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Giants Have No Answer For The Nats

Published

11 years ago

June 12, 2014

San Francisco, CA – The Giants tried to even the series but failed when the Nationals scored three runs in the first frame. Matt Cain took the mound after a stellar outing during his last start. But tonight, it was all but successful for the right-hander. For the third consecutive night, San Francisco could not contain Washington’s offense and fell 6-2.

“I was just missing off the plate and I couldn’t get the ball back on the plate for some reason to the first three hitters,” said Cain. “I made an OK pitch to [Adam] LaRoche and he hit it up the middle. I put our guys behind the eight ball. That was too much of a deficit to come back from.”

Cain issued four walks in one inning which is a career-high for the most he’s allowed in a single frame. The last Giants pitcher to issue four walks was LHP Eric Surkamp on September 24, 2011 at Arizona (bottom of 1st). San Francisco pitchers issued a season-high eight walks tonight.

“I’ve never seen that from Matt,” Nationals manager Matt Williams said. “I’ve stood in that coach’s box over there a lot. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the time, he’s playing with his control.”

Cain walked the first three batters he faced and allowed a two-run single to LaRoche giving Washington a 2-0 lead with no outs. The Nationals extended their lead when Ryan Zimmerman grounded out to the pitcher scoring in Jayson Werth.

“We’ve hit a little bump in the road,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy. “What’s important is how we handle it.”

It’s been unusual territory for San Francisco to have lost three games consecutively. Despite still holding the best record in the Majors, the Giants loss tonight matched their season-high losing three games (April 17-19).

Cain settled down and tossed three scoreless innings until he surrendered a solo home run to Werth in the fifth. That ended his time on the mound. He pitched five innings, walked five, yielded four runs and struck out four.

“We started the game off and we got some really good at-bats,” Werth said. “We kind of got Cain on the ropes early. We got his pitch count up. We got some big hits. The first inning kind of set the tone for the game.”

The Giants have been held to just three runs in their past two games and have gone 3-for-14 with runners in scoring position in the first two games of this series. San Francisco has not hit a home run in a season-high five-straight games.

Brandon Crawford’s RBI triple put San Francisco on the board in the fourth. The Giants rallied late in the seventh when Tanner Roark allowed two back-to-back singles to both Brandon Hicks and Gregor Blanco. But the bullpen came in and forced a double play leaving one runner on.

Pablo Sandoval whose been battling an illness, pinched hit and knocked a RBI single to right field cutting the lead in half. Unfortunately, Angel Pagan popped out to right field to end the threat. And if things couldn’t get worse for San Francisco.

Yusmeiro Petit loaded the bases in the ninth with two outs. He allowed a single from Jose Lobaton and forced pinch-hitter Greg Dobbs to ground out. Petit walked the next two batters then gave up a two-run single to Werth to extend the Nationals lead 6-2.

Notes – In the last few games the Giants have relied on the bottom of the order to muster some runs. While their at-bats are cooling off, San Francisco still has talent to pick up the slack. The Brandon’s excluding Brandon Belt who is currently on the dialed list have proved hitting 7th or 8th is just as good.

“No necessarily, he doesn’t have to,” said Brandon Crawford when asked if manager Bruce Bochy has talked to him about how well he’s been doing. “Wherever I am, it’s my job is to get hits. The focus is still the middle of the lineup but [Brandon] Hicks and I have been doing a pretty good job of getting guys on.”

Crawford has gotten on base successfully in each of his last ten games. His 35 RBI’s this season rank as the second most on the club. He’s already 12 RBI’s shy of matching his career-best for a season (45 in 2012). Crawford has hit a team-leading fifth triple of the season and is now tied for second most in the National League.

“I like the way he’s swinging right now,” Bochy said. “He’s squaring up the ball pretty good right now and we moved him up the lineup.”

“I haven’t change anything but I guess I’m being more aggressive even on off-speed pitches,” said Crawford. “I’m swinging especially with guys on. That was the goal from the beginning to play everyday and contribute to this team wether it’s a righty or lefty.”

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Activism

Gov. Newsom Approves $170 Million to Fast Track Wildfire Resilience

AB 100 approves major investments in regional conservancies across the state, including over $30 million each for the Sierra Nevada, Santa Monica Mountains, State Coastal, and San Gabriel/Lower LA Rivers and Mountains conservancies. An additional $10 million will support wildfire response and resilience efforts.

Published

4 days ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

Courtesy of California Governor Gavin Newsom’s Facebook page.

By Bo Tefu
California Black Media

With wildfire season approaching, last week Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill (AB) 100, unlocking $170 million to fast-track wildfire prevention and forest management projects — many of which directly protect communities of color, who are often hardest hit by climate-driven disasters.

“With this latest round of funding, we’re continuing to increase the speed and size of forest and vegetation management essential to protecting communities,” said Newsom when he announced the funding on April 14.

“We are leaving no stone unturned — including cutting red tape — in our mission to ensure our neighborhoods are protected from destructive wildfires,” he said.

Newsom also signed an executive order suspending certain regulations to allow urgent work to move forward faster.

This funding builds on California’s broader Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan, a $2.7 billion effort to reduce fuel loads, increase prescribed burning, and harden communities. The state has also launched new dashboards to keep the public informed and hold agencies accountable.

California has also committed to continue investing $200 million annually through 2028 to expand this effort, ensuring long-term resilience, particularly in vulnerable communities.

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California Rideshare Drivers and Supporters Step Up Push to Unionize

Today in California, over 600,000 rideshare drivers want the ability to form or join unions for the sole purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid and protection. It’s a right, and recently at the State Capitol, a large number of people, including some rideshare drivers and others working in the gig economy, reaffirmed that they want to exercise it.

Published

4 days ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

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By Antonio‌ ‌Ray‌ ‌Harvey‌
California‌ ‌Black‌ ‌Media‌

On July 5, 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into federal law the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Also known as the “Wagner Act,” the law paved the way for employees to have “the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations,” and “to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, according to the legislation’s language.

On April 8, the rideshare drivers held a rally with lawmakers to garner support for Assembly Bill (AB) 1340, the “Transportation Network Company Drivers (TNC) Labor Relations Act.”

Authored by Assemblymembers Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) and Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park), AB 1340 would allow drivers to create a union and negotiate contracts with industry leaders like Uber and Lyft.

“All work has dignity, and every worker deserves a voice — especially in these uncertain times,” Wicks said at the rally. “AB 1340 empowers drivers with the choice to join a union and negotiate for better wages, benefits, and protections. When workers stand together, they are one of the most powerful forces for justice in California.”

Wicks and Berman were joined by three members of the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC): Assemblymembers Tina McKinnor (D-Inglewood), Sade Elhawary (D-Los Angeles), and Isaac Bryan (D-Ladera Heights).

Yvonne Wheeler, president of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor; April Verrett, President of Service Employees International Union (SEIU); Tia Orr, Executive Director of SEIU; and a host of others participated in the demonstration on the grounds of the state capitol.

“This is not a gig. This is your life. This is your job,” Bryan said at the rally. “When we organize and fight for our collective needs, it pulls from the people who have so much that they don’t know what to do with it and puts it in the hands of people who are struggling every single day.”

Existing law, the “Protect App-Based Drivers and Services Act,” created by Proposition (Prop) 22, a ballot initiative, categorizes app-based drivers for companies such as Uber and Lyft as independent contractors.

Prop 22 was approved by voters in the November 2020 statewide general election. Since then, Prop 22 has been in court facing challenges from groups trying to overturn it.

However, last July, Prop 22 was upheld by the California Supreme Court last July.

In a 2024, statement after the ruling, Lyft stated that 80% of the rideshare drivers they surveyed acknowledged that Prop 22 “was good for them” and “median hourly earnings of drivers on the Lyft platform in California were 22% higher in 2023 than in 2019.”

Wicks and Berman crafted AB 1340 to circumvent Prop 22.

“With AB 1340, we are putting power in the hands of hundreds of thousands of workers to raise the bar in their industry and create a model for an equitable and innovative partnership in the tech sector,” Berman said.

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California Holds the Line on DEI as Trump Administration Threatens School Funding

The conflict began on Feb. 14, when Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), issued a “Dear Colleague” letter warning that DEI-related programs in public schools could violate federal civil rights law. The letter, which cited Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which ended race-conscious admissions, ordered schools to eliminate race-based considerations in areas such as admissions, scholarships, hiring, discipline, and student programming.

Published

5 days ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

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By Joe W. Bowers Jr
California Black Media

California education leaders are pushing back against the Trump administration’s directive to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in its K-12 public schools — despite threats to take away billions in federal funding.

The conflict began on Feb. 14, when Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights at the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), issued a “Dear Colleague” letter warning that DEI-related programs in public schools could violate federal civil rights law. The letter, which cited Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which ended race-conscious admissions, ordered schools to eliminate race-based considerations in areas such as admissions, scholarships, hiring, discipline, and student programming.

According to Trainor, “DEI programs discriminate against one group of Americans to favor another.”

On April 3, the DOE escalated the pressure, sending a follow-up letter to states demanding that every local educational agency (LEA) certify — within 10 business days — that they were not using federal funds to support “illegal DEI.” The certification requirement, tied to continued federal aid, raised the stakes for California, which receives more than $16 billion annually in federal education funding.

So far, California has refused to comply with the DOE order.

“There is nothing in state or federal law that outlaws the broad concepts of ‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ or ‘inclusion,’” wrote David Schapira, California’s Chief Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction, in an April 4 letter to superintendents and charter school administrators. Schapira noted that all of California’s more than 1,000 traditional public school districts submit Title VI compliance assurances annually and are subject to regular oversight by the state and the federal government.

In a formal response to the DOE on April 11, the California Department of Education, the State Board of Education, and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond collectively rejected the certification demand, calling it vague, legally unsupported, and procedurally improper.

“California and its nearly 2,000 LEAs (including traditional public schools and charter schools) have already provided the requisite guarantee that its programs and services are, and will be, in compliance with Title VI and its implementing regulation,” the letter says.

Thurmond added in a statement, “Today, California affirmed existing and continued compliance with federal laws while we stay the course to move the needle for all students. As our responses to the United States Department of Education state and as the plain text of state and federal laws affirm, there is nothing unlawful about broad core values such as diversity, equity and inclusion. I am proud of our students, educators and school communities who continue to focus on teaching and learning, despite federal actions intended to distract and disrupt.”

California officials say that the federal government cannot change existing civil rights enforcement standards without going through formal rule-making procedures, which require public notice and comment.

Other states are taking a similar approach. In a letter to the DOE, Daniel Morton-Bentley, deputy commissioner and counsel for the New York State Education Department, wrote, “We understand that the current administration seeks to censor anything it deems ‘diversity, equity & inclusion.’ But there are no federal or State laws prohibiting the principles of DEI.”