Giants: Little things and big defeats

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — They’re not going to win the division. That’s for sure. Maybe the Giants still will make the postseason, get in as a wild card, and even that’s problematic.

But definitely the way they are playing, just poorly enough to lose, they won’t overtake the Dodgers — who gleefully overtook the tumbling Giants in the National League West days ago.

It’s not that the Giants are a bad team. The Atlanta Braves are a bad team. No, the Braves are a terrible team. The San Diego Padres are a bad team. They are 22 games below .500. And that’s after sweeping a three-game series from the Giants. For a second time this season.

The Giants are a good team playing badly. Or once were a good team playing badly, very badly as defined by a classical, baseball reference.

When they hit they don’t pitch, as they did and didn't on Tuesday night, San Francisco entering the ninth with a 4-1 lead and ingloriously losing to the Padres 6-4 on a home run by, not Nate Colbert or Tony Gwynn even, but Ryan Schimpf. The 27th blown save of the season. Oh, where are you now, Robb Nen?

When the Giants pitch they don’t hit, as they did and didn't on Wednesday in the sunshine and gloom (the mood, not the weather) at AT&T Park, San Francisco getting only four singles and thus getting whipped by the Pads, 3-1.

So the little bit of optimism created when the Giants had a sweep of their own, taking three in a row at Arizona over the weekend, has been trashed, smashed and tossed into McCovey Cove. So much for progress.

The Dodgers, who beat the Yankees for the second time in their three-game series at the Stadium, now are five in front of San Francisco. The billionaires at Chavez Ravine smirk.

In the post-game session Wednesday, Bruce Bochy, the Giants' manager, was asked if he had sleepless nights, to which he answered in the affirmative, adding, “I wish I could do more. Every manager or head coach does. It’s always on your mind.”

Some would say Bochy could have done more on Tuesday night if Brandon Belt hadn’t been out because he was ailing. Buster Posey was playing first, and there was a ball off Posey’s mitt, which became an infield single when reliever Hunter Strickland conceded he was slow to cover the base.

The little things, and the big defeats.

On Wednesday, the Giants' bullpen couldn’t be faulted. Neither could starter Madison Bumgarner. You allow only three runs, you’ll normally win. Not, however, when the season is coming apart at the seams.

San Diego starter Luis Perdomo mystified the Giants' batters. The first four men in the order, Denard Span, Angel Pagan, Posey and Brandon Crawford, had two walks and no hits among them. Only because Belt and Joe Panik managed back-to-back singles in the second, after a Crawford walk, did the Giants avoid a shutout.

“He had a good sinker,” Bochy, a former catcher, said of Perdomo, who didn’t look like someone who came into the game with a 7-9 record and 5.89 earned run average. Ah, but the Giants looked very much like the team that has collapsed (20-35 since July 10) in notable fashion.

Bumgarner, gracious as always post-game, stood there attired like a hunter (not Strickland) and was asked what needs to be corrected: pitching, hitting, whatever.

“I don’t know,” he answered quietly. “So far, the second half’s been a club I’ve never seen before.”

A club that Giants fans have seen too much of, one that's causing them to wonder what might have transpired if San Francisco, not the Cubs, got 100 mph closer Aroldis Chapman (or who the Giants would have been forced to trade to acquire him).

Bumgarner was unable to pick up his 100th career victory, a total that’s inevitable.

“There’s a lot of pressure this time of year,” reminded Baumgarner, reflecting on the chase for the playoffs and not his personal goals or difficulties. “It’s more of a mind-set this time of the year.”

Bochy could only agree.

“This was a big series,” he conceded about the three games, three defeats, against San Diego. “They’re all big.”

A little more than two weeks are left in a season that began so well, a season — an even year — in which the Giants were picked to be champions. How did we go wrong? How did the Giants?

S.F. Examiner: Rams looked pathetic — making it hard to gauge how good the 49ers actually are

By Art Spander
San Francisco Examiner

So we’ll get to the trivial stuff quickly, meaning you won’t have to wade through the material about the 49ers crushing the Rams and Carlos Hyde rushing for 88 yards just to find out that yes, Colin Kaepernick and Eric Reid knelt down during the Star Spangled Banner, next to an American flag literally as big as the football field.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

A question for Serena, but no questions for Kerber

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — It seemed wrong, a final in women’s tennis without Serena Williams, but at the same time it seemed right. Sport is nothing but change, heroes and heroines raising a trophy or a hand in triumph and then being pushed aside, maybe in a matter of weeks or months — the Warriors' reign was halted all too quickly — or, in Serena’s case, a matter of years.

Now there is a new women’s tennis champion, someone who not that long ago the critics said didn’t have the game or the nerve to get to the top. Angelique Kerber is not only the U.S. Open winner but No. 1 in the rankings.

Kerber left no questions Saturday in the Open final, beating Karolina Pliskova, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, someone who like Kerber few outside the little, provincial world of tennis knew well, if at all, until recently.

Yet their questions of another, Serena, whose defeat in the semifinals by Pliskova on Thursday, and tumble from the top of the rankings on Saturday morning, became front-page news in the New York Times, 24 hours later.

The day the women’s final, for a second straight year, would played without her.

“Serena Williams Will Be 35.” said the headline over a story by tennis correspondent Chris Clarey. “But Will She Be No. 1 Again?”

Yes, Williams is American and held her position for 186 consecutive weeks, and we tend to dwell on what was as much as what is. Still, women’s tennis is in flux, although Kerber suddenly appears to be the top-of-the-heap player who may hold her ranking for a while.

Kerber has done what Serena used to do, what Venus Williams used to do, what Steffi Graf and Chris Evert used to do: she stepped up and dominated. She beat Serena in the Australian Open final, lost to Serena in the Wimbledon final and now beats Pliskova in the U.S. Open final. Three finals and two titles in a calendar year. That’s something we would have expected from Serena, or from Kerber’s mentor and fellow German, Steffi Graf, who persuaded Kerber to be more aggressive.

As perhaps too many women on tour, Kerber played too carefully, keeping the ball in play but rarely forcing the issue. But after she lost to Victoria Azarenka in the third round of last year’s Open, she visited Graf — the last player, male or female, to take the Grand Slam, all four majors in a year, 1988 — in Las Vegas, where Graf lives with her husband, Andre Agassi, and family.

“Kerber used to play too defensively,” Evert told the ESPN television audience, “and she had that pitty-pat serve.”

At age 28, Kerber conquered her faults and her demons. And with experience she then conquered the hard-serving Pliskova, who at 24 finally had her breakthrough.

Pliskova, who never had been beyond the third round of any major, first won the Cincinnati tournament a month ago, beating Kerber in the final, 6-3, 6-1, and then going all the way to this final — if not to the championship.

Kerber said she had dreamed of being No. 1 since she was a child in Bremen. Sometimes even in a sport where the young come up so quickly, and the veterans slip away no less quickly, success is a process that takes a long while.

"It means a lot to me,” said Kerber, still on the Arthur Ashe Stadium court as tears trickled down her face immediately after the match. “I mean, all the dreams came true this year, and I'm just trying to enjoy every moment on court and also off court."

She’ll enjoy it. Serena Williams may enjoy it less so. Will she be No. 1 again? It will be fascinating to find out.

Serena denies she was beaten because she was ‘beat up’

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — She looked weary, bewildered, and even, yes, old, because some two weeks from her 35th birthday, as a tennis player Serena Williams is old, 12 years older than Karolina Pliskova, who on a Thursday night of disbelief — and perhaps transition — stunned tennis and Williams.

A 6-foot-1 Czech with a serve no less impressive — and at times more effective — than Williams', Pliskova overcame her own history of Grand Slam failures, Serena’s reputation and a howling crowd with a 6-2, 7-6 (5) win in a U.S. Open semifinal.

For a second straight year, Williams falls one match short of the Open final — in 2015 she was upset by Roberta Vinci — and also for the first time in months falls out of the No. 1 ranking in women’s tennis, which now goes to Germany's Angelique Kerber, who faces Pliskova in Saturday's final.

Maybe it was because Serena played a three-setter in the quarterfinals Wednesday against Simona Halep and was unable to recover physically.   

Maybe it was because Serena’s game is not what it used to be.

Maybe it’s because Pliskova has learned to conquer the nerves that rattled her until this summer.

Maybe it’s because Serena has a sore leg.

However, she rejected any thought that playing two matches in two days had any effect on her game.

“I definitely was not beat up after my quarterfinal match,” she insisted. “I wasn’t tired from (Wednesday’s) match. I’m a professional player, been playing for over 20 years.

“If I can’t turn around after 24 hours and play again, then I shouldn’t be on tour. So I definitely wasn’t tired from (Wednesday’s) match at all. But yeah, I’ve been having some serious knee problems. Fatigue had nothing to do with it.”

Williams, who rides on her thundering serves, was broken twice in the first set and once in the second. Pliskova, who until this Open had never been past the third round of any major in 17 previous attempts, won the battle of serves, and thus the match.

“Yes,” said Williams. “I thought she served well today, and that definitely was a big thing for her.” 

As over the years it’s been a very big thing for Serena, who in the tiebreak had two double faults. That’s what others do, not Williams. Until this semi.

Pliskova had beaten Venus Williams, Serena’s older sister, in the fourth round of this Open, and so becomes only the fourth player, along with Martina Hingis, Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin, to score a victory over both Williamses in the same Slam tournament.

"I don't believe it," said Pliskova moments after the match finished at Arthur Ashe Stadium.

She wasn’t the only one, but anything in tennis, in sports, is believable. Who would have thought Rafa Nadal and Andy Murray would be gone before the semis? Who would have thought the San Francisco Giants would fall apart as they have done?

"I knew I had the chance to beat anyone if I played my game,” said Pliskova.

Which basically is preventing the opponent from returning a serve. It was evident why Pliskova leads the Tour in service aces.

Williams’ coach, Patrick Mouratoglou, had suggested that the knee injury was the difference. It’s tough to blame defeat on ailments. Long ago Venus Williams, when asked after losing a match if she had been hurt, said, “If you play you’re not hurt. If you’re hurt don’t play.”

Serena, pressed about the knee, said, “I’m not downplaying anything. Karolina played great today. I think had she played any less, I would have had a chance.

“So I think I wasn’t 100 percent, but I also think she played well. She deserved to win today.”

As with almost every full-time tennis player, Williams has had her share of injuries. It’s a fact in a sport where the competitors are traveling around the world and rarely taking days off.

There’s a never-ending circle. You have to be in a tournament for a chance to earn points that will get you into a tournament. And bodies fray.

Nadal pulled out of the French Open and missed Wimbledon because he was injured. Roger Federer’s knee would not allow him to play in this Open. Time catches up, especially as the years mount.

Williams lost to Kerber in the Australian Open final in January and beat her in the Wimbledon final in July. Who knows whether Serena can keep going on year after year? What we do know is she’s not going on in the 2016 U.S. Open.

An official’s call and a rain delay unhinge Andy Murray

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — He was adamant in defeat, trying to handle the questions better than he did Kei Nishikori’s maddening drop shots, a man whose summer of success, a Wimbledon championship, an Olympics championship, unwound in a single afternoon on America’s biggest tennis stage.

Andy Murray was playing elegantly, happily. He had won 26 of 27 matches since mid-June, was in control of his game, the forehands, the backhands, the serves, and no less significantly because of an intensity that can lead to frustration, in control of himself.

Sure, Novak Djokovic might be there at the end of this U.S. Open, Sunday’s final, but Roger Federer hadn’t entered because of an injury and Rafa Nadal was upset in the fourth round. What an opportunity for the 29-year-old Murray, the No. 2 seed, to win the Open a second time, to win a fourth major.

But like that, the whole world seemed to go against him, from the closing of the new roof over 23,000-seat Arthur Ashe Stadium when rain began to fall, to a loud bong on the public address system that had the umpire calling a let, to a moth or butterfly fluttering around before the fifth set to getting broken at the start of the fifth set.

So Nishikori, the No. 6 seed, beaten in the Open final two years ago by Marin Cilic, eliminated Murray, 1-6, 6-4, 4-6, 6-1, 7-5 and goes to the semis. Murray, who got so angry at one juncture he slammed his racquet to the court, goes to Glasgow and a Davis Cup match. 

“I was in good position,” said Murray, “up a set and a break and had chances at the beginning of the fourth set as well. I could have won the match for sure.”

But he didn’t, and as we’ve seen so often, no matter what the sport, when the person or the team lets the extraneous stuff — the weather, the noise, the officials’ calls — get to them, get them rattled, they’re in trouble. As was Murray.

After the loudspeaker system acted up in the fourth set — Open officials explained the noise was a computer problem — the chair umpire, Marija Cicak, called a let and halted play. Murray protested.

“Stopped the point,” said Murray, “and I was curious why that was. (Tournament referee) Wayne McKewen told me it happened four times during the match. I only heard it once before, which was on set point in the second set.”

After the discussion in the fourth set, Murray lost seven straight games.

“Yeah,” said Murray, “I lost my serve a couple of times from positions when I was up in the game. I got broken once from 40-love, once from 40-15, and at the end of the match I think I was up 30-15 in the game as well. That was the difference.

“It was obviously different serving under the roof. I started off the match serving pretty well. It (closing the roof) slows the conditions down so it becomes easier to return. You know, he started returning a bit better. I didn’t serve so well, obviously ... Under the roof, he was able to dictate more of the points. He was playing a bit closer to the baseline than me and taking the ball up a little more.”

And using drop shots, which is the tennis equivalent of a baseball bunt, a ball that doesn’t go very far but doesn’t have to when the opponent, whether a third baseman or a tennis player, is all the way back, unable to return the shot.

“Yeah, a couple of them,” said Murray about being hurt by the drop shots. “I didn’t lose all the points. I won a number of them.”

Nishikori had lost seven of eight previous matches against Murray over the last five years, and when he got stormed in the first set, taking only one game, the pattern seemed certain to continue. Then came the rain, the roof and the Murray reaction — along with the Nishikori resilience.

With some 20 minutes to get the roof closed, Nishikori went to the locker room and got advice from his coaches, one of them Michael Chang, the Californian who at age 17 won the 1989 French Open.

“We talked about a lot of things,” said Nishikori, the only Japanese player to get to the finals of a Grand Slam event. “It was definitely my mistake I lost the first set. I was feeling a bit rushed. After the rain delay I changed something.”

He certainly changed the direction of the Open, ousting Murray.

“I have not let anyone down,” Murray insisted about his performance. “I tried my best. I didn’t let anyone down. Certainly not myself.”

He just let himself get distracted by a let call and a rain delay. Not very smart.