Baseball Resumes, As Does Ineptitude

It's true what they say: absence does make the heart grow fonder. "They" often neglect to mention, however, that absence also makes the brain forget. Forget, for example, how much the Giants suck.

And so it goes: Matt Cain continues his underwhelming season, the offense still is horrific, and No Period Sabathia and the Brew Crew dominate the G-Men in the second half opener.

Those rumblings of buying at the deadline seem sillier with each passing day.  Considering the A's got a legitimate package for Joe Blanton, the notion of trading Cainer to a team like the Rangers, who have an absolutely stocked minor league system and a chance of making the playoffs, also seems less silly with each passing day.

Thanks to the recent stocking of the Giants minor league cupboard, losing Cain wouldn't be as painful as it might have once seemed.  Check out who makes #2 and #12 on the Baseball America Prospect Hot Sheet from yesterday (with compliments to EJ):

No. 2 MADISON BUMGARNER, LHP GIANTS
Team: low Class A Augusta (South Atlantic)
Age: 18
Why He's Here: 1-0, 0.00, 7 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 11 SO
The Scoop: Sheer domination. There's no other way to characterize Bumgarner's last three months. Over his last 16 starts, he's allowed more than two runs only twice, and the loss he took on July 10 was his first since April 18, a span of 12 starts with out a defeat. Bumgarner, now 9-3, 1.79 for the year, has few rivals for title of best arm in the Sally League, especially since the Rockies promoted Jhoulys Chacin to high Class A Modesto. The flame-throwing Bumgarner turned in what, for him, was a pretty standard outing on Wednesday against Hagerstown, dominating the Suns for seven innings. Bumgarner had a stretch in that game in which he fanned eight hitters out of 10, and no baserunner got further than second against him. And of the four baserunners he did allow, he picked off two of them.

(Snip.)

No. 12 TIM ALDERSON, RHP GIANTS
Team: high Class A San Jose (California)
Age: 19
Why He's Here: 1-0, 1.50, 6 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 HB, 6 SO, 1 BB
The Scoop: This is all just routine for Alderson. Week to week, it's becoming a matter of where—not if—he'll make the Hot Sheet. He's won his last three starts and hasn't been tagged with a loss since June 10 when he gave up a run in 5 2/3 innings and received zilch in run support. He's 9-3, 3.24 now and has bounced back from a slight bump a couple months ago. His ERA was 4.02 for the month of May, but he went 1-1, 2.57 in June and is 2-0, 4.09 in 11 innings in July so far.

Comment! Are you getting sick of me advocating trading Matt Cain?  I challenge you to tell me why I shouldn't.  I dare you.