Marty; You call it the road trip from hell and that says it all. The only bright spot is the quote from Schmidt to the effect that there is nothing wrong with his arm, just the eleven day inactivity thet resulted in the poor performance. One can only hope he is not whistling in the dark.

Writing about the Giants today is not the easy task it has been all year long.

Ed Stern has been analyzing the Giants chances all season long, today he explains the current state of the team.

Thanks, Ed,

Marty LurieFor the avid fan, beginning with the 18 and 4 start and continuing until the very recent 12 game lead, it has all been roses. The only question asked, of any significance, was one which asked why the team kept winning and the given answer was that they won because they were good. As simple as that. Now they are losing and their injury list seems to keep growing exponentially. They have finally decided that Snow, after two futile attempts to play, should be placed on the DL until it is clear that he has recovered. Snow is an integral part of this club when thay are winning. When he doesn’t play, they not only lose his professionalism on the field, they suffer on the bench since Galarroga, playing for Snow, is not available to come off the bench in clutch situations. There still is no word respecting the return of Durham, who apparently was hurt worse than reported. Grissom was injured yesterday and the only hope is that it will not keep him out of the lineup for more than a few days. Given the team’s recent history of bad luck, one finds it difficult to be that optimistic. They will be playing today with one regular outfielder and one regular infielder in the lineup. That they are still 9 and 1/2 games in front is due solely to Arizona’s inability to cash in on the Giants losing streak. The one bright thought is, assuming Schmidt is healthy, the pitching, particularly coming out of the bullpen, remains impressive. It is true that Foppert and, now, Williams are experiencing rookie problems not unanticipated. Williams next start, against Atlanta next week, will be instructive. The Giants have kept him out of the Montreal series in order to pitch him against the Braves, That says something about their hopes for him based upon his earlier sterling performances. Once Bonds returns next week, if Grissom is not out too long, if Santiago can start hitting again, if the team once again begins to resemble the outfit which streaked to the second best record in the majors until the past few games, we may see a team which provokes only the question, how do they keep on winning. Hope springs eternal, as they say. At this time, when one is only wishing for the best when one surveys the extensive and growing injury list, it might be felt bad form to comment on a situation which has produced only an overwhelming degree of silence from management and Sabean since the beginning of the season. Bad form or not, here goes. When this season has came to an end, when the playoffs, for better or worse are all over and the World Series winner has been proclaimed, the Giants will be faced with the unbelievable fact that they have given away a probable Cy Young winner and a young pitcher for whom they had been predicting great things and have received, in exchange, absolutely nothing save for the right to the services of Ponzon the remainder of the 2003 season. This is the result of the combination of the Ortiz for Moss deal and the resultant Moss and Ainsworth for Ponzon trade. To characterize these transactions and the result they led to as an exercise in incredible bad judgement on the part of a management and a general manager who, in the past, have prided itself and himself on their good sense, is an understatement. To compound the evil, they turned Ortiz over to the Braves, a perennial winner in the National League, and, if the Giants get over their present problems and make it that far, a likely opponent in the playoffs. Further, in the years to come they will be facing Ortiz and the Braves in a fight for league dominance. Not a pleasant prospect. If they had to ship Ortiz off, and one can’t see the sense in that even in the light of managements money saving plea, why not to some losing club in the other league? It isn’t as tho they received, in Moss, a great talent. They shipped Moss off to Baltimore without much concern. They will be living with this one for more years than they presently like to think about. In closing this lament. one can point out that this isn’t simply second guessing, Monday morning quarterbacking. When the Ortiz deal was announced before spring training, the cries of dismay went up. They were asked to recall who was pitching in the most important game of the year, who was handed the game ball by Dusty in recognition that he had apparently won this game for the team, (the bullpen breakdown being unanticipated). His name was Ortiz. He had shown for some time that he was capable of winning games such as this. His prominence in the Braves record this year should have come as no surprise. It hasn’t surprised many of us. I must assume that it has surprised those who made the decisions that led to all this.