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Red-hot Giants stun Padres, close in on Wild Card
By Daniel Dullum September 9, 2006 |
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SAN FRANCISCO-For six National League teams hovering around the .500 mark, a pennant race is a pennant race, even if it doesn’t look like one. And, after struggling through the 2006 campaign, the San Francisco Giants find themselves in the thick of that battle, such as it is. In almost any other year, the Giants would be playing the minor league call-ups, playing out the string and making vacation plans. But this is no ordinary season – the National League West is baseball’s weakest division, and if a team can win at least half of its games, a division title or wild card berth is a legitimate, reachable goal. The Giants took another step at dreaming the impossible dream on an overcast Saturday afternoon at AT&T Park, defeating the San Diego Padres 5-4 in 11 innings. San Francisco shortstop Omar Vizquel said, “The last thing you want to lose is hope. Every time you have a tie game like that, you always want to go out and try to win it. We had a good opportunity there and we took advantage of it.” The opportunity arose with one out in the 11th inning. After Ray Durham’s one-out triple to right-center, Moises Alou and Pedro Feliz drew intentional walks from San Diego reliever Rudy Seanez to load the bases and set up a possible double play at any base. The move made sense to pinch-hitter Mark Sweeney and Giants manager Felipe Alou. Sweeney opined, “Pedro’s got 80-some RBIs, and it was a situation where coming off the bench is a lot tougher and I’m a double play candidate myself, so I guess that’s what they wanted to do – have that opportunity and that was the best decision for them.” Alou said, “You got to load the bases there and look for a double play. They almost got what they wanted, but that ball hit by Sweeney was right in the hole … Pedro has done his share of damage. He’s a fly-ball guy. He could hit a long fly to win the game, too.” Instead, Sweeney’s soft chopper between first and second drove in Durham with the game-winning run. The ex-Padre explained that he played out the pinch-hitting scenario in his mind before grabbing a bat to hit for Todd Greene. “You just see that kind of foresee that situation happening and think about it, go about your business and think about what you have to do to contribute to win the ballgame,” Sweeney, who is sixth on the all-time pinch-hit list with 138, said. “As a pinch hitter, it’s one of those situations you have to visualize how things happen before it does, because you don’t want to be surprised.” “All kinds of thoughts go through your mind when you’re going down to first,” he added. “I hit it just soft enough to let [Durham] get in there. It wasn’t the hardest hit of my life – I know that! “We starve for those situations to help our ball club win. Individually, that’s pretty special for me to contribute.” Sweeney’s chopper was fielded by second baseman Josh Barfield, who went home with a high throw. As catcher Josh Bard left his feet to take the throw, Durham slid in underneath him for the winning run. “It’s a great situation for a pinch hitter to be in a position to help your team win a ballgame,” Sweeney said. “It wasn’t that pretty, but when you get 0-2 right off the bat before they announce your name, and going against Rudy… “I have a lot of respect for Rudy because he was a teammate of mine last year, and he’s probably one of the best relievers we had [on the Padres] last year,” he continued. “I knew what stuff he had. I haven’t faced him too many times. It was a tough situation, I got a decent fastball, got enough of it and having Ray on third base was big.” San Diego manager Bruce Bochy said, "Barfield made a little move toward the runner, and with a good throw, [Durham] is out. It was just a little wide. Sweeney just hit it in a tough spot. Rudy made some good pitches there. The ball went their way." San Francisco (72-70) has won six of its last seven games and pulled to within one and one-half games of the Padres in the NL Wild Card race, while trailing the Los Angeles Dodgers by three games in the NL West battle. “It’s weird how the division goes,” Sweeney, said. “We’ve owned San Diego, and they’ve played well against the Dodgers. It goes back and forth. Sometimes that can work for you and I think it does for us.” Padres’ starter David Wells, who wound up with a no-decision, minced no words afterward. "You don't like losing the close ones, or any game, period,” Wells said. “But we didn't do too good last night, and today we lose again. We're just putting ourselves in an awkward situation. But we're just going to have to come back out and fight it and try to make it a little better around here. When you lose a couple of games and the other teams gain on you, that just makes things tougher." The Giants roughed up Wells early. With two out in the first, Shea Hillenbrand singled, and Barry Bonds followed with his 731st career home run over the 421 marker at the right-center power alley. It was home run No. 23 for Bonds, and his 64th RBI. Wells said the gopher ball to Bonds was “right down the middle. It was a belt-high fastball, the type of pitch everyone would hit." "I'm swinging the bat good," Bonds said. "I'm doing better. My leg's doing better. Things are getting better." Manager Alou said he wouldn’t hesitate to start Bonds in the 5 p.m. Sunday night game, explaining, “We’re right back to where we were a few months ago where people didn’t want to pitch to him. I believe he’s going to play and I believe he’s going to be healthy and I believe he’s going to hit home runs.” San Francisco doubled its lead to 4-0 in the fourth inning. Again, Hillenbrand started the rally with a base hit, followed with a single by Bonds. Durham hit into a fielder’s choice that erased Bonds and moved Hillenbrand to third. Moises Alou plated Hillenbrand with a base hit, and an RBI single by Greene scored Durham. “No matter how good or bad you did, if you keep your team in the ball game, and your behind a couple of runs and come back to win, that's great. Then anything can happen,” Wells said. “When you give up four runs in five innings, it's nothing to write home about, but the team still plugged away and gave me the opportunity to slip the hook and gave the team a chance to win. Unfortunately it didn't happen that way." San Diego clawed back in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings. In the Padres’ sixth, pinch-hitter Jack Cust singled, advanced to third on a pair of infield outs, and scored on a base hit by Todd Walker, cutting the Giants’ lead to 4-1. Terrmell Sledge hit a two-run homer off Giants starter Jason Schmidt in the seventh to bring the Friars to within 4-3. Brian Giles completed the comeback with a solo shot in the eighth off Schmidt to tie the game at 4-4. Before being chased by the Giles home run, Schmidt struck out 10, walked one, but surrendered all four Padres runs. "It's great to come back and tie the game when you're down four runs,” Bochy said. “At that point it's a big 'if' as to who's going to win the game. Any time you come back, you feel good about it." Acknowledging that this is the type of game the Padres usually win – situational substitutions and effective bullpen management – Bochy noted, “The bullpen did a great job of putting zeroes up there. We just needed another big hit." But that big hit Bochy was seeking never materialized, as the Giants bullpen corps of Steve Kline, Vinnie Chulk and Mike Stanton threw four shutout innings down the stretch. Stanton picked up his sixth win, facing seven batters in the 10th and 11th innings. “Stanton could be our MVP, if not for Ray Durham, for what he’s done in different roles,” Sweeney said. “But all the guys have contributed – Kliner threw a great pitch to Gonzalez who’s a tough guy to strike out. Then Vinnie came in. All the guys are doing it. We’re just finding ways to win ballgames. “Sometimes it might not be pretty, but we have confidence in our abilities and we have a long road ahead. But we’re in a better position than we were yesterday.” They certainly are. In September baseball, history has proven that it isn’t always the team with the best record who makes the most noise, but the team that gets hot at the right time. For the San Francisco Giants, that time is the present, with 20 games to play and a legitimate claim to have something to play for. DIAMOND DUST: Padres reliever Cla Meredith set a San Diego franchise record with 31 consecutive scoreless innings, breaking the previous mark of 30 set by Randy Jones (5/6/80 to 5/21/80). It’s the longest such streak in the majors this season. … The Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Kansas City Royals and the Washington Nationals are the first three teams this season to be mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. … Padres RP Trevor Hoffman needs five saves to tie Lee Smith on the all-time career list. Hoffman, who pitched in the 10th inning Saturday, has 473 saves, 37 this year. |
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