and I’m a scientist by day, and don’t believe in this even/odd year thing. This may have finally made me a believer. I just realized that the guy who took Pence out is named “Black.” The guy replacing Pence is named “Blanco.” Maybe this shit is real, bro.

#oddyearconspiracy

Get well, Hunter!

– Chad @chadk21

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by | February 23, 2015 · 11:05 PM

Episode 80: Jerry Rice

You can download this episode here, or

Stream it below:

[audio http://torturecast.podomatic.com/enclosure/2015-02-23T23_03_20-08_00.mp3]

Yes, Jerry is a 49er, but we covered him at the AT&T Pro-Am at Pebble Beach this month, so it sort of, by proxy, regionally counts to fit our jersey-number-title-thing that is dying. So, here’s a video of Jerry leading the group “Buster Hug” that we caught on film earlier this month.

The boys are back in Arizona! Timmy reunites with his dad, Pablo is still fat, Cain is throwing wild and free, Ben and Chad review their experience and interviews at Media Day, Bochy’s heart had a scare, Sheilds rejected a larger offer from the Giants, Moncada signed with Boston, and the first radio broadcast of a spring training game is next week, March 3.

Can’t you just smell the fresh cut grass through your media player of choice?

You can follow us on Twitter @TortureCast and like us on Facebook! All of our podcasts and video and audio San Francisco Giants player interviews can be found here or YouTube.com/TortureCast.

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by | December 30, 2014 · 10:37 PM

Top 14 SF Giants moments from 2014 part 2

SF Giants win 2014 World Series

Denny Medley, USA TODAY Sports

If you missed it, I covered the San Francisco Giants regular season in Part 1. Time for the good stuff.

As I mentioned yesterday, there are no ground rules for this list and everything is listed in chronological order. Moments can stick out for different reasons. The rough draft was literally me sitting on my front porch drinking coffee and just thinking about the playoffs. I really miss baseball.

At least 10 different things jumped out at me. For instance, I thought the Hunter Pence homer in Game 1 of the World Series was a huge moment. Then as I kept adding things to the list it got bumped down. So it gets an honorable mention. Others that just missed the cut were Hunter Strickland striking out Ian Desmond in Game 1 of the NLDS and Randy Choate throwing it away in Game 3 of the NLCS.

After some more beard scratching and coffee drinking on the front porch, here’s my 7 best moments of the Giants 2014 championship run.

October 1 – Crawford’s grand slam of silence and Bumgarner’s first shutout

Were you as nervous as I was heading in to this game? I hate coin-flip games. Anything can happen. Randomness can determine a ball game. So when the top of the 4th inning of the NL Wild Card game began to unfold we were all unsure of what would happen.  Continue reading →

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by | December 29, 2014 · 4:01 PM

Top 14 SF Giants moments from 2014

Photo: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

Photo: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

As a San Francisco Giants fan, 2014 was a great freaking year. They won the World Series for the 3rd time in 5 years and cemented a dynasty in the modern game. There was a fast start to the season, a rut in the middle, and then a Fall surge to the title. We got to watch it all. Whether you saw them in Scottsdale, spent time on the shores of McCovey Cove, or just watched from the couch at home, all Giants fans will remember this past year as something special.

Here’s where I get to be corny. I’m going with the original idea of the 14 best moments from 2014. I know, I had to stretch far for that one. Someone else may have already beaten me to it, I don’t care. I want to relive what happened and I suspect you’ll enjoy reliving it too.

I have no ground rules for this list. A moment can be anything I want to shoehorn in just for the fun of it. It was just that kind of crazy, wonderful year. This will be split in to 2 parts. Today will be the regular season, Tuesday will be the playoffs. Everything will be in chronological order. All clips courtesy MLB and /or Youtube.

Click here for Part 2: The Posteseason.

March 31 – Opening Day comeback

The Giants wasted no time making the 2014 season exciting. Right away the team put together a comeback victory. After falling behind 6-2 and 7-3 to Arizona they put together a couple of rallys and started the year on a positive note. You didn’t want to look too much in to one game, but it felt like this team knew how to win right out of the gate.

Madison Bumgarner started and only lasted 4 innings. He allowed 4 runs but amazingly none of them were earned because of 2 errors by the infield to start the bottom of the 4th inning. The comeback started in the top of the 7th as Michael Morse singled off Brandon McCarthy to lead off the inning. Five pitches later McCarthy had 2 quick outs and Joaquin Arias was on 1st after a fielder’s choice. Ehire Adrianza then pinch hit and hooked a 3-2 pitch into the RF corner to score Arias. It  began a streak of 5 consecutive hits with 2 outs. Continue reading →

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by | November 4, 2014 · 1:01 AM

Episode 77: We are the Champions…Again!

Buster Posey dishes out his third championship #BusterHug to Madison Bumgarner moments after Pablo Sandoval caught a foul popup to secure the Giants’ third World Series in five years (Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

Download the podcast here, or stream it below!

They did it.

Again.

For the third time in the last five years, the San Francisco Giants are World Series Champions!

Riding the superhero left arm of Madison Bumgarner, the Giants squeezed out a 3-2 win in game 7 of the World Series to down the Kansas City Royals.

Willie, Chad and Eric record our longest podcast of the year to discuss this memorable World Series; the heroes, the almost-goats, and what it took to fuel a remarkable run that has placed the black and orange in “dynasty” status.

Even if you have to listen to it in two parts, sit back, relax, and bask in the glow of three Commissioner’s trophies!

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