Giles has obviously been a lot better. Now with that being said, I still do t trust him. He makes me nervous everytime and I'm sure some of you can agree with that
In the sense that I basically always feel nervous late in games. Almost all closers will make you feel it. I grew up with Billy Wagner, and felt nervous every time the tying/winning run came up (I always remember the Grand Slam to Giles, the McGwire walk-off in 98, the Chipper HR in the NLDS, and the Leyritz HR in the NLDS). The only guy I've ever trusted 100% is Brad Lidge, and we saw what happened to him.
Exactly. I trust him as much as I'd trust any closer not named Mariano Rivera. It's just the nature of the job.
It used to bother me how he would do his slow motion movements getting ready to pitch like he was about to grace everyone with one of his throws. His last few games I haven't minded it so much.
Does he have to be perfect the whole year? He's been dominant for a few months. **** happens sometimes and tonight the bullpen was a turd.
I don't know. There is just something about Giles that doesn't seem right. Guy can throw vapor. Hits 100. But I never see anyone swing late. They always seem to get wood on the ball. Sometimes hard hit balls. Yea when he breaks an 88mph slider off he can make batters look silly but otherwise that 100mph heat seems very hitable. I am not sure why Wagner seemed to always blow it past batters. What was the difference between Wagners heat and Giles? 2nd thing on Giles. Seems like when he is handed a clean inning and starts out well he does well. But when he gets hit or the pressure rises he crumbles. He does not look comfortable with any sort of adversity. Up until Pujols Lidge didn't seem to let a home run or a couple of hits from him striking out the next two or three. Hopefully he grows into an elite closer as I just don't think he is quite there yet despite only giving up 3 in the last couple months.
I like how we can't evaluate our closer's performance because Marinao Rivera blew a save in the World Series.
So we still keep going round and round, I guess. It's fairly simple, if the two sides would just make little concessions. Haters (like myself) need to concede that giles has had a very good year, and based on this year, we all should have a lot more faith in him. Kool aid drinkers need to concede that giles' history with the Astros is not without stretches of poor play, and you can't expect everyone to simply forget that because of this season (especially with the playoffs coming up.) We all want him to succeed. It's what is best for the team. No need to bump this thread after every outing.
Evaluate away -- The point is that no closer is perfect , even the GOAT in the most crucial of game situations. The fact that the same 2-3 posters keep coming back here giddy after his 2nd blown save in 3 months seems silly to me. Here's the list of closers with a better WHIP than Giles: Kenley Jansen Craig Kimbrel Roberto Osuna For reference, Osuna has 10 blown saves to Giles' 4. Even Kimbrel, who is filthy, has 4 blown saves. Here's the list of closers with 25 or more saves, and fewer blown saves than Giles: Kenley Jansen Wade Davis AJ Ramos Raisel Iglesias So, what we can evaluate is Kenley Jansen is the best closer around, and Ken Giles is not him. Do we also need a thread about George Springer not being Aaron Judge? My evaluation says Giles is not an all time elite like Kimbrel or Jansen, but he's strongly in the discussion for the top 5 in the league. What's your evaluation? Who are the closers you'd rather have than Giles?