Tuesday night, that lead finally evaporated.
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The Giants held an 6-1/2 game lead in the West when the second half ended. The Giants took the field fully aware that the Los Angeles Dodgers were well on their way to a win at Philadelphia. They’ve accumulated an MLB-worst 9-20 record this second half, after all. They led by as many as eight games in late June.
“We had some chances, ” Giants manager Bruce Bochy said. “So you keep going, and come out here and be ready to go tomorrow. I don’t know if there’s any more sense of alarm now that we aren’t in first”. This has been a long one. But this team is used to having their backs against the wall. “But they get the big hit that we couldn’t”.
Building momentum has been a challenge. Giants OF Angel Pagan is riding a 14-game hitting streak during which he is 19-for-58 (.328).2.
It may feel like doomsday, what with the Clayton Kershaw-less Dodgers streaking to the top in mid-August. The speedy Marte easily beat his throw to give the Pirates a 1-0 lead, but Kang followed by hitting a double-play grounder to second baseman Panik. “At the same time, nobody’s happy”.
Until that swing, the game could have gone either way. We’re trying hard. We’re getting after it. In the top of the first, he allowed back-to-back one-out singles to Marte and McCutchen, and when Polanco hit a chopper between the mound and first, Samardzija fielded the ball and elected to try and come home.
But the right-hander’s most recent 45 2/3 innings against Pittsburgh have been a different story, one he’d like to rewrite.
“The fans were so unbelievably supportive during my rehab”, Vogelsong said. “I wanted to throw a fastball in, tried to get it off the plate and just yanked it”.
It was very out of character for me, especially after I d just given up two home runs, he said. “I just wish I would’ve got it off the plate a little bit”.
A pair of subsequent RBI singles by McCutchen and 3 1/3 innings of three-hit, one-run relief by four Pirates relievers secured Pittsburgh’s fourth consecutive win in San Francisco.
Cervelli then called for an intentional walk to Adrianza and Watson complied by throwing a pitch well out of the strike zone.
It proved the right decision. Nuñez and Denard Span homered in the sixth, ending Vogelsong’s night.
Second place seemed an inevitable home for the bumbling Giants. “That’s all you can do, and hope somebody comes through”.
Giants: Buster Posey sat for the second straight game due to tightness in his lower back.
Moore’s night started well – he didn’t allow a hit until the fourth inning – but the lefthander struggled in the middle innings and wound giving up five runs in six innings of work. Brandon Belt singled him to third and Brandon Crawford walked to load the bases. Posey said he does intend to play in the series finale Wednesday.
Andrew McCutchen had two hits while Gregory Polanco drove in two runs without a hit to help the Pirates remain one game behind the second NL wild card. He spent the previous five seasons with the Giants, authoring another comeback story, before signing with the Pirates as a free agent this past winter as he won two World Series rings and made his lone All-Star Game appearance after being out of the major leagues for a four-year span from 2007-10 while pitching in Japan and the minor leagues. The Giants, though, lost for the seventh time in Samardzija’s last nine outings. “He’s not going to be afraid, we know that about him. Hopefully, we’ll be playing our best baseball then”.
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The Giants are not doing so now, and their road does not get easier.
