Out of the cellar and into the streets!

Your 2008 San Francisco Giants are, wait...just saying it gets me a little teary...not...not in...last place.  Phew, I did it.  

What have we learned?  Hopefully that the team that played like shit against Los Angeles and Milwaukee is gone, banished to the depths of baseball oblivion where light-hitting .200 hitters are passed as every day starters.  These Giants, these 5-3 since that crummy start Giants, really have no starters in the traditional sense.  Okay, Rowand, maybe and Winn, definitely, but the rest of the pieces are, nay, must be interchangeable.  The injuries to Roberts and Rowand have opened spots with which Bochy can experiment, starting Bowker and Lewis in right and left and slotting Lewis in at leadoff with desired results.  Ortmeier and Velez get their turns, and we've seen that an on-base Velez changes the game.  I think it's telling that Velez went in for Durham on a double switch.  No way that happens if the manager believes it's essential to have Durham out there, as has been the case over his Giants tenure.  Maybe it demonstrates that Bochy realizes everyone's interchangeable on this team.  That's what we've really hoped for, right?  We knew our complaints to get Durham and Roberts and Aurilia out of the lineup were falling on deaf ears, knowing full well that Bochy and Sabean weren't going to out and out sit the three guys with pictures of the manager and GM getting it on in Bonds' old locker.  So Durham being recognized and used more like the role player he is spells success for us and these Giants.  Amazingly, Aurilia is still in there every day.  But these things take time, and change will come.  It has to.  

This is working a little right now, having less to do with some mythical and nonsensical feeling like 'momentum' or a 'vibe' or 'it,' having everything to do with playing good baseball in which guys get on base, pitchers get guys out, and everyone catches the ball.  Woofuckinghoo.  But Roberts is coming back.  Lowry is coming back.  Will it still work?  Well no, not if Bochy regresses and Roberts is anointed the everyday left fielder, trotted out there without fail to hit .227 and OBPing .301.  Lowry?  Who knows.  The Giants only sport one soft-tosser in the rotation right now, and that's not really flying.  Lowry's got better command than Zito though, and his stuff might be better at this point too.  But Sadly, Correia or Sanchez, the guys with the filthiness, are headed to the 'pen. 

We shall enjoy this while it lasts.  The two-weeks-from-now Giants are going to look a lot more OmarRobertsLowryish than this group.