Late Inning LaMonte struck again, driving in the winner in the 9th to finish off the pesky Diamondbacks. Giants sweep the series and notch their sixth straight win. The magic number to take the West title is now down to two. Madison Bumgarner got to bat in the 1st--it was an ugly outing for Scott Kazmir--and of course was treated to a huge ovation. He struck out. The Giants eventually tagged him for four runs in his five frames, three of them the work of Austin Slater, Darin Ruf, and Buster Posey. Brandon Crawford, the only lefty in the lineup, hit a solo shot in the 4th. Tyler Rogers pitched a scoreless 8th and 9th to notch the win. Zack Littell struck out four in 1-2/3, and Johnny Cueto chipped in 2-1/3 to help out. Both Ruf and Cueto were just off the IL.
Kazmir walked two and gave up three hits and got only one out. He twisted his ankle on a play at first base and had to leave the game. Kervin Castro came in and the Giants wriggled out of the mess only three runs behind. It could have been a disaster but they hung on and hung around and finally got a chance to win. Wilmer Flores doubled with one out in the 9th and they walked Donovan Solano intentionally. Pinch-hitter Curt Casali then worked a walk to load the bases for Wade. It was the Giants fifth walk-off win.
It all comes down to the final weekend. We knew it would. The Giants have three games to play with the Padres and two wins will get things done. Anthony DeSclafani gets the ball tonight at 6:45 PT.
GO GIANTS!!
WIN THE WEST!!
--M.C.
5 comments:
Happy Birthday Matt! I’m sure he reads this, right?
Kazmir was obviously off, but the ugliness in the first inning included some really sloppy fielding, yet no errors were charged. One was a blooper to center which should have been caught. The other was on a grounder, that could have been a dp, but with our fielding arrangement it ended up a hit when Kazmir did not get to first ahead of the runner. If nothing else it was a mental error. No error charged. Should have gotten out of the inning with only one run scored and his ankle intact. Interestingly early in the season the giants were winning games with their almost flawless defense. Lately the defense has been way to sloppy yet the continue to win. If I recall they did lose a game to the Brewers because of sloppy defense, but the Brewers lost one to the giants for the same reason. Once in a while any major league team will have a sloppy game, but the trend for sloppy defense is concerning. I suspect some of it has to do with the platoon system and players shuffling in and out of the game. I am surprise that they did not try to finish off Wade with a slider over the outside corner. He had hit a long fly ball just foul a pitch or two before his game winning seeing eye grounder, that also would have won the game. Two more wins and it does not matter what the bums win. Again, except for the Padres make-up game vs. the Braves, the only 3 games they have won in almost the last 3 weeks were against the giants. That should make the giants upset enough to take the first 2 games from the Pads. A dodger's loss would be helpful.
Fasten seat belts for the weekend flight. Turbulence in forecast.
Yeah Slater and Bryant both made misplays. Slater made up for it with his three hits and three runs scored!
Indeed, Happy Birthday to our namesake Matt Cain. He's 37 today. When he made his debut in 2005 (Aug 29) he was still 19 and was the youngest player in the big leagues.
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