The Giants rack up another big number--this time it was nine--and close out the weekend with their third straight win. Chris Heston couldn't get out of the 3rd, but Yumseiro Petit kept enough of a lid on things to hand it over to the late-inning crew and they got it done. Jeremy Affeldt had a challenging time, but Santiago Casilla made up for it with an overpowering nine-pitch save. In the end the Giants scorching hot lineup scored on every Reds pitcher except Aroldis Chapman, and they created an opportunity against him with two hits. There were heroes up and down: three hits and three RBI from Aoki; three hits (including a clutch late homer!) and three runs scored from Belt; two hits and two RBI from Pence; two hits, three RBI, and a run from BCraw; a hit, walk, and a run from Blanco; and two hits and an RBI from Duffy. They needed every damn run today, that's for sure. I'm happy to see that the hitters can take advantage of a offense-friendly park and match up with these bandbox brigades. We know they can play their special brand of walk-off bad-bounce one-run win at home, but a great team has to win those slug-fests on the road now and again as well. A good club has lots of dimensions, and we saw that this weekend with thirty runs scored.
The Giants return to San Francisco for a quick three with their SoCal rivals the Los Angeles Dodgers before hitting the road again. Thursday we get to see Madison Bumgarner and Clayton Kershaw. The Tims man the other two starts.
GO GIANTS!
--M.C.
p.s. The Giants have now scored 145 runs which equals their 145 runs allowed.
6 comments:
The Giants hung on to their lead to the end, ending with Casilla's "immaculate inning", never heard of that before, ending a successful road trip.
Now they need to kick some Bridegroom Butt, get closer, as they head to that other house of horror, Coors Field afterward, then Milwaukee. After surviving that, they get a homestand against the Braves and Pirates, hopefully we can kick them while they are down and in our home.
Go Giants!
Six teams in the NL over .500, two in each division. Nine teams below .500, three in each division. Weird, eh?
Your point about having a team that keeps up with those made for bandboxes is right on. I used to get so frustrated when they would go into the little places and get absolutely punished even though their pitching was supposed to be good. It was fun to have my cake and eat it too this weekend.
Baseball Almanac's list of Immaculate Innings is wrong. I was at this game, which featured multiple rain delays, including one between the top of the 12th & the bottom of the 12th. I clearly remember un-notable St. Louis Pitcher Tom Bruno throwing a 9-strike bottom of the 12th. What few Mets' fans remained at around 1:00 AM, booed vociferously. Clearly, the 3 hitters involved (Lee Mazzilli, Tim Foli, & Steve Henderson) just wanted to get everyone home. In the expanded Game Log for Tom Bruno, it still doesn't indicate how many pitches were thrown. It's also a little suspicious that several decades go by in-between Immaculate Innings listed in Baseball Almanac's list. Congratulations to Santiago, Casilla, though - still quite an accomplishment:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYN/NYN197808110.shtml
Giants now lead the league in batting average with 270. Yet they are third from the bottom in runs scored. Station to station running, pick offs, base running errors, and double plays have held back their run production. At least it is starting to get better. But now they go against that tough Dodger pitching staff. Stay thirsty SF giants hitters.
B-R has a feedback and correction page.
I'm sure they'd appreciate the updated info.
According to their info page anything pre-1988 is incomplete as a far as individual pitch data.
I love B-R and use it obsessively.
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