Crawford's historic night lifts Giants to victory

The uninitiated might be forgiven if they thought the teams switched uniforms after the sixth inning of Monday’s bass-ackwards Giants win at Miami. Fortunately for San Francisco, Brandon Crawford stayed put.

Crawford became the first player since 1975 to record seven hits in a game … SEVEN HITS…..Giants needed every darned one of them in defeating the Marlins 8-7 in 14 innings. He became just the fifth player in baseball’s modern era to accomplish the feat, last pulled off by Rennie Stennett.

If we could make this bigger, we would. (SF Giants Twitter)

Yes, a Rennie Stennett reference. Longtime Giants fans just threw up in their mouths a bit. Here’s the palate cleanser: Giants’ previous franchise record was six, last accomplished by Mike Benjamin in 1995. And if we mention Stennett and Benjamin in the same post, there’s something wrong with the universe. In the same sentence? Armageddon.

Aside from Crawford’s historic accomplishment, the game was a highly-entertaining, nail-biting farce. Hurler Johnny Cueto, arguable the team’s most consistent winner, failed to go past five innings for the third time in his last five starts as Miami built a 5-1 lead.  At that point the bullpens took turns squandering leads before the night settled into a war of attrition that was finally decided by Crawford’s seventh hit in eight at-bats.  

Crawford would stroke a double and a triple to go with five singles, including a line drive up the middle in the top of the 14th to finally deliver the two-out hit the team has sought for the better part of a month. No wonder Manager Bruce Bochy watched this one from a hospital bed. We were experiencing symptoms ourselves. At least Crawford got well: he boosted his average from .265 to .278 over on game – albeit a game that took five hours and 34 minutes to complete.

In fact, late arrivals probably thought they’d missed a pretty good fight. Posey wore the scars of a face-first slide into third and a jammed finger. Pence still looks like he went a few rounds with Roberto Duran thanks to last weekend’s foul ball to the face. Bochy was playing Motel 6 at a local hospital, keeping the light on for any new arrivals.

Crawford seemed to be the only person who could solve Marlins starter Jose Fernandez, who started the night with a 26-2 record and 1.62 ERA in 38 career starts at home. He didn’t get tagged for the loss here either, getting saddled with a no-decision when the pen channeled the Giants’ year-long bullpen misfortunes and coughed up a four-run lead like a calico hurls up a hair ball.

Miami broke on top when Christian Yellich and Giancarlo “Don’t Call Me Mike” Stanton drove in runs in the fourth but the real damage came an inning later. After Posey doubled home Denard Span in the top of the fifth to cut the deficit in half, a lead-off single by Fernandez signaled the beginning of the end. After a force out, Martin Prado went deep for two runs and Yellich followed with a solo shot.

Fernandez pitched six, and then the bullpen imploded like it was wearing orange and black. Hunter Cervenka faced three hitters, serving up singles to Span and Angel Pagan followed by Brandon Belt’s two-run double. Posey greeted Nick Wittgren with a single to score Belt and Crawford single to put runners at the corners. Pence singled in a run to draw the Giants even and Joe Panik sacrificed runners to second and third with one out.

For a team in need of a 'Halelujah moment', this qualifies. (SF Giants Twitter) 

It could have been bigger. Brian Ellington’s first pitch in relief sailed to the backstop, plating Crawford with the go-ahead run and sending Pence to third. But Eduardo Nunez popped out and Conor Gillaspie lined out to end the inning. It was that same runner-on-third, less-than-two-out bit the Giants have fought all year.  All told, despite getting 18 hits in the contest, the Giants were just 6-for-21 with RISP and left 18 men on base.

The Giants also continued to lament the pitching. In 18 pre-break outings, Cueto failed to go at least six frames only once. The Giants have just five quality starts in 22 games since the All-Star break. Newly-acquired Will Smith gave no indication the bullpen would be any better, surrendering the Giants’ just-established lead with a two-run bottom of the seventh while failing to retire any of the three batters he faced.

Then something weird and unexpected happened: the bullpen started getting outs. Derek Law got Giancarlo “Don’t Call Me Mike” Stanton to hit into a double play to put out Smith’s kerosene-laden outing.  Hunter Strickland and Santiago Casilla (we know, we know) each threw two scoreless innings, Sergio Romo tossed one scoreless, and George Kontos finished it off when the Marlins, who had arrived home from Colorado at 4 am, were too tired to swing the sticks anymore.

Crawford took care of the offense himself, driving home Span with a single in the eighth to tie the game and following up two-out walks to Posey and Belt for the game-winner. In between, Crawford gave his team another chance to win, tripling with one out in the 13^th. As per usual, the Giants couldn’t cash in with Pence stroking a grounder that allowed no advance. Two intentional walks loaded the bases for a pinch-hitting Madison Bumgarner, who struck out.

It goes without saying that Crawford was the hitting star, so we typed it instead. Span contributed with a three-hit night while Pagan and Posey had two hits apiece.

The 64-48 Giants thusly clung to their tenuous one-game lead in the NL West. Los Angeles kept pace, thumping the Phillies 9-4.

San Francisco continues its efforts to stave off the Dodgers and a losing trip Tuesday at Matt Moore 

(7-7, 4.04 ERA) makes with second Giants start against Miami’s Tom Koehler (8-8, 4.05).

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