Article:Giants Within 6

The Giants most recent surge of winning baseball has moved them within 6 games of the first place Arizona Diamondbacks. If you would have told me the Giants would have only been a handful of games out of first come mid-season, I would have laughed at you, but here we are, in mid-June, and the Giants are making a little bit of noise. Most of the reason the Giants have moved back within striking distance is because of the way the Diamondbacks and Dodgers have been struggling this month. However, you can't take away the fact that the Giants are 6-3 in June and playing better than they have all season long. No, they aren't going to be making any playoff push, or even finish at .500, but you have to like the way the team has played over the last few weeks if you a Giants fan. They've gotten terrific starting pitching over the last 10 days as well as some clutch hitting by some of their most recent call-ups. Travis Denker and Brian Horwitz are the 2 latest Fresnoians to be brought up to the big league squad and both have been hammering the ball ever since. In 14 at-bats, Horwitz already has 2 home runs and 5 rbi to go along with a .429 average. He's had limited at-bats, but has really been impressive in those few he's gotten. Denker is also looking like a bat to keep an eye on as he's 7-22 with 5 extra base hits since his promotion and starting to earn some time at second base. Denker is a very intriguing kid becuase he's only 22 years-old and had never really played much above A ball until this season. He kind of has some Marcus Giles in him as he's only a 5'9" second basemen, but can drive the baseball like he's 6'4".

It hasn't been all positives in San Francisco since the calender turned to June though. While one young arm, Kevin Corriea, is headed back to San Francisco and ready to make his start June 15th, another one looks like he'll be shelved for the year. It was reported last week that Noah Lowry is likely looking at a season long recovery from his strained elbow and probably won't pitch in 2008 at all. Lowry is still holding out optimism that he'll be able to start working again in July and be ready by late July or early August, but it doesn't look too probable at this point. I think it would be wise to take it slow with Lowry. The Giants aren't going to be challenging for any playoff spot this season and unless he's %100 healthy, he should take the year off. I was looking forward to seeing this strong pitching staff at full strength, but I guess we'll have to wait until next year. Getting Corriea back however, will be a huge shot in the arm for the staff. Every starter has been throwing the ball well recently except for Pat Misch and Corriea's arrival will bump him out of the rotation and likely back to Fresno.

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