The Lunatic Fringe

Here’s your trivia question…the answer’s at the end of this post.

Q: Hensley Meulens is not the first current Giants who has been knighted.  Who was the first?

As for the offense…it’s a long debated point about how effective major league hitting coaches are at helping major league hitters.  Bad habits are learned in the minors.  And the older any dog gets, the harder it is for them to learn new tricks, supposedly.

Then again, who else is supposed to help hitters who are in slumps stay out of bad habits they fall into, or make the small adjustments?

For years, Jim Lefebrve raised the ire of Giants fans.  He served as hitting coach for the Giants in the worst of years, hitting-wise.  For everyone not named Bonds, the team seemed to ignore the Moneyball sensibilities that were rising.  And it was Lefebrve who was viewed as the one who wasn’t helping.

But the next hitting coach, Carney Lansford, did nothing either.  He wasn’t blamed the same way, but he was just as ineffective.

Now, with Meulens…he got a World Series ring in his first year, but the team’s offense continues to be bad, at best.  What can he do?

I don’t know.  But with Lincecum having a tough season, the team will need to rely on offense a bit more than before.  Sandoval being good, and Cabrera’s addition have helped.  But it’s not going to be easy.  I hope Meulens can make this happen.

By the way, notice that asterisk up there?  You can see what it’s there for by putting your cursor over the comic and letting it sit there.  In fact, try that with all our comics.  See what you think.

A: The other Knighted Giant was Sidney Ponson, also knighted by the Netherlands since he hailed from the island territory of Aruba.  That’s right, he was an Arubian Knight.

Did you know that the royal color of the Netherlands is Orange, despite the flag being red, white and blue?  This all seems all too appropriate.