San Francisco Giants: 2016 in Review
By Jason Evans
The San Francisco Giants even year magic ran out. A look back at the 2016 San Francisco Giants
Unfortunately, all good things come to an end. For the San Francisco Giants, their even year magic voodoo UFC chokehold on this decade is over. The Chicago Cubs ended their season, Madison Bumgarner‘s postseason dominance and even year run in the NLDS.
Bumgarner shut out the Mets in the Wild Card game in an epic duel with Noah Syndergaard and the Giants had to scratch and claw and hold off the St. Louis Cardinals in order to reach the game.
The Giants started 2016 looking like it was going to be a cakewalk to a division title. They had a better first half record than the Cubs with a 57-33 record, despite injuries to players like Hunter Pence.
At the deadline, the Giants acquired Will Smith to strengthen the bullpen. They added Matt Moore to give them four solid starters and Eduardo Nunez to give them some speed at the top of the order.
Unfortunately, the Giants bullpen had more leaks than a presidential campaign and that lead to their downfall. The Giants didn’t have a reliable option to get the last three outs of the game and their second half record was 12 games under .500. It got so bad that Joe Nathan, who is over 40 and coming off two Tommy John surgeries, earned a spot in the bullpen.
Let’s take a look at each part of the Giants and look back at their 2016 season.