Offense awakens late; Giants refuse to die

This is our 200th post of the season, and it’s not gonna be the last. The weaknesses the San Francisco Giants displayed over the final three months of the season were manifest Monday night, and the Giants overcame. Joe Panik’s RBI double capped a 6-5, 13-inning marathon as the Giants held off elimination and lived to battle for at least one more day.

For a team that had never lost a postseason series under Manager Bruce Bochy, being swept out of existence by Chicago was a staggering prospect. But for the 10^th consecutive time, San Francisco stared elimination in the face and made it blink.

The hopes of an entire fan base once were again placed on the broad shoulders of Madison Bumgarner, who came into the contest riding a streak of 23 scoreless postseason innings. That quickly came to an end. With one out in the second, Bumgarner hit Addison Russell with a pitch and Javier Baez followed with a shot that third sacker Connor Gillaspie knocked down but had to eat. Bumgarner managed to get out number two and it seemed he would wiggle free with opposing pitcher Jake Arrieta coming up, but Bumgarner left a pitch over the middle of the plate and Arietta launched it into the left field seats: 3-0 Cubs.

This is what a walk-off looks like. (CSN Bay Area)

Bumgarner's air of invincibility certainly had been punctured. He lasted just five innings, needing 101 pitches to get that far. He struck out four and walked one, giving up the three earned runs on seven hits; not exactly the outing we've come to expect from him with the season on the line. He retired the side in order only once; in the final inning he pitched. The collection of un-Bumgarner like numbers did somewhat disguise the fact that all of the damage came on one swing of the bat.

But there was still a fight in the G-Men. Arrieta, the reigning Cy Young Award winner, was hardly invincible himself. The Giants got their first run in the bottom half of the third on a single by Denard Span and Buster Posey's two-out RBI base hit. Span struck again in the fifth, lining a triple into, what else, Triples Alley, and he scored on Brandon Belt's sacrifice fly to cut the gap to 3-2.

Then came the sixth, and one call by the boys in blue that could have had Giants fans talking for years had things not turned out differently. MLB proved once and for all that it's replay system is irreparably broken.

Leading off the Giants half of the sixth, Gillaspie's ground ball up the middle was gloved by Javier Baez and flipped toward Anthony Rizzo at first. Rizzo clearly came off the bag. You saw it. We saw it. Matt Vasgersian and John Smoltz saw it. Guide dogs in training, Mr. Magoo, you name it: this call was as obvious as Elton John's weave.

Apparently the only folks in the nation who didn't see it that way were the replay officials in New York. The Giants' challenge was denied and what might have sparked a rally instead ended up a 1-2-3 inning for the Cubs. The official word from MLB was that no definitive angle showed when the ball impacted Rizzo's glove and the okay stood as called. What that had to do with his foot being off the bag beats the hell out of us

Arrieta went six, giving up two runs on six hits while striking out five against one walk. The Giants certainly weren't sorry to see him go. However, San Francisco had enjoyed no luck against the Cubs bullpen all season. With outs fast dwindling, the Giants best chance to draw even seemed to be the bottom of the eighth. Travis Wood was on to pitch as the Giants sent up the meat of the order. Belt opened the frame with a single and Wood was a memory, replaced by Hector Rondon.

Buster Posey walked. The tying run moved to second base. Eric Young, anyone? No, but it was the end for Rondon as Cubs manager Joe Maddon asked closer Aroldis Chapman to deliver a six-out save for only the second time in his career. You remember Chapman, the guy Giants' fans begged to acquire, the trade deadline kewpie doll who would've spared us three months of watching Santiago Casilla implode like an aging Las Vegas casino?

Hunter Pence struck out. Gillaspie (pause for dramatic effect) crushed one. His triple toward the far reaches of left center plated two of the Giants' slowest runners and provided their first lead of the night. It was San Francisco's first run in 33-plus innings against the Cubs bullpen, and they weren't done. Brandon Crawford singled up the middle against a drawn-in infield to score Gillespie and pad the lead to 5-3. Chapman managed just one out before being replaced. For the Giants it was the rally of the season.

And it wasn’t enough.

Premature jocularity as Gillaspie and Roberto Kelly celebrate a big hit. (CSN Bay Area)

The game was turned over to Sergio Romo, the old closer made new, and he was asked to run the gauntlet. He didn’t get out of the starting blocks. Dexter Fowler drew a six-pitch walk, and Kris Bryant went yard, bouncing a slider that didn’t slide off the top of the Chevron cars. The air was sucked out of the park. Talk about popping the balloon. The Hindenberg didn’t blow up that fast. The Giants much-maligned pen had lived up to its reputation.

It looked like the Giants would walk off in the ninth. Belt drew a one-out walk and Posey lined a shot toward the right field corner. Albert Almora Jr. robbed him with a diving catch. Belt, who was halfway to Brisbane when the ball was caught, was easily doubled up to send the game to extras. In Belt’s defense, it was a great catch. And can you imagine the furor if that ball lands and he doesn’t score? Sometimes you just tip your cap.

With Derek Law and Hunter Strickland having already been used, Romo was sent back out or the 10^th. He retired the side in order, striking out two and leaving us to wonder where the hell that had been an inning earlier Will Smith pitched the 11^th inning and Ty Blach the 12^th and 13^th, giving the Giants multiple chances to walk off. In the bottom of the 13^th they finally cash one in. Crawford’s double into the right field corner started things off, and Panik followed with the game winner off the bricks in deep right.

Blach got the win in relief, the last of five Giants pitchers to appear over the five hours and four minutes of gut-wrenching baseball. Panik and Posey led a 13-hit outburst with three hits each. Span and Crawford both hit safely twice.

With a one-day reprieve from baseball execution, San Francisco looks to Matt Moore (13-12, 4.08 ERA), making his postseason debut, in an effort to extend its campaign.  The Cubs will ask John Lackey (11-8, 3.35 ERA) to close it out. A Giants sends the series back to Chicago for a winner-take-all tilt on Thursday.

God help us.

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