The Giants used the long ball early and "small ball" late to eke out another win and a sweep of the A's. Key Lines:
Heliot Ramos LF- 2 for 4, HR(8), R, 2 RBI. BA= .293. The story of this game literally begins and ends with Heliot Ramos. He homered as the first batter in the Giants half of the first inning and then singled in the winning run in the 8'th inning. In between, A's SP Jeffrey Springs LHP retired 20 batters in a row before Matt Chapman's single in the 7'th inning brought on a pitching change.
Lamonte Wade Jr. PH/1B- 1 for 1, 3B, R. BA= .165. LMWJ led off the Giants half of the 8'th inning pinch-hitting for Sam Huff C. He roped a liner that split the gap in Triples Alley with the ball rolling all the way to the apex. He scored the tying run when Patrick Bailey pinch-hit for David Villar and singled up the middle.
Christian Koss 2B- 0 for 2, Sac. BA= .233. Koss put down a perfect sac bunt to move Bailey into scoring position. Just my opinion FWIW but Christian has been the Giants best "small ball" player and has contributed to several wins that way. Of course there was also his grand slam HR which was not "small ball." Bailey then scored on Heliot's game-winning single.
Justin Verlander RHP- 4 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 5 BB, 1 K, 7/3 GO/AO. ERA= 4.33. Verlander got through 3 innings unscathed but threw 49 pitches in the first two innings that doomed him to a short start. He threw 84 pitches in 4 innings, at least 24 above the target of 15 pitches per inning.
Spencer Bivens RHP- 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, 3/0 GO/AO. ERA= 3.22. While Heliot Ramos was undoubtedly the player of the game, Bivens was the pitcher of the game by getting it to the 7'th inning without any additional damage beyone the 2 runs Verlander allowed in the 4'th inning.
Ryan Walker RHP- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, Save(8). ERA= 5.29. Walker looked a lot more confident out there today but still was lucky that his leadoff batter lined it directly into Christian Koss's glove at 2B or the inning might have taken a very different turn. At least Walker appeared to be confidently throwing strikes and his confidence appeared to rise after the lineout.
The Giants open a series against the Royals tomorrow evening with Robbie Ray LHP facing Kris Bubic LHP who comes in with an ERA of 1.66. Royals have a serious team so strap in.
Kudos to off-criticized Melvin for handling pitchers and pinch hitters so deftly. Who knew you could create a rally with sub-.200 batters?
ReplyDeleteI agree. No manager is perfect, especially in hindsight. I even occasionally found reasons to disagree with some of Bruce Bochy's decisions. You can't look at the Giants and where they currently are in the standings and not conclude that Melvin has done a solid job managing them. His moves may not be as obviously strategically brilliant as Bochy's but he makes a lot of sneaky great moves. He and J. P. Martinez and the rest of the pitching staff have done a particularly good job and nursing pitchers out of funks with Camilo Doval and Ryan Walker being the most prominent examples.
DeleteMelvin did a good job of navigating the 17 games in 17 days streak. Some of the in-game moves were questionable on a game level but they made sense in the context of keeping the team fresh for that whole stretch.
DeleteBad-luck LMWJ woke everyone up with the crucial triple which, in the opinion of Baseball-Reference, in itself, turned the game around, away from the A's, from 28% likelihood of winning to 57%, then 67% with Bailey's hit, and 85% with Ramos.
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Wade-Bailey-Ramos: what a sequence. Maybe that's why Melvin has Heliot leading off. And Bailey & Wade pinchhitting.
It's what makes baseball so compelling: LMWJ legging out a triple — would you believe he has more triples than home runs this year? And he's 4-11 in his last 5 games plus 2 walks?
After losing 4 of 5 games last week (the 4 losses by a total of 5 runs!), the Giants are in a virtual tie for 2nd place, only one game behind the Hated Ones!
With such an offensively challenged team (most of the times) Melvin is doing a great job getting the max effort from his players and getting the most out of his team whilst major high priced players (or not so high priced) continue to struggle. Hopefully they wake up soon. His handling of the pitching staff has been excellent all season too. And the team is having fun with signs of great chemistry., a departure from the last two years of FZ and his churn and dumpster diving.
ReplyDeleteAnd if BIRDSONG can pitch to his capability as a starter replacing HICKS and Hicks adds another great arm to the bullpen..well..maybe Melvin can make it work until a bat is found.
And I read about a possible injury to VERLANDER yesterday...Who is the next man up for the rotation..WHIZ or Harrison (may be better off in the bullpen where the Giants need a LHRP).
SteveVA
Whiz and Harrison are both lefties…
DeleteI understand that...but WHIZ has been built to be a SP this year with 4 7IP outings in a row,,,,Harrison, while he was starting in SAC over 4IP outings may just be better suited and more helpful to the Giants as a LHRP THIS SEASON...but his future is as a starter
DeleteSteveVA
Someone on BlueSky pointed out that while Sacramento is one of the more pitcher-friendly parks in the PCL, it's proving to be one of the more hitter-friendly parks in MLB. Interesting that we now have that cross-comparison.
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