Giants' recent hot streak looks a lot like first half of 2016 season

Share

SAN DIEGO -- The 2016 Giants season did not make sense as it was happening. It didn't make sense that offseason, and it hasn't in the three years since. Sometimes you just have to chalk things up to "that's baseball, and you can't figure out baseball," and right now this is an organization that again seems to be in that mode. 

The Giants, one of the two worst teams in the National League for most of the first half, have been the hottest team in the Majors for nearly a month. It has been bizarre and fun and confusing. It has also looked familiar to some of the team's cornerstones. 

"This right here reminds me of the first half of 2016," Madison Bumgarner said this week.

As the Giants return to Petco Park, this is as good a time as any to dive into that statement. After all, that 2016 second-half slide started in San Diego. The Giants came out of the All-Star break and got swept by the rebuilding Padres, then lost two in Boston and two of three in New York. You know the rest. The Matt Duffy trade. The tense final week. The Game 4 collapse in the NLDS.

Three years later, Petco Park is again part of the story. This latest run started on June 30 at home against the Diamondbacks, and then the Giants went to San Diego and swept the Padres. They have gone 13-4 since and start a three-game series in San Diego on Friday night. 

If you add it all up, the math is, well, hilarious. In the first half of 2016 and the second half of 2019, the Giants are 68-36. In the three years in between, they went 208-277. 

[RELATED: Giants trade Holland to Cubs for cash after last week's DFA]

Will Farhan Zaidi look at his organization and see a roster that's played .656 baseball for two stretches of the past four seasons? Or will he see one that's posted a .429 winning percentage over a much larger sample size? This really is a tale of two teams, but right now the clubhouse believes in the positive side, that this is a group that can put together another strong run like the 57-33 first half in 2016. 

"That's the last time I can remember something like this," Bumgarner said. "This might be the reverse of that."

Contact Us