Pablo and Zito: End of the bench to top of the world

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO – They sat side by side on the dais, heroes on a heroic night, so near to each other and so far from the pain of 2010. That was the World Series that Barry Zito didn’t even get on the roster, the World Series that Pablo Sandoval only started one day.

That Series they also were also side by side, on the end of the bench, watching their Giant teammates, supportive but surely disappointed – one not even being allowed to play, the other having misplayed himself out the lineup.

But now it’s the Series of 2012, and on a wild and historic Wednesday night by the bay, everything changed.

Sandoval rang down the echoes of the Babe, of Mr. October, of Albert Pujols, hitting three home runs.

Zito pitched elegantly and tantalizingly, keeping one of the baseball’s top offensive teams to a single run before leaving.

And the Giants, the underdogs, the team nobody east of the Sierra Nevada understands or tries to understand, clubbed the Detroit Tigers, 8-3, in Game 1 of the Series.

That the other starter, the guy for the Tigers, was Justin Verlander, arguably the best pitcher in baseball, seemed make everything perfect – for Sandoval, for Zito, for all the Giants and maybe most of all for 42,855 fans engulfed in their own gleeful bedlam.

Four in a row now for the Giants, three over St. Louis in the National League Championship Series and then the opener of the World Series. Four in a row, in which the opposition scored a total of four runs – and two of those came in the ninth inning by Detroit. Four in a row in which San Francisco scored a total of 29 runs.

Sandoval got it going, a homer with no one on to dead center in the first. Then he kept it going, a two-run home to left in the third. Then he made it go some more, another solo to center in the fifth. Each inning climaxed with a playing of that long-ago song from the days of Mays, McCovey and Cepeda, “Bye Bye, Baby.’’

“To hit three home runs,’’ said Giants manager Bruce Bochy, “that’s always a surprise. But the guy can hit. He’s got great ability to get the good part of the bat on the ball and threw out some great at-bats . . . Just a tremendous night. A night I know he’ll never forget.”

Nor will anyone else. Sandoval, the Panda, the player replaced by Juan Uribe in the 2010 Series because he was overweight and underachieving, is the first ever to hit home runs his first three at bats in a Series game.  Babe Ruth, who twice hit three, Reggie Jackson and Pujols needed to come to the plate four times. In his fourth at bat, Sandoval singled.

“Man, I still can’t believe it,” was Sandoval’s opening statement of his accomplishment, even if everyone in the place could believe it.

“When you’re a little kid, you dream of being in the World Series, but I was thinking of being in this situation, three homers one game. You have to keep focused, keep focused and playing your game.”

Sandoval had a big hit off Verlander during July’s All-Star Game, where the National League's win gave the Giants the home field advantage in the best-of-seven Series, four games if it lasts the full seven.

“For me, I just go there and don’t think too much,’’ he said. “This means a lot. In 2010 I was part of the World Series. I didn’t get a chance to play too much. I’m enjoying this World Series. I’m enjoying all my moments. You never know when it’s going to happen again.”

Sandoval is 26. Zito, 34, may have wondered it was going to happen ever. He had that $127-million contract. He struggled. The fans booed. He was an outcast. Until 2012. The Giants have won 14 consecutive games in which Barry Zito started.

“I battled in September to make the postseason roster,’’ admitted Zito, haunted by his failure two years earlier. “The last thing I would have expected was to be starting in Game 1. Just the opportunity was magical. To be able to go up against Verlander and give our team a chance to up, 1-0, and the fact that we won, it’s just kind of surreal.”

Sandoval tried to stay cool about his night, unlike his teammates.

“When he hit his third,” Zito said, “man we were just going nuts in there. We were going nuts.”

A glance at the rally-rag waving, shrieking fans proved they weren’t the only ones.

“We didn’t know at that point if it ever had been done,’’ said Zito, “and we’re just like, ‘Oh, my gosh.’ “

Or, linking Sandoval and Zito, oh, good gosh.

“We got ups and downs in our career,” Sandoval insisted. “Not every year is going to be up . . . so I see my teammate, Barry, and I’m very happy for him. He started the first game of the World Series. We were sitting down on the bench in 2010.”

Now they’re on top of the world.