The Giants won’t need any extra motivation for this week’s stretch in Pittsburgh and St. Louis – the two best teams in the National League will always get the best from a Bochy-led team. To start the game MadBum struck out the first three hitters he faced, including the dangerous Bryce Harper. 318 range, his walk rate this month is the highest it has been all season and it has rebounded near his 2013 rate. He has dropped his last three in the cross-country rivalry and the Giants have lost Bumgarner’s previous five starts facing the Nationals.
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The Giants out-hit the Nationals 7-Three. MadBum struck out Wilson Ramos and after a sacrifice bunt from Ross, the Nats were back to the top of the lineup for Michael Taylor.
San Francisco is a -171 favorite against Washington and the Over/Under (O/U) for this game is sitting at seven runs. Due up to lead off the bottom of third was Justin Maxwell, who was limited to pinch hit duties in Saturday’s game. After tossing eight scoreless innings against the Los Angeles Dodgers in his last start, the lefty was knocked out in the third for his shortest appearance of the year. Like five hitters before him, Tomlinson struck out and Bumgarner grounded out to Desmond to end the inning. Escobar followed the K’s with a groundout to Crawford.
But by the time the Giants scored their fifth run, the game was already over.
Ranking 21st in home runs, San Francisco has hit 101 this season. But that won’t even be a thought unless the veterans start swinging their bats. Washington ranks 11th with 115 home runs. “There’s just something in the air that’s a little different”. A foul out that Zimmerman had to reach over the fence on the first base side ended the inning.
If the Nationals don’t get their act in gear soon, they may see their window of opportunity slam shut.
“You try to make a quality pitch and throw it with conviction”, he said, “and if you can do that, you live with the result”. In the four games against Washington, San Francisco’s offense erupted for 28 runs. Taylor and Harper accounted for half of Bumgarner’s strikeouts.
Ross went back and looked at the pitches that got him in trouble and talked with reporters about making necessary adjustments.
How could they possibly still be in the playoff race, despite them playing arguably their worst baseball since Mike Rizzo took over as GM? Pitching for the Nats in the eighth was Matt Thorton who got Belt to groundout and then survived a hard line out from Posey that was caught by Taylor in center.
Hunter Pence’s number one fan?
Bumgarner drove himself home in the seventh, connecting off Casey Janssen for his fourth home run of the season and 10th of his career.
The win on Sunday gave San Francisco its first four-game sweep of the Expos/Nationals franchise since 1971.
Giants: RHP Tim Hudson (right shoulder strain) allowed one hit in 2 2/3 scoreless innings in a rehab start with the Single-A San Jose Giants.
Before Sunday, the Nationals had enjoyed rare success against Giants ace Madison Bumgarner. He tied a career-high with 14 strikeouts while walking just one in his fifth-career complete-game shutout.
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Carlos Beltran had delivered big homers in the first two games of this series for the Yankees.
