Giants Spoil Bumgarner's Return, Edge Diamondbacks 4-3

Though every divisional clash feels critical during a shortened, 60-game MLB regular season, Saturday's match-up may have been fueled by extra adrenaline, as San Francisco Giants' legend Madison Bumgarner returned to pitch at Oracle Park -- as a member of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Bumgarner made his MLB debut for San Francisco in September 2009, and in the decade that followed, became one of the most beloved athletes in the history of Bay Area sports. His most notable effort came in Game 7 of the 2014 World Series, when he shocked the baseball world by pitching five scoreless innings in relief (only three days after his complete-game shutout in Game 5) to preserve a one-run lead and help the Giants clinch their third World Series trophy in five seasons.

While Saturday's match-up certainly featured lower stakes, San Francisco (firmly entangled in a postseason race) desperately needed to best their former ace and post a victory for the first time since their historic win on Tuesday evening. 

Poised to spoil Bumgarner's return to the Bay Area, Giants' manager Gabe Kapler stacked his line-up with seven right-handed hitters on Saturday, including the notable bat of Austin Slater, freshly removed from the IL.

Fortunately for Kapler, his managerial decision paid immediate dividends, as right-handers Evan Longoria and Darin Ruf launched back-to-back home runs in the second inning to claim a 2-1 lead for San Francisco.

Although Bumgarner exited after only four innings of work (delivering 72 pitches in his first start since August 9), the Giants' right-handed hitters continued to shine late into the night.

In the bottom of the sixth, Joey Bart and Mauricio Dubon connected on back-to-back RBI triples, increasing San Francisco's advantage to 4-1. With their all-important swings, the teammates not only created separation on the scoreboard, but made Giants' history, as Bart and Dubon became the only duo to hit their first career triples in consecutive at-bats since the team moved west in 1958.

Despite a late rally from Arizona (courtesy of a Daulton Varsho solo home run in the seventh and an Eduardo Escobar RBI single in the eighth), San Francisco clung to their one-run lead and emerged with a 4-3 victory on Saturday night.

Recording perhaps the most important out of the evening was Giants' reliever Sam Selman, who entered with two outs in the eighth inning to strike out Diamondbacks' DH Josh Rojas, stranding a pair of Arizona base runners at a pivotal moment in the game.

And in the ninth, Kapler and company called upon Tony Watson to slam the door.

The Giants (now 19-21) will do battle with the Diamondbacks once more on Sunday at 1:05 PM PST before wrapping up their four-game series on Monday evening.

Alexa, play "It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over" by Lenny Kravitz.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ranking Every Song From Paramore's "After Laughter"

Following the relative success of my rankings of Taylor Swift's " folklore " and Maroon 5's " Red Pill Blues ", I've decided to make these posts a semi-regular occurrence.  As I've followed Paramore religiously for over a decade, this one seemed like the next logical choice. Without further adieu, let's dive into Paramore's 2017 release entitled "After Laughter", an album that saw the band adopt an entirely new sound. 12. No Friend Three years have passed and I still don't fully understand what "No Friend" is, but I'm not convinced it's a rankable song. It sounds more like a dramatic reading of a poem drowned out by one of Paramore's jam sessions. Congrats, Aaron Weiss? In any case, please let me know if there's more I can give you. 11. Idle Worship Perhaps suffering from being linked to "No Friend" in such an inseparable way, something about this track is just a tad unsettling. From its
Read more

Why Quidditch Is Totally Ridiculous (Yet We Still Love It)

Image
On June 26, 1997,  Harry Potter creator J.K. Rowling introduced the world to a remarkable new sport called Quidditch. In theory, Rowling's invention is fairly simple. For those who are unfamiliar with the game, I will provide a brief description of its rules.  Quidditch is played in a 7-on-7 format on flying broomsticks. Each team features three "Chasers" who attempt to throw a large ball (called the Quaffle) past the opposing team's "Keeper" into one of three circular hoops.  Every time the Chasers succeed in beating the Keeper, their team is awarded 10 points. Meanwhile, there are a pair of bat-wielding "Beaters" on each team who add to the chaos by clubbing two smaller balls (called Bludgers) at their opposition. However, the most important position on the field is that of the "Seeker", which is Harry Potter's position on Gryffindor's Quidditch team during his time at Hogwarts.  Each team has one Seeker who scours t
Read more

TWD World Beyond: Brave (Episode 1.01)

Image
On Sunday, October 4, AMC aired the series premiere of World Beyond , the third installment in The Walking Dead franchise. Though billed as a limited series (featuring only two seasons with a total of 20 episodes), World Beyond generated much anticipation throughout the fandom for a variety of reasons -- the most obvious being further knowledge about a three-ring emblem spotted on helicopters in each of the franchise's two established series. In "What Comes After" [ The Walking Dead : Season 9, Episode 5], protagonist Rick Grimes is rescued by a helicopter featuring this mysterious emblem -- an emblem that reappears in "The End of Everything" [ Fear the Walking Dead : Season 5, Episode 5], when Althea Szewczyk-Przygocki (better known as Al) encounters a woman named Isabelle with a top-secret mission. As the fandom has now spent two years wondering about the reoccurring emblem, World Beyond promised to address their curiosity while presenting the "comin
Read more