Madbum Leaves Early; Not Because He's Traded

Fluky game.  Madison Bumgarner was the starting pitcher.  And start he did, giving up a single.  The second batter, Jose Martinez, hit a line shot that caught Maddy's pitching arm in the triceps at about 99 mph.  He shook it off, gave up a run and pitched a scoreless second in spite of a big lump visible on the tv.  But the swelling and, probably, stiffness got to him and he did not come out to pitch the 3rd.  Madbum's short line: 2 IP, 2 K, 4 hits, 1 run.  After the game, they reported nothing broken.

The Giants tied the game in the bottom of the 1st.  1 - 1 remained the score until the bottom of the 4th.  Pablo singled, and 2 missed fly balls tied the bases with 1 out.  Austin Slater, brought in to hit for Sam Dyson, who relieved Madbum, put one in the seats for a pinch hit grand slam!  Did I say fluky?  In the 5th, the home plate umpire caught one in the facemask and had to be replaced.  The Giants, after a short outing by the starter, Drew Pomeranz, last night, used Dyson, Moronta, Melancon, Watson and Smith to finish out the game.

The 5 - 1 score after the grand slam was not the end of the Giants or the Cardinals scoring.  The Giants tacked on 1 in the 7th on a Alex Dickerson triple and 2 more on a Pablo Sandoval home run, and the Cardinals added 3 in the 8th off of Watson on a Paul Goldschmidt (who else?) home run.  The Giants win a game in which Madbum was knocked out of the box (almost literally) after 2, by a final score of 8 - 4.  4 rbi for Slater, 3 for the Panda, and the Giants showed some moxie after a loss.  That was their first pinch hit grand salami since Rich Aurila hit one in 2003.  Rubber match tomorrow before the All Star break.

Thriller Gets the Giants to........ .500?

I love me a 1 - 0 game, especially when my favorite pitcher is on the mound.   But this was a weird one.

This game felt like the Giants were going to lose.  They allowed a lot of base-runners.  Clay Bucholz didn't seem to allow much to the Giants, each hit he allowed was shortly erased.   The Giants grounded into double plays to end both the 1st and 2nd innings.  Brandon Crawford grabbed a line drive, only to have the ball bounce out of his glove.  Madison Bumgarner was called out on a 3rd strike that was at least 9 inches outside, and no, he did not get that call when he was on the mound.  In fact, there seemed to be numerous bad ball / strike calls and those bad calls didn't favor the Giants.  I don't think I've ever seen a 3-base error, but Austin Slater made one that put Jon Jay on 3rd with one out.

Yet, they held on.  Madison Bumgarner threw 107 pitches to go 7 full.  He gave up 4 hits, but walked 4 and struck out 5.  He got some pop-ups and grounders when he needed them.  And a relay, Duggar to Crawford to Hundley, at least 9 1/2 feet in the air, that Hundley caught to tag out Nick Ahmed at the plate in the 8th.  Clay Bucholz left the game after 7, the game was scoreless at that point.  Sam Dyson gave up 2 hits in the 8th, but no runs (well, thanks to that tag at the plate).   Will Smith worked the 9th, and looked good doing it.  In the bottom of the 9th, Steve Duggar walked with Brad Ziegler on the mound, went to 2nd on a Nick Hundley single, and then jammed his left arm coming back to 2nd base as he thought better than to try for 3rd.  But he stayed in the game.  Alen Hanson was to hit for Will Smith, so the snakes swapped pitchers, bringing in Jake Diekman.  So Bochy swapped Hanson for Gorkys.  Gorkys saw one pitch, hit one pitch and Duggar scored before a throw from left got close.  Then, I assume, he immediately went to get his arm iced and examined.  The score was 1 - 0 Giants.

Steve Duggar scored the Giants only run.  He also has been responsible for 4 of the Giants 5 runs they scored in the last 2 days.  The Giants have now won 4 in a row and are a .500 club.  In their last 9 games, the Giants are 6 - 3 with a 1.84 era.  Colorado picks up a game, as do the blue goo.  Derek Rodriguez pitches tomorrow.

An August Victory

After scoring less than 4 runs per game for July, the Giants beat the dbacks behind Madison Bumgarner tonight by a score of 8 - 1.   That suggests that Madison dominated and that the Arizona starter flailed, but neither of those things are true.  Zach Greinke threw for the snakes, he was effective and made it through most innings in very few pitches as the Giants made quick outs.  Evan Longoria put the Giants on the board with a 1st inning solo home run, and Madison loaded the bases before getting the 3rd out in the 1st.  Maddy also loaded the bases in the 2nd, and allowed a tying run to score on a sac fly.  He allowed 2 runners on in the 3rd, 1 in the 4th and 1 in the 5th.  Somehow, no further runs scored, but by that time he had thrown over 100 pitches and was done for the evening.  Maddy's line: 5 innings, 101 pitches, 7 hits, 3 walks, but only 1 run.  Meanwhile Greinke allowed only 4 hits and 1 walk.  2 of those hits came in the 5th, when Austin Slater, who is the only Giant who has a batting average that is not totally unimpressive these days, doubled, went to 3rd on a Steve Duggar ground out, and then scored on a Madison Bumgarner rope to left.  That was the Giants' second run and Greinke left the game at 2 - 1 Giants.

The game fell apart for the dbacks with their relief - recently acquired Jake Diekman was a mess, walking 2; recently acquired (or, re-acquired) Brad Ziegler gave up 4 runs on 3 hits and TJ McFarland added the 8th.  Melancon, Black and Blach allowed no runs in relief.

So that's 4 wins in a row for the Giants, just 1 short of their season's best streak.  It is also their 5th consecutive win against the dbacks.  LA won (by a lot), so the win only moves the snakes 1 game behind, although Colorado also loses a game.  The Panda will need hamstring surgery, so is out for the year.  Brandon Belt will need another 8 - 10 days on the DL, according to Alex Pavlovic.  Chris Stratton is expected to re-join the Giants.

The Suarez-Slater-Smith Show

SF 2 AZ 1
The Giants bounce back from yesterday's heartbreaker with a superbly-pitched effort tonight in Arizona. Rookie Andrew Suarez allowed only one run in his six-inning start, stymieing a hot Diamondbacks lineup with a heap o'grounders (they had FIVE infield hits). Rookie Austin Slater had three great at-bats, hammering a liner each time, two went for doubles, both drove in a run. That was the offense. Rookie Reyes Moronta pitched the 7th in dominating fashion. He's been superb this season what with 42 K and 19 H in 35-2/3 IP. Tony Watson was equally brilliant with a 1-2-3 8th. He has to be the best off-season move the team made. Will Smith overpowered them in the 9th for his first career save*. So nice to have him healthy and performing at the level everyone was hoping for. A terrific win against the first-place club, especially in their yard. The Giants were 25-30 on May 29th, here on June 29th they are 43-40. Not a bad turnaround!

Five more games on the road and then they are back home for six before The Break. Derek Rodriguez starts tomorrow night (7:10 Pacific). Go Giants!

--M.C.

*turns out it was second career save, his saved a game with Milwaukee in 2014