The Giants survived week one of this tough section of their schedule, going 4-2 against the Dodgers and Cardinals. It feels like it could have been better since they won the first 2 games in each series. Nonetheless, this is exactly what they need to do: win each series on their quest to get back to .500 by July 1.

They need to go 22-15 over these next 37 games to get there.

How have they been succeeding?

1. Quality Starts. The starting pitching hasn’t been brilliant, but the Giants got 4 quality starts this week: one from Cain, one from Blach, one from Moore, and one from Samardzija. They lost when they failed to get QSs in Cueto and Cain starts (although to Johnny Cueto’s credit, it would have taken far more than a quality start to beat Clayton Kershaw on Wednesday).
2. Resilience. The offense has been much, much better. It hasn’t quite been 2000 level SF Giants (or pick your favorite juggernaut), but the Giants averaged 5 runs per win. That’s pretty much the formula: 4+ runs and a quality start, Giants baseball. The bigger issue, though, has been the toughness, especially on the road, to gut out big wins this week with timely at bats and strong situational hitting. Once again, Christian Arroyo’s stat line is not jumping off the page at anyone, but that 11 pitch at bat with the bases loaded in the 13th inning of a 0-0 game certainly grew his legend. He still has a lot of developing to do, but the foundation is there.
3. Bullpen/Defense. The Giants have not been shooting themselves in the proverbial feet with bullpen meltdowns and dumb plays in the field. To the previous point, Christian Arroyo is proving he belongs with smart plays and versatility.

A couple of other things worth mentioning:

• Jeff Samardzija just might be establishing himself as the ace of this staff. On the surface that sounds like an indictment of the state of the Giants rotation, and to a certain degree it is, but he has been outstanding of late. Over his last 6 starts: 42 innings (7 per start!), 47 strikeouts and only 4 walks (!), an ERA of 3.86, and a WHIP of 1.00. Those are strong numbers.
• Eduardo Nunez has come back to life, Brandon Belt keeps hitting home runs (and getting in tiffs with Posey), and Brandon Crawford seems to be getting back into the groove. I also feel Joe Panik is due for a big week or two in the very near future.
• Mac Williamson had a great start on Monday night and then has tapered off significantly. I still would love to see the Giants give him a long leash even if it means cutting into Nunez’s playing time.

Which leads us to: some tough decisions looming. Aaron Hill, Connor Gillaspie, and Hunter Pence should be returning soon. The easiest guys to demote would be Arroyo and Williamson, but it will be fascinating to see how the Giants make these decisions. In addition, there probably won’t be room for both Justin Ruggiano and Michael Moorse. What should the Giants do?

My vote would be to stay with the young guys, but I also understand the need for depth and the best way to preserve that is to keep the old guys on the roster and let the young guys go to Sacramento.

Stay tuned. Big week with four games agains the Cubbies, starting today. Go Giants.