Game Wrap 06-20-2010: Giants 9 Blue Jays 6

The Giants offense unleashed the pent up frustration of the last two games and overcame a poor start by Jonathan Sanchez with the help of some relievers who have struggled recently. Key lines:

Freddy Sanchez- 2 for 5, HR(1). BA= .333. Freddy's HR off the LF foul pole was the key hit of the game giving the Giants a 6-3 lead and an sense that maybe they could exorcise the demons that had bedeviled them the first two games of the series.

Aubrey Huff- 2 for 4, HR(12), BB. BA= .307.

Pat Burrell- 1 for 4, HR(5). BA= .248. I believe this is Burrell's second HR with the Giants. I have to say I'm still getting used to thinking of him as a Giant.

Edgar Renteria- 2 for 3, 2B, 2 BB. BA= .337. When healthy, Rent has contributed. Bochy has a challenge in apportioning playing time here.

Jonathan Sanchez- 2.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 5 BB, 5 K's. ERA= 2.90. As usual, nothing wrong with Sanchez' stuff here. He appeared to lose focus after Uribe's error and never got it back. He's going to have to learn to block out those distractions and just trust his stuff if he wants to take his game to the next level.

Denny Bautista- 2.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K. ERA= 2.89. Bautista had scuffled a couple of times. The W today was well deserved as he put out the fire and then held the Jays at bay for the next two innings.

Guillermo Mota- 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K. ERA= 2.84. Another reliever who has scuffled. This was a clutch performance today eating up another two innings and keep the Jays from getting back into the game.

Jeremy Affeldt- 0.2 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 0 BB, 0 K's. Affeldt got hit hard. At this point, he's little more than a mop up man.

The win enabled the Giants to keep pace with the Padres who pounded the Orioles 9-4. The Pads record stands at 40-29, 1.5 games ahead of the Giants who are at 38-30. Meanwhile, the BoSox complete a series sweep of the Dodgers in Fenway , so the Giants move 0.5 games ahead of the Dodgers into second place in the NL West. Colorado lost to the BrewCrew to fall 4 games behind the Pads while Arizona lost to Detroit and their former pitcher Max Scherzer 3-1 to fall 12.5 games back of the leaders.

Although the first two games were quite disheartening, and both winnable for the Giants, they have to feel good about avoiding the brooms. Winning 1 game of a series is infinitely better than getting swept. The Giants now head to Houston where they owned the 'Sros in the opening series. With the weekend bookended by off days, the Giants will skip the #5 starter and replay the opening series with Timmy, Zito and Cainer with Timmy going against Roy Oswalt in the opener.