This was, perhaps, the best Giants game of the year.
The San Francisco Giants beat the Oakland Athletics by a score of 7 - 1.
The Giants pitching was superb.
Madison Bumgarner was the starter. He got his 3rd win, which, perhaps, is a good illustration of how odd the designation of a W to a pitcher can be. Madison threw 6 fantastic innings, he gave up a home run to Oakland left fielder Chad Pinder in the 5th inning, with no one on base. That was Oakland's first run, and it tied the score at 1 each. The Giants had scored on a balk the previous inning. Apparently, the Oakland starter, Edwin Jackson, slipped or caught his cleats or something as he was in his motion. It brought Steve Duggar in from 3rd base. In those 6, Madison gave up 2 hits, 1 walk, struck out 5 and threw 84 pitches. Madison also pitched in the 7th inning, and did not fare so well. He threw 18 more pitches, gave up a single followed by 2 walks and was pulled for Reyes Moronta. Reyes induced a strike out, a line out to the Panda, and a ground ball to Brandon Crawford. If you could award a "win" based on sheer grit and savvy, Reyes gets the credit. Innings 8 and 9 were handled perfunctorily by Sam Dyson (a 4-pitch 8th).
After that, it fell apart for the A's. A series of relievers in the 7th culminating with Santiago Casilla (who also pitched the 8th) gave the Giants 5 runs for the final score.
The Giants hitting was timely.
Steve Duggar scored 3 times, walked, hit 2 doubles and picked up 2 rbi. In the 7th, with the bases loaded by way of two singles and a walk, Duggar slammed a double to right to score 2. Belt was hit on the hand (but stayed in the game), McCutheon hit a sac fly to score d'Arnaud and send Duggar to 3rd, where a wild Santiago Casilla pitch brought him in. A Buster Posey double scored Belt. Buster had 2 rbi, both coming with 2 outs. The Giants had to scrap for opportunity early in the game, but took advantage of them when they came.
The Oakland A's had just beaten the world champion and AL West division-leading Houston Astros in 3 games out of 4. Oakland, even with tonight's loss, would be in first place in the NL West. Mark's hope is still alive.
3 comments:
would like to know the rule book on the Dugger foul ball which could have been his third double of the game. The fly ball was extremely hard to tell if fair or fell, but it hit the left fielders glove, and fell in fair territory. It never hit in foul territory. If a ball hits a fielders glove and bounces over the fence it is a home run. If a ball hits a fielder's glove on a fly, and lands in fair territory, why is that a foul ball?
That was a great win. A's were the hottest club in baseball (19 wins in 24 games) coming in to SF.
I'm guessing the ump ruled it foul because he saw it cross the bag in foul ground--we've all seen balls land in foul territory but ruled fair because they were fair as they passed over the infield. I suppose this was a case of that in reverse, sort of. The ball was judged to be foul passing over the base and before it hit the fielder's glove in the outfield.
This was a long (supposedly) foul ball, I do not think third base had anything to do with it. Probably as a fly ball it was quite fair when it was going from the infield to the outfield. It was not a groundball to be judged by whether it went over third base. So would still like to know what the reason is to why that was not a fair ball.
Post a Comment