4 minutes reading
Reporting from ORACLE PARK
Despite Blake Snell‘s tumultuous outing, the San Francisco Giants and their offense were able to chip away with a few answer-back innings as they defeated the Philadelphia Phillies 8-4 at Oracle Park on Monday afternoon.
The Giants (28-27) have now won nine of their last 11 games.
This story has been updated with quotes and post-game material from the Giants clubhouse at Oracle Park.
Following his last start in Pittsburgh in which Snell allowed four earned runs in 3-1/3 innings, the necessity for the left-hander to endure another strong outing was critical against a tough Phillies lineup.
The Cy Young Award-winning left-hander used a season-high 90 pitches to battle through four innings, allowing two walks, five hits and three earned runs while striking out seven Phillies batters.
He also didn’t make the start under normal circumstances.
Snell was placed on the paternity list on Thursday while anticipating the birth of his first child with his girlfriend, Haeley. However, the baby has yet to arrive and the Giants activated Snell for Monday afternoon’s start with the understanding the timing would be cutting things rather close. On the tough situation, Snell says it doesn’t effect his preparation:
“I’m excited to have a kid — can’t wait. When it’s time to pitch, that’s the only thing on my mind. Just find ways to get better and start succeeding.”
After two scoreless innings, the Phillies finally broke through against Snell when Johan Rojas ripped a one-out single, bringing up Kyle Schwarber. Entering into the game, Schwarber was 1-for-9 in his career against Snell, but was able to turn around a middle-in 96 mph fastball over the right field wall for the two-run blast to put the Phillies within a run at 3-2.
In the fourth, real chaos erupted.
Shortstop Edmundo Sosa drove an opposite-field triple and scored when Snell unleashed a wild pitch through the legs of catcher Patrick Bailey to knot the game at 3-3. A rare error by third baseman Matt Chapman prefaced another run — Rojas’ bloop single gave the Phillies a 4-3 lead. On facing the lineup the second time through, Snell says he didn’t make the necessary adjustments:
“I do think second time through the lineup, my mind changed to give the hitters more credit than what I was doing early in the game. It’s such a battle mentally when you pitch in the big leagues.”
Chapman’s error was erased in the fifth when Phillies third baseman Alec Bohm made a similar faux pas at the hot corner, whiffing on a routine ground ball to allow the Giants to tie the game. Patrick Bailey was next, lining a sacrifice fly to left to put the Giants on top at 5-4.
Since May 10, the Phillies and Giants rank first and second in the big leagues in runs scored — San Francisco had 91 entering Sunday with the Phillies recording 98. Much of that production from the Giants has come in later innings, with an MLB-leading 41 runs scored in the seventh inning or later.
Monday started differently, with the Giants pouncing on Phillies veteran right-hander Taijuan Walker early for a three-run second inning, fueled by Mike Yastrzemski‘s two-run double.
After Chapman walked and Bailey roped a single to right, designated hitter Jorge Soler — who has struggled with runners in scoring position all season — added a productive at-bat when his fly ball to deep center was deep enough for Chapman and Bailey to both tag up and advance 90-feet.
The smart baserunning set the table for Yastrzemski to barrel a first-pitch cutter from Walker down the right field line to put the Giants out to an early 2-0 lead. The Giants have now recorded an extra-base hit in 25 straight games, the longest active streak by a National League team.
Shortstop Brett Wisely was next, depositing a seeing-eye single up the middle to score Yastrzemski from second to cushion the lead to 3-0. Wisley came up again in the sixth and continued his hot stretch, doubling into the right-center field gap to extend the lead to 6-4. On the recent East Coast road trip, Wisley was tearing the cover off the ball, going 7-for-11 with four runs batted in, including the go-ahead RBI single during Thursday’s late-inning victory over the Pirates.
Heliot Ramos added a multi-hit game to his resume, including a two-run single in the seventh. He’s now reached base in 16 straight games.
LaMonte Wade Jr. left Monday’s game in the fifth inning with a left hamstring strain after an awkward slide into second base. Wade battled through a tight hamstring at the end of the last road trip. Wilmer Flores pinch-ran. Giants manager Bob Melvin says the magnitude of the injury “doesn’t sound great,” and Wade will likely miss time on the IL. He’ll receive an MRI on Tuseday.
Rookie reliever Randy Rodriguez racked up his first MLB win with two hitless innings of work on Monday. On the accomplishment, Rodriguez said:
“Every outing gives me more confidence and I get more motivated when I see the results. I see that everything that I’ve been working on has worked.”
Up Next
The Giants square off against Phillies right-hander Zack Wheeler (6-3, 2.53 ERA) on Tuesday evening. San Francisco’s starter is a giant question mark — the club hasn’t announced one and could wind up using a plethora of relievers to navigate through the game, according to Melvin. First pitch is 6:45 p.m.
Notes
Outfielder Michael Conforto says he’s on track for a possible rehab assignment on Thursday for Triple-A Sacramento. … If cleared from his concussion by Dr. Chris Chung on Monday, Austin Slater could start his rehab assignment for Sacramento as early as Tuesday.
