Seeing the San Francisco Giants win the World Series was tough for me. As an Oakland A’s fan, I’ve always maintained a healthy ire toward the Athletics’ crosstown rivals, though I’ve never publicly expressed it. It’s a reaction similar to Giants supporters constantly ripping on the Los Angeles Dodgers—you just get inundated with a biased view as soon as you choose sides. There’s always an element of schadenfreude motivating a fan’s response to other teams, and I didn’t want to have to hear my friends (99 percent of whom are Giants fans) gloat about sweeping the Detroit Tigers for the next five months.
After I finished watching the final showdown of the 2012 World Series, in which the Giants absolutely crushed the Tigers in four games, I sat back and tried to come up with an excuse for their success. I shouted bitterly at the TV—“It was all luck! The Tigers just rolled over! Conspiracy!”—but there was no rationale for my accusations, and eventually I came to the conclusion that the Giants are just that good.
I wasn’t sure at first exactly what made them so good. The separate pieces of their team aren’t as immediately eye-catching as the players on the Los Angeles Angels or the Texas Rangers. Unlike those teams, however, the Giants actually made it to the postseason, and they did it by playing as a unit. Their collective talent was a force that the Tigers just couldn’t counteract, and it was all thanks to the managerial skills of Bruce Bochy.
It’s easy to attribute the success of the Giants’ playoff triumphs to Pablo Sandoval, the official World Series MVP. He hit a ridiculous .500 batting average during the series and cracked three home runs in game one alone. He certainly deserved the award, but focusing on Sandoval’s capacity to get hits only serves to limit the attention on the Giants’ defense and pitching, which I believe are the real reasons that the team steamrolled their way to a sweep.
To the average baseball fan, the names Gregor Blanco and Brandon Crawford may not ring any bells, but they both were integral parts of the Giants’ dominance over the hapless Tigers. Blanco and Crawford both hit under .250 this season, so it came as a surprise when Bochy left them in the lineup to battle against the might of Detroit’s power hitters. But Bochy had a clear game plan—shore up the defense to freeze the Tigers’ hot bats—and it paid off in a big way. The two un-sung heroes robbed their opponents of countless hits and runs, and, perhaps due to an increase in confidence, ended up hitting better during the series than star catcher Buster Posey and veteran outfielder Hunter Pence.
Two of Bochy’s favorites, former Cy Young Award winners Barry Zito and Tim Lincecum, had started the year with dismal numbers and had been the recipients of intense vitriol from Giants fans as a result. So it was a surprise to many when Bochy decided to start Zito against Tigers pitching ace Justin Verlander for game one. Not only did Zito thoroughly outpitch Verlander that night, but Lincecum delivered a superb performance with five strikeouts in two-plus innings of relief.
Bochy’s other miscellaneous decisions (namely, promoting pinch hitter Ryan Theriot to DH for the first time ever) continued to pay off throughout the World Series in ways that no one could have predicted. Given their impressive lineup, the Tigers were significant favorites coming in, but the Giants ultimately proved that even the best players can crumble without a solid foundation of support.
Was it luck? Some of it, perhaps, but there is no denying that the cohesiveness of the Giants’ roster was the driving force behind their victory, and they have Bruce Bochy to thank for that.