SF Giants Press Clips Sunday, July 2, 2017
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SF Giants Press Clips Sunday, July 2, 2017 San Francisco Chronicle Giants win fifth straight on 11 th -inning wild pitch Henry Schulman PITTSBURGH — The Giants’ bid for a fifth straight win was fraught with trouble. Matt Moore and Hunter Strickland tried to walk the entire Pirates roster. The Giants were no-hit for five innings by a 5.58-ERA pitcher. Brandon Belt made a running mistake you rarely see above high school ball. Teams in winning streaks find ways to persevere, and the Giants did in a 2-1, 11-inning victory over the Pirates. The Giants matched their longest win streak of the season in a game settled by Daniel Hudson’s wild pitch as he threw ball four to Buster Posey. Hudson had walked Denard Span with one out. A passed ball sent Span to second, and Joe Panik’s bloop hit to left moved Span to third. Hudson struck out Hunter Pence for the second out before bouncing ball four to Posey off the plate, allowing Span to score. Sam Dyson, the Giants’ interim closer, struck out David Freese to complete the save and ensure a rare Giants series win on the road. In a bizarre bookend of wildness, Moore walked the bases loaded in the first inning and Strickland did the same in the ninth, and both pitchers escaped. 1 In all, the Giants walked 10 Pirates in 11 innings, and none scored. Only twice in franchise history, dating to 1913, had the Giants walked 10 hitters and allowed just one run, in a 1987 win over the Braves and in a 1960 14-inning tie with the Cubs. Strickland’s strikeout looking of Elias Diaz in the ninth on a 2-2 curveball that appeared inside sent the game into extra innings. The Giants bullpen was solid, Strickland included. His two-out walk in the ninth to National League Player of the Month candidate Andrew McCutchen was not a bad move. But he then walked David Freese on four pitches and Josh Bell to load the bases, the seventh, eighth and ninth walks allowed by the Giants. Steven Okert issued the 10th walk, to Gregory Polanco leading off the 10th, but escaped with a double play. Moore, the perpetual enigma, spent the afternoon dodging a career-high six walks over 51/3 innings, including the three in a row in the first inning. He owes George Kontos. With the game tied 1-1, Kontos struck out Josh Harrison to end the sixth after Moore’s fifth and sixth walks helped load the bases. Moore allowed a run and got no decision as he lowered what was the league’s highest ERA from 6.04 to 5.78. The Giants’ seventh-inning bid to break the tie ended on an unusual double play. With one out and Belt taking off from first on the pitch, Brandon Crawford hit an easy fly to center. Belt appeared to get deked by a middle infielder and did not know where the ball was. He finally turned toward center, saw the catch and returned to first. But his first step was lateral, to his left, and the Pirates challenged that Belt technically did not retouch second base on the way back. After a 3-minute review, the umps agreed and the inning was over. 2 A Giants offense that scored 31 runs in its previous four games, 13 on Friday night, could not solve Chad Kuhl, the definition of a five-inning pitcher. Kuhl had thrown exactly that many innings in each of his five prior starts. He had not completed seven innings in any of his first 29 career games. The Giants did not have a hit until the sixth, when Austin Slater drove the inning’s first pitch over the center-field wall to end the no-hitter and tie the game 1-1. McCutchen leaped for the ball and nearly caught it. The fans and some Pirates thought he had, too, raising their arms triumphantly while Slater stopped at second base. Only when McCutchen, on his knees, lowered his head in a “gosh darn it” pose did everyone realize Slater had his third home run. San Francisco Chronicle Remembering purchase of Giants, with a twist John Shea As the story went at the time, National League owners voted in 1992 to reject Bob Lurie ’s plan to sell the Giants to a Florida group that would relocate them to St. Petersburg, Fla. National League president Bill White was an advocate of keeping the Giants in San Francisco as was Dodgers owner Peter O’Malley , who didn’t want the historic rivalry to disappear. In the end, Lurie’s only option was to sell to the Peter Magowan group, and the Giants stuck around. And now we know more of the story. And that’s Katy Feeney ’s involvement. Feeney died in April at 68, just months after she retired as senior VP of club relations and scheduling for Major League Baseball. She was a baseball executive for four decades and had Giants pedigree, the daughter of former general manager Chub Feeney , who was the nephew of Horace Stoneham , the owner who moved the team west in 1958. A celebration of life honoring Feeney was held at AT&T Park on Thursday, and White, 83, said at an earlier tribute in New York that Feeney was “instrumental in making sure the Giants remain in San Francisco” with her input to owners, and added that she deserves a plaque at the Hall of Fame. 3 Lurie needed 10 of 13 votes from owners to approve his $115 million agreement with the Florida group, headed by Vincent Naimoli , but got just four. He sold to Magowan and Co. for $100 million. An expansion team was placed in St. Petersburg five years later. Feeney’s connection with the Giants turned out to be an asset for the team. Not that she wanted it in a headline. Co-worker Phyllis Merhige (they left their jobs together) said Feeney never sought credit, compliments or to be the center of attention and forever was humble and self-effacing. That’s probably why we didn’t hear about Feeney’s connection to the story until now. Giants CEO Larry Baer , while not aware of her impact at the time, said Friday of White’s message, “Bill said she had a big influence. That doesn’t surprise me because Katy very much acted from her heart — she had a heart of gold — and mind. It would have been totally in character for her to do what she felt was right and not take any credit for it or receive any acknowledgment.” Feeney eventually was going to return to the Bay Area. She graduated from Cal and relocated to New York in the ’70s to work in the National League office after her father left the Giants to become NL president. She was the ultimate behind-the-scenes force, and her title didn’t define her. She was a liaison in countless matters, settled many a battle and pooh-poohed friction. She was a trailblazer for women in baseball and did many jobs, including introducing players at postseason and All-Star news conferences to drawing up 30 teams’ schedules. Milwaukee’s finest: What is it about former A’s moving to Milwaukee and becoming offensive terrors? Eric Sogard joined the Brewers in mid-May, homered in his first game and hasn’t stopped producing. After hitting .239 with a .294 on-base percentage in his six years in Oakland, Sogard’s at .338 with a .449 OBP in 41 games. Now along comes Stephen Vogt , acquired by the Brewers after the A’s designated him for assignment. In his third game, first at Miller Park, he homered twice in Friday’s 3-2 win over the Marlins. He received a curtain call, the first he remembers in his career. 4 “You don’t have too many multihomer games in Oakland,” Vogt said, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, “unless you’re Khris Davis .” Around the majors: Bruce Bochy had 23 career wins more than Dusty Baker to begin the season, but their teams’ play has narrowed the gap. Heading into Saturday, Baker (1,813) was seven wins behind Bochy (1,820). … Curious why the Nationals still haven’t added a proven closer when the entire baseball world knew in the offseason there was a hole. They took a flier on Francisco Rodriguez , who was dumped by Detroit because of a 7.82 ERA, but need a legitimate ninth-inning presence if Baker is going to manage in the World Series. A couple of options: David Robertson , Pat Neshek . The Nats could learn from the Cubs, whose acquisition of Aroldis Chapman before the trade deadline last year helped make history on Chicago’s North Side. ... The Orange County Register ran a story on Dodgers outfielder Trayce Thompson ’s long wingspan that he inherited from his NBA father, Mychal , as did his brother Klay of the Warriors. Long arms can help a batter reach pitches away but could be a hindrance on pitches in, and it’s an issue Thompson has tried to address. Wednesday, he hit his first big-league homer in nearly a year. The pitch, a 96 mph fastball, was over the inner half of the plate. … The Giants’ three- game sweep of Colorado was part of an eight-game Rockies skid that knocked them from first place, and it didn’t help that the rotation ERA in the streak was 10.22. The starters repeatedly got pulled in the early innings, but manager Bud Black didn’t freak out.