DETROIT ? There were two lineup cards in the Giants
clubhouse Saturday night, and they did not resemble each other in the
slightest.
Manager Bruce Bochy wrote the familiar one. He chose his
starting nine for Game 3 at Comerica Park.
Giants hitting coach Hensley ?Bam Bam? Meulens jotted down
the other one. His players were 2,400 miles away, in a beach town on the
Caribbean coast, and what do you expect? They don?t put off the Venezuelan
Winter League just because one of their managers is still busy with the World
Series.
When Meulens heads down to join Los Bravos de Margarita in a
few days, he should expect the Giants to supply him with a thick stack of
papers ? standard uniform player contracts, enough to paper over a hotel room.
And maybe a second stack, just to make sure.
Sure, successful organizations build through the draft, they
pick the right investments on the free-agent front, they make shrewd trades and
they employ minor league coaches who teach prospects how to play the game the
right way.
But when the Giants reached the doorstep of the World Series
with a 2-0 victory Saturday night, their principal contributors were a well-traveled
right-hander and a hustling little left fielder who were neither drafted,
developed nor signed to a rich deal that warranted a jersey-lifting news
conference.
Ryan Vogelsong and Gregor Blanco signed minor league
contracts as non-roster invitees in back-to-back winters, both having caught
the club?s eye in the Venezuelan Winter League.
And on a mittens-and-mufflers night in Detroit, they made all the difference
as the Giants moved within a victory of what would be the franchise?s first
World Series sweep since 1954, when Willie Mays made his iconic basket catch to turn
aside the powerful Cleveland Indians.
?I was in Venezuela pitching basically for my life ? for my
life in baseball,? said Vogelsong, who had been released from two Triple-A
clubs in 2010.
?I was just hoping for a good opportunity to be in the big
leagues,? said Blanco, who hit .201 for Washington?s Triple-A affiliate in 2011.
The Giants, starting with Meulens and roving minor league
infield coach Jose Alguacil, saw something more.
?He always was a guy who could get on base,? Meulens said of
Blanco, who was the league MVP in Venezuela. ?But I saw something different
last winter. He was even more patient. He had a knack of hitting left-handers
and right-handers. He played defense and he had gap power that would play in
out park. That?s why I was intrigued with bringing him on board.?
Blanco played for La Guaira, which was Ozzie Guillen?s
former club. Blanco was very close to signing with Guillen?s Miami Marlins to
try to win a backup outfield job, but Meulens told him that the Giants would
give him a great shot in the spring.
?It was a leap of faith on his part,? Giants vice president
Bobby Evans said. ?Nothing was guaranteed and so you have to trust the baseball
people that you?re going to get the honest look that you?re promised.?
Blanco insisted that he speak directly with Evans and had
his agent dial the number. After a reassuring conversation, he put pen to
paper. Then he showed up to Scottsdale and turned every exhibition game into a
dazzling display of speed, hard hits and running catches.
?We weren?t two weeks into spring training and he was making
our club,? Evans said, laughing.
Meulens was convinced even before that.
?Definitely, the day he walked into camp, I knew this guy
would help us out,? Meulens said. ?It?s the way he plays. He?s not afraid to go
deep in counts and we hadn?t done that the year before. We needed good at-bats
from guys who don?t strike out.
?We?ve seen three good pitchers in this series but we grind
at-bats and get their pitch count up and keep the line moving.?
Blanco did that in the second inning against right-hander
Anibal Sanchez. He saw a fastball and a curve. He saw a two-seamer that ran and
another fastball that cut. He fouled one of them off, and then fouled a
changeup, and then Sanchez came back with the one pitch he hadn?t thrown yet.
It was a slider, and it caught too much of the plate.
?I was just trying to put the ball in play,? Blanco said.
?Angel Pagan and I talked about that, especially in this park. There is so much
room out there. Just put it in play and anything can happen.?
Good things happen when you barrel the pitch and send it 400
feet to the deepest part of right-center field. Blanco?s triple gave the Giants
a 1-0 lead, and it made him the first player in franchise history to own two
triples in one World Series.
It was emblematic of a team that hit the fewest home runs in
the majors but the most triples, who had the second fewest strikeouts in the NL
and who strung together hits and kept taking an extra 90 feet to score 718 runs
? far more than the 570 they scored a year earlier. And when they lost Melky Cabrera, who was leading the majors in hits and runs when he was suspended Aug. 15, they found a way to keep going with Blanco as the primary left fielder.
The Giants didn?t make a big offensive splash on the
free-agent market last winter. It was these Tigers who did the cannonball in the deep end, signing Prince Fielder to
a nine-year, $212 million contract.
But the Giants saw a player a continent away who had some skills
and fit their system, and they moved aggressively to get him.
Blanco went to the wall, all right. He sprinted into the left
field corner and caught Jhonny Peralta?s fly ball in the narrow space between
the foul line and the wall, securing the first of Sergio Romo?s three outs in the ninth.
?I?m thinking, `Two outs to go!?? Romo said. ?He?s not afraid
of anything. He?s played that way since he got here. He?s fearless and he?ll go
get those balls for you.?
Said Blanco: ?I was full speed, I just put the glove out and
the ball pretty much caught itself."
The ball caught itself. So it has gone in this World Series for the Giants, who became the first club to post consecutive
shutouts since the 1966 Baltimore Orioles. Their staff boasts two former Cy
Young Award winners, as well as the author of a perfect game who started for the NL
All-Star team.
But their truest ace is found elsewhere in Vogelsong, whose story just keeps
getting better. He competed with stuff that graded a tick below those searing,
darting pitches he threw to beat the St. Louis Cardinals twice in the NLCS, or
the Reds in that Game 3 in Cincinnati that was their seafloor.
But he competed. He always does that.
?I remember the game when Vogey threw seven shutout innings
against my team,? Meulens said. ?I was aware of him from the Pirates, too. But
he was a different guy in Venezuela. Was he better than the five starters we
had? No, but he could jump in and help us out.?
The Giants had kept in touch with Vogelsong, a former
prospect dealt to the Pirates in 2001 for Jason Schmidt, both before and after
he went to pitch in Japan. Meulens was one of the major recruiters in getting
him to sign with the Giants, after his strong winter in Venezuela led to
multiple offers.
Maybe it?s time to give Bam Bam a bonus.
Vogelsong has been more than just a solid starting pitcher and
inspirational tale over the past two years. He?s doing historic stuff this
postseason.
After holding the Tigers off the board for 5 2/3 innings,
Vogelsong became just the fifth pitcher in history to make four starts in a
single postseason in which he gave up one run or less. Curt Schilling, John
Smoltz, John ?Blue Moon? Odom and Burt Hooton are good company.
And Vogelsong?s 1.09 ERA is the lowest by a starting pitcher
in a single postseason, with a minimum of 24 innings, since Orel Hershiser
(1.05) for the 1988 Dodgers.
No question: Vogelsong is the Giants? bulldog.
?I didn?t think my stuff was as good as the NLCS, but I
really just tried to hit Buster?s glove as many times as I could,? said
Vogelsong, who pitched around five hits and four walks. ?And when the guys are
playing deep behind you, it encourages you to put the ball in play.
?You know, it?s my first World Series. I?ve been waiting for
this since I was five years old, and I wasn?t going to go down without a fight,
that?s for sure.?
He had the fight of his life in the fifth inning, after the
Tigers loaded the bases with one out on two singles and a walk. Vogelsong struck out Quintin
Berry with fastballs up and away. Tigers manager Jim Leyland called it the
biggest at-bat of the night, remarking that Berry still had a thought worming
through his brain --? that changeup
Vogelsong threw him to induce a double play in his previous at-bat.
All apologies to Leyland, but the at-bat that everyone will
remember from Game 3 came next.
Miguel Cabrera, who won the first Triple Crown in 45 years,
stepped to the plate and he was impossible to avoid. He hit .420 with two outs
and runners in scoring position during the regular season. He finished with 44
home runs and 137 RBIs.
Vogelsong had one place to go.
?You know what? You just go with your gut,? catcher Buster
Posey said. ?If I put something down and he?s not convinced, he?ll shake. But
we were on the same page there.?
Fastball in. Vogelsong threw it and Cabrera nearly flicked
it down the right field line. It landed six feet foul.
Some pitchers, spooked, might have gone away with the next pitch.
Vogelsong did not. He put his head in the lion?s mouth again.
?He?s the best hitter in the game,? Vogelsong said. ?I was
just trying to make a pitch, and the way we were playing defense, just to get
him to put a ball in play somewhere. Because I had a good feeling we were going
to catch it if he did.?
Vogelsong trusted his defense. He trusted himself.
His inside fastball was just up enough to jam Cabrera, and
the game?s most dangerous hitter made the most harmless of outs ? a pop-up to
shortstop.
The Tigers, already wearing so much defeat and resignation
in their swings, watched as three baserunners drifted listlessly back to the dugout. They
did not threaten again. They might never threaten again.
?If you?re throwing the ball in there for strikes, it forces
then to swing at it eventually,? Vogelsong said. ?I think it?s vital for any
pitcher to establish the inner part of the plate, especially against a lineup
that hits for power.?
Said Giants manager Bruce Bochy: ?Very impressive, with the
hitters he had to face. But he?s been so good at that all year, and I think
that?s what makes him a good pitcher, a quality pitcher. He?s got the ability
to ?keep his poise and slow things
down, one pitch at a time, and execute. That?s what he did in that situation.
?You appreciate his whole game -- the stuff he has, sure,
but also how competitive he is.?
The will to compete is a quality that translates in any
league, in any language and on any continent. And when you see it, wherever
it?s embodied, you don?t let it get away.
Source: http://www.csnbayarea.com/10/28/12/Vogelsong-Blanco-Non-roster-invitees-to-/nbcsportsgiants.html?blockID=794465&feedID=2796
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