Giants are lucky — and good

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — Oh, those lucky Giants. Oh, those remarkable Giants.

They can’t hit a home run. They squander first-inning leads. They score on bloop hits. They score on wild pitches. They score when a bunt is thrown into right field. Is that luck or what?

“It’s a great thing to have,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy, of the black magic and good fortune. “But you don’t get this far by being lucky. You have to be good.”

You have to have players who are tough, talented and most of all resilient.

You have to have players who can go through the fifth through ninth innings as they did Tuesday against the St. Louis Cardinals, with only two base runners and one hit, and remain unfazed.

You have to have players who appear as if they’re going to blow another game as they did on Sunday night when the Cardinals rallied again and again and won on a walkoff home run.

And then, as a sellout crowd at AT&T Park stops gasping and starts screaming, you have to have players who do the little things that turn out so big and win in what seems the most unlikeliest of fashions — but to the Giants is, yawn, the norm.

In the bottom of the 10th, Brandon Crawford, hitless in three at bats, leads off with a walk. Ninth-place batter Juan Perez fouls off two balls attempting to bunt, swings away and singles. Gregor Blanco lays down a bunt, which reliever Randy Choate fields and flings into right field for an error as Crawford dashes home to give San Francisco a 5-4 win and a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven National League Championship Series.

“I’m a little delirious, I guess,” said a half-joking Bochy when asked what it’s like to manage this team in these games. “Man, these are hard-fought games. We don’t do anything easy.”

When have they ever? Sweet Torture is how the broadcasters Mike Krukow and Duane Kuiper labeled Giants baseball back in 2010, when the torture sweetly climaxed with a World Series triumph.

The template was created, and it’s being followed once again — chomped cuticle by chomped cuticle.

“I’m not sure if I assume something is going to happen,” said Bochy, “but it couldn’t have worked out better. Perez, he couldn’t get a bunt down and gets a base hit. Now you’re playing with house money.”

Now you’re playing Giants baseball, making the easy difficult, making the absurd reasonable. The Giants had a homer (by Crawford) in the wild card game at Pittsburgh. The Giants had a homer (by Brandon Belt in the 18th) in the second NL Division Series game against Washington.

That was six postseason games ago. They haven’t had one since.

“It’s kind of our way,” conceded Bochy of the scrambling. "We play a lot of tight games ... We didn’t get a lot of chances with men on, but we took advantage of them. Ishi with the big hit. Pence that first inning, two outs, two strikes and he hits the ball down the line.”

Hunter Pence, not unexpected. Travis Ishikawa, reacquired during the season after seasons in the minors,  quite unexpected.

Two outs in the first, none on. Buster Posey singles, Pablo Sandoval singles, Pence doubles, Belt walks and then Ishikawa hits it deep and high to right center, where the ball is blown around by wind that would have done Candlestick proud. Ishikawa has a double, two runs batted in, and San Francisco has a 4-0 lead.

“One of the toughest winds I can remember,” said Pence, who despite being the Giants regular right fielder misjudged a shot by the Cards’ Kolten Wong in the fourth that ended up a two-RBI triple. “I started to my left and it blew over my head to the right.”

The subplot in this one was the tale of Giants starter Tim Hudson, who at age 39, in the majors since 1997 with Oakland, Atlanta and now San Francisco, had never pitched in a league championship game.

He made it to the seventh, then with one out gave up a home run to rookie Randal Grichuk. The 4-0 lead was now a 4-4 tie, and Hudson was relieved by Jeremy Affeldt.

“One thing that can kill you,” sighed Hudson, “is giving up a homer right there to the number eight hitter, and you know they are going to pinch-hit for the pitcher after him. It was probably the worst cutter (cut fastball) I’ve thrown all day ... Obviously it was a tough one for me to swallow. But the guys battled and picked me up as they have all year.

“That’s our personality as a team. We have guys who scratch and claw and do whatever it takes to get some runs across and keep the game close at times, and try to find ways to win in the end.”

Which, when the other team turned a simple bunt into a mammoth mistake, is exactly what they did.

“It doesn’t matter how we score our runs,” said Ishikawa. “It’s been a big topic on how we scored on wild pitches and passed balls and things like that. Somebody asked me if there’s another way we can score a run other than a non-conventional way. I said, 'If there is, we’re going to find a way.'”

Call them lucky. Call them resourceful. Call them remarkable. Call them winners.

Giants: Lunacy, magic, destiny

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — This was lunacy. This was magic.  This was destiny.

This was baseball at its best and worst, baseball of misplays, brilliance and autumn satisfaction.

This was the no-chance Giants doing what that they seem programmed to do, lurching through the first round of the playoffs, while their opponents, this time the Washington Nationals, wonder how life and sport can be so unfair.

They were lucky to be here, the Giants, needing a wild-card win — on the road, against Pittsburgh — to get to the National League Division Series. That enabled them to advance to the best-of-five against the Nats, who had the more wins than any team in the league during the regular season.

But this isn’t the regular season, this is the Giants’ season, as was obvious from the Mumm’s Napa sparkling wine being spritzed Tuesday night through a clubhouse reeking in grapiness and joy.     

Yes, there were the Giants, celebrating their very bizarre, but very real, 3-2 win over the Nats, and the series victory, three games to one.

This was Hunter Pence crashing into the padding between the fourth and fifth archways in right field at AT&T Park to make a catch, which surely was shown on a dozen replays and should have been on a hundred.

This was beleaguered Ryan Vogelsong courageously going 5 2/3 innings in what some suspected might be the last game he would ever pitch for the Giants — of course, now it will not — and saying his thoughts were about getting teammate Tim Hudson into the next round for the first time in Hudson’s career.

This was the offensively challenged Giants, who kept leaving the bases loaded and had only nine runs in the four games, scoring on a walk, an unfielded bunt, a ground out and finally, breaking a 2-2 tie in the seventh, on a wild pitch.

“I have a gritty bunch out there,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy. “I told them earlier, there’s nobody’s will that’s stronger than theirs.”

And probably nobody’s fans who were louder than theirs.

When the Giants went out for the ninth, under a full moon that had risen behind the centerfield scoreboard, AT&T Park was cauldron of noise.

And not long after the final out, a grounder to second baseman Joe Panik, the Giants raced around the extremities of the ballpark, slapping hands with fans who they could reach or waving gleefully at those in the upper decks.

“We were determined not to get back on the plane and go to Washington,” said Bochy of a possible fifth game.

Instead, they will get on a plane and fly to St. Louis, where Saturday they play the Cardinals in the opener of the best-of-seven NL Championship Series.

As if things couldn’t be any better by the docks of the Bay, the Cards earlier in the evening came from behind to stun Clayton Kershaw and the Dodgers. As we know, many of the good people in Northern California so despise L.A. they’d just as soon the Dodgers lose as the Giants win.

On Tuesday, both took place.

What a screwball few days. On Saturday, Buster Posey gets thrown out at the plate trying to score from second, and the game goes 18 innings, the Giants winning. On Tuesday, Posey again gets thrown out at home place trying to score from third when Nats reliever Aaron Barrett flung one over the catcher’s head on an intentional walk.

“I was just trying to score, both times,” said Posey. He was ducking sprays of sparkling wine and trying to grab his twins, who along with the members of many Giants’ families had been brought to the clubhouse.

What a screwball few days. Tony Bennett, the 88-year-old crooner best known for “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” was brought in Monday to sing “God Bless America,” done before the home seventh of important nationally televised games.

He botched one of the verses, transforming “ ...oceans white with foam...” to what sounded like “ripe with gold.”

People laughed. People shrugged. A botch, but not nearly as critical as the botches made by the Nats, letting bunts roll untouched, bouncing pitches in front of home plate.

"I wish I knew the formula, the secret," Bochy said of the Giants’ success. "They seem to thrive on this type of play. They elevate their play. I tell them, 'It's in your DNA.' But I can't say there's a silver bullet. I've been on the other end, too, in these short series. There's no magic formula, trust me.

“It was one of the strangest games, how we scored. But that’s our way sometimes. We scratch and paw for runs. And we got a break.”

They also got a tremendous effort from Vogelsong, who, despite his struggles in the season, somehow got it done in the postseason.

The 37-year-old, 0-4 with a 5.53 earned run average in September, held the Nats hitless until the fifth.

"That's what I expect out of myself in these games," Vogelsong said. "You can't treat it like any other game. I don't. Some guys do, but I treat it like the last game I'm ever going to pitch."

When he was replaced in the top of the seventh by Javier Lopez, after Pence’s great catch and a long out by Jayson Werth, the crowd began to chant, “Vogey, Vogey, Vogey.”

“Just a gutty effort,” said Bochy. “I’m proud of him. I really am. He really came through for us tonight.”

He wasn’t alone. At AT&T, maybe the oceans truly are ripe with gold.

Did Bumgarner’s throw let Nats get away?

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — It just got away. Madison Bumgarner was talking about the bunt he picked up and hurled into left field. He could have been talking about history, about the National League Division Series, the one that may have slipped out of the Giants’ grasp as surely as the ball did from Bumgarner’s grasp.

A sacrifice bunt with runners on first and second and nobody out in the top of the seventh of a scoreless game. Bumgarner grabbed the ball. He’s a lefthander.

He’s a great pitcher, probably San Francisco’s best. He was out there to wrap up the Series, to give the Giants a sweep over the Washington Nationals. For six innings Monday afternoon he was impressive, as was the other starter, Doug Fister.   

In the seventh, Bumgarner gave up a leadoff double to Ian Desmond and then a walk to the dangerous Bryce Harper. The Nats needed a win. The Nats needed a run. Wilson Ramos tried to sacrifice, but the count went to 1-2. Washington manager Matt Williams wouldn’t back away from the bunt.

Ramos dumped it down, and Bumgarner picked it up. And threw away the baseball. Maybe, knowing how little things grow large and fateful in the playoffs, threw away the postseason. Flung the ball past third baseman Pablo Sandoval. Maybe flung the Giants' chances into oblivion.

Desmond would score from second, Harper from first. The Nats would beat the Giants, 4-1, and not only would stay alive but perhaps also would change the direction of the series.

Washington had a win. Washington had momentum.

“It just got away from me,” said Bumgarner. He had gone 22 innings in the postseason without permitting a run, six in this game. He was the man who would clinch. But with the bunt in his hand, he clutched. “I felt good throwing it,” said Bumgarner.

A door was opened. The Nats had the best record in the National League during the regular season. But the Giants were baffling them, frustrating them, beating them, 3-2, the first game then in a record 18 hours, 2-1 the second. Everything was going the Giants way. Until Bumgarner’s throw went the wrong way.

Do the Giants come back? Do the Nationals, waiting for the break, win the last two? Was that error in the nightmarish litany of fairy stories the clock striking midnight? The Giants did win the World Series in 2010 and 2012, but their legacy is of heartbreak, of line drives caught and other miseries.

Giants manager Bruce Bochy saw everything unfolding and winced. “I was hoping we would get an out there,” said Bochy. Instead he got a figurative punch in the jaw.

“He tried to do too a little too much there on the bunt,” Bochy said of Bumgarner. “You know you take the out. He tried to rush it. He threw it away.”

Then as if to lighten a grim setting, Bochy added, “He threw it away well, too.”

There was laughter. There was jolting reality. The Nats had been given life, and in baseball, where time stands still, where there is no clock, that’s all you need. Especially when you have Denard Span, Anthony Rendon (7 of 15 in the three games), Jayson Werth and Adam LaRoche at the top of the lineup.

Ryan Vogelsong pitches for the Giants when the teams play again Tuesday night at AT&T Park. “He’s one of our starters,” said Bochy, explaining why Vogelsong was chosen. “He’s a guy we have all the confidence in the world in. He’s been in this situation before.”

Gio Gonzalez will go for the Nats. He used to be on the Oakland A’s. He knows AT&T. “Spent half my career here,” said Gonzalez, exaggerating only a trifle. What he didn’t know Monday morning was he would have the opportunity to pitch one more time. One very big time.

“We all want to win,” said Gonzalez. “We can’t dwell on the past.”

That was the Nats’ mantra after the 18-inning loss Saturday night. That is the Giants’ mantra after the stunning loss Monday afternoon.

“I don’t know if shock’s the word,” Bochy said of the way the way things turned in the seventh. “It’s such an intense game, and I know that they wanted to get that out at third base. They played so well in these type of games. We made a mistake. We’ve got to learn from it.”

It may be too late. It may be that the only thing Bumgarner and the Giants will learn is they gave the Nationals the break that may break the Giants.

“Well,” said Bochy, “I don’t know how many times I’ve heard down the stretch in September ‘must win’ and all that. That’s why you play the game. We’re fortunate not to be in that situation quite yet with our two wins in Washington.

“But they are all important games. We know how good this club is we’re playing, and you have to play your best ball to beat them. Today we didn’t, and we made a mistake that hurt us. But we’ll come out and get after it (Friday).”

Giants-Dodgers: Disdain, Paranoia, History

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — This is what baseball wanted. This is what the Giants hoped. The Dodgers are coming to the Bay, coming to play a three-game series, which could mean everything and then again, because there’s such craziness in the long season, might mean very little.

Dodgers-Giants, so much background, so much disdain. And up here, even after two World Series victories, so much jealousy. The chant isn’t “Go Giants,” it’s “Beat L.A.”  Short and pithy. Resonating with paranoia.

Watching the Dodgers lose gives San Francisco fans as big a thrill as watching the Giants win, and if both can be accomplished in one fell swoop — well, Brian Johnson’s 1997 home run against L.A., which sent the Giants to the postseason, is the stuff of legend.

It’s a sporting matchup, the one-two teams in the National League West. It’s a societal matchup, the glitz of Hollywood against the garlic fries of North Beach.

“It’s good for baseball the way the schedule worked out,” said Bruce Bochy, the Giants' manager. “This is where we were hoping to be.”

He means in the chase, two games back of L.A. He also means at AT&T Park, where on a fine Thursday afternoon San Francisco beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 6-2, a ninth straight win at home.

“There’s a lot of history between these two teams,” said Bochy of the Dodgers-Giants battle.

There’s Bill Terry, back in 1934, when the Giants were in New York and the Dodgers in Brooklyn, chiding, “The Dodgers? Are they still in the league?” Oh yes they were, and they beat the Giants the final two games of the season to give the Cardinals the flag.

There’s the Dodgers building up a 13½ game lead over the Giants in 1951, ending up tied and losing the playoff on Bobby Thomson’s momentous home run in the bottom of the ninth at the Polo Grounds, the “shot heard ‘round the world.”

There’s Juan Marichal smashing John Roseboro over the head with a bat, and Reggie Smith — a Dodger who would become a Giant — climbing into the stands at Candlestick Park to attack a pesky fan. And, of course, there’s Joe Morgan’s home run in 1982, which KO'ed the Dodgers and left Tom Lasorda apoplectic.

Three games in San Francisco this series, then three games next week at Dodger Stadium. “We’re feeling good,” said Giants catcher Buster Posey. And why not? Four days ago the Giants were 3½ games out, a month ago 5½ games behind.

“We also know that’s a pretty good team coming to town.”

No, that’s a very good team. A team that overtook the Giants in July and hasn’t been out of the lead since.

Over the last couple of weeks, the Giants, finally out of their funk, also have looked like a pretty good team. Their pitching is back where it belongs — the Diamondbacks scored only three runs in losing all three games of the series. Now the Giants are hitting when needed, and they’ve won 12 of the last 15.

So much of it is attributable to Angel Pagan. He missed 34 games with back inflammation. The Giants had no leadoff hitter. The Giants had no spark.

On Wednesday, he began the game with a double, then had a single and walk, scoring twice. “He’s our catalyst,” said Bochy, emphasizing the obvious. “We’re a different team with him out there. He’s our get-on-base guy. It’s funny how one guy can mean so much.”

Pagan went 7-for-12 in the three games against Arizona and is hitting .488 (21-for-43) in 10 games against the D-backs. With Pagan on base, opposing pitchers think and throw differently when they face Joe Panik. And Buster Posey. And Pablo Sandoval. And Hunter Pence.

Dodgers-Giants, pitching against pitching. Hyun-Jin Ryu, Zack Greinke and the remarkable Clayton Kershaw for L.A., Madison Bumgarner, Tim Hudson and Yusmeiro Petit for San Francisco.

“Pitching gives you a chance to win,” said Bochy.

It did Wednesday. Jake Peavy started for the Giants. In 5 2/3 innings he allowed only one run, striking out eight.

“Since we got him, he’s been solid,” said Bochy said of Peavy, whom San Francisco acquired from Boston in July. “It’s been fun watching him. He’s a guy who plays the game the way it should be played, as hard as anyone.”

Bochy is upbeat. He knows what’s ahead, and he’s confident.

“This club has been through quite a bit,” he said, meaning the great April and early May, the awful June and July.

In the three games against the Dodgers, it will go through a great deal more. Just as it hoped. Just as baseball wanted.

Time to stop believin’ in Giants?

By Art Spander

SAN FRANCISCO — The manager was talking about resilience. Bruce Bochy said he’s proud of the way the Giants, his team, came back when it seemed to have no chance. Yes, the San Francisco Giants are persistent, courageous, gutsy. But they’re not successful.

They rallied in the ninth. Scored two runs to send the game into extra innings, then lost in the 10^th, then Tuesday night were beaten, 3-2, by the Chicago White Sox, who had dropped five of their previous six. Which doesn’t say much for the Giants.

Their race is all but run, resilient or not. They’ve lost five in a row. They’re six behind the Los Angeles Dodgers, a team that never loses, as opposed to the Giants, who lately never win.

Six back, and in May the Giants were 9½ ahead. Sure it was early, but they looked like a contender, maybe a champion. Now they look like a team that is lucky to get a run.

Bochy was talking about the almosts, which is what happens when you’re not quite as good as you thought you would be, not quite as good as most of baseball thought you’d be.

Hunter Pence was on third in the bottom of the first with one out, but he broke slowly on a grounder to short and was cut down at the plate.   

In the bottom of the ninth, trailing 2-0, with the bases loaded and none out, Joe Panik hit a smash up the middle, but White Sox second baseman Gordon Beckham made a spectacular diving stop and it was a 4-6-3 double play. Yes, San Francisco eventually tied, but it could have won in nine.

Still, could-haves and would-haves are the thoughts of teams that can’t find a way to win. They may not quit — nor do the fans, the sellout crowd of 42,317 at AT&T Park staying and screaming to an end that was bitter — but neither do they win.

“We could use a break,” sighed Bochy in his post-game remarks.

They could. They also could use some runs. They did avoid being shut out for a 14^th time this season, and they were facing one of the best pitchers in baseball in Chicago’s Chris Sale, but a run here or there just isn’t enough.

Especially when in the first inning Ryan Vogelsong gave up two on a home run to Adam Dunn. One mistake. In another season, perhaps, that’s overcome. Not this season for the Giants, so painfully ineffective.

“We have to pitch shutouts,” Bochy said in a conversation before the game. It was an offhanded remark, but there is a great deal of truth. Because the other team pitches shutouts against the Giants.

Especially when Vogelsong is pitching by the Bay. He was gone by the time the Giants finally broke through, and this was the fifth straight home game in which Vogelsong received not one iota of offensive help. It also was the eighth time in 24 starts overall.

The Giants simply can’t score. Angel Pagan, Pence, Buster Posey and Pablo Sandoval, the four men at the top of the order, had one hit apiece Tuesday night. It was a two-out single by Brandon Crawford, the No. 8 batter, that tied the game.

“Their defense beat us,” said Bochy. “That double play on the Panik ball was one of the best I’ve seen.”

Bochy is remarkable at keeping his cool. He doesn’t throw equipment. He doesn’t berate his athletes. He simply says things like, “This was a tough one,” and again, “We could use a break.”

No less, they could use some hitters. The strain on the pitchers must be enormous. And now there’s no Matt Cain, who at the least underwent successful surgery to remove bone chips from his elbow.

No Cain. No hitting. No runs. A bad combination.

Six games back of the Dodgers, and a month and a half to go. The talk is about a wild card, but if they can’t beat the White Sox, a team with a losing record, then whom can they beat? They were swept by the Dodgers, swept by the Kansas City Royals.

“I was hoping when Hunter (Pence) was caught at home it wouldn’t affect the game,” said Bochy, “but it did. We were behind 2-0 in the first and it would have been 2-1. I don’t think he read it right. He’s as good a runner as we have.”

Giants home night games are mostly as they have been. There’s the recording of Sinatra singing “Strangers in the Night,” and close-ups of fans kissing. There’s the recording of Journey singing “Don’t Stop Believin.’”

What’s changed is the Giants can’t score and can’t win. Maybe it is time to stop believin’.