DENVER — The surging San Francisco Giants open a three-game series Monday at Coors Field Pernell McPhee Jersey , where they have fared poorly. But ace left-hander Madison Bumgarner, who is in vintage form, will start against the Colorado Rockies in a sequel of sorts.
Bumgarner (1-2, 2.51) and Rockies left-hander Kyle Freeland (7-6, 3.29), who has been the Rockies’ best starter, opposed each other Wednesday at AT&T Park. Both starters pitched seven scoreless innings before the Giants won 1-0 on Brandon Crawford’s walk-off homer.
The Giants have lost 12 of their past 14 games at Coors Field. But they began their current road trip by sweeping three games at Arizona — their first sweep at Chase Field since September 2016 — giving the Giants (45-40) 10 wins in their past 12 games.
The Giants are 19-26 on the road, which is the second-worst road record in the National League. But they have won eight of their past 14 road games.
The Giants are tied for second in the NL West with the Los Angeles Dodgers, 2 1/2 games behind the Diamondbacks. That is the closest the Giants have been to first place since June 10, when they were also 2 1/2 games behind.
The Giants got strong starts from Andrew Suarez and Dereck Rodriguez while beating the Diamondbacks 2-1 and 7-0 and overcame a poor start by Derek Holland to win the series finale, 9-6.
“These are big games for us, for sure,” Giants catcher Buster Posey said after Saturday’s win. “I think we all collectively know we’ve got to play better on the road. … We go to Denver Dick Butkus Jersey , where we haven’t played well the past couple of years. It’s a matter of keeping our focus and executing.”
Bumgarner’s execution has been uncommonly good lately.
He has a string of 16 consecutive scoreless innings dating back to June 16 against the Dodgers at Los Angeles. He then worked eight scoreless innings June 21 against San Diego and limited the Rockies to two hits Wednesday in seven innings.
That gave Bumgarner back-to-back scoreless outings of at least seven innings for the first time in his career. In 27 starts in his career, Bumgarner is 12-7 with a 2.92 ERA against the Rockies.
At Coors Field, he is 5-5 with an ERA of 4.00 in 13 starts. He hasn’t pitched in Colorado since 2016.
This is the second season in the majors for Freeland, who is 4-2 with an ERA of 2.61 in seven starts against the Giants. He’s 2-0 in three starts against them this year.
Freeland has allowed three or fewer runs in 11 starts and four runs in the other. In six starts at Coors Field this year, Freeland is 4-2, 2.95.
Freeland held the Giants to four singles Wednesday, and registered 12 ground-ball outs.
Bumgarner gave up a single and a double, allowed one runner to reach third base and struck out eight (six swinging). Freeland threw 104 pitches, 67 for strikes. Bumgarner finished with 101 pitches, 66 strikes.
“It was a great matchup between two lefties, one just starting his career and getting his feet on the ground, and Bumgarner obviously we know what he’s done in his career,” Rockies manager Bud Black said. “It was impressive from Kyle in terms of the changeup usage J'Mon Moore Jersey , keeping the ball down, enough inside to keep the righties honest, changing speeds, sinking the ball.”
The Rockies (41-43) dropped two of three at San Francisco but then won two of three at Los Angeles, ending a 3-3 road trip with a 6-4 loss Sunday that kept them six games behind Arizona.
The Rockies are 26-21 on the road, but their 15-22 home record is the second-worst in the NL.
Not that long ago, the Chicago Cubs probably viewed a series against the Cincinnati Reds as a near-guaranteed way to pick up some quick victories and gain some ground in the National League Central standings.
Those days have changed. And so is the Cubs-Reds rivalry.
The Cubs couldn’t hold a multi-run lead for the second straight night, and the Reds won their fifth in a row and eighth in 10 games — quite a run for a team that played .250 ball for the first month-plus of the season — by rallying for a 6-3 victory on Friday night.
Now, the Cubs are expected to ask their bullpen to carry them through the third game of the four-game series Saturday at Great American Ball Park — a series that isn’t going much like most of those Cubs-Reds matchups for the last four seasons.
Going into the series, the Cubs were 43-19 against the Reds since 2015, but the Reds are playing much differently now than they did when they were 8-27 on May 7. They’re 4-0 on their current homestand, even though they still remain well below .500 at 30-45.
“Even when we were losing, they (his veteran players) felt like Danny Trevathan Jersey , ‘We’re a good ballclub, we’re going to get our share (of wins),'” Reds interim manager Jim Riggleman said. “(When) we’re on a roll like this, they feel like we’re just going to keep going with it.”
Eugenio Suarez lifted his average to .304 by going 3-for-4 with a go-ahead two-run homer in the fifth inning off Jose Quintana (6-6) and Joey Votto had two hits and an RBI. Quintana gave up four runs and nine hits in five innings.
“We’re playing really good baseball,” Suarez said. “We’ve got to keep doing what we’re doing — and keep winning. If we play like this, something good is going to happen.”
The Cubs scored three times against Reds starter Luis Castillo (5-8) in 5 2/3 innings — Kyle Schwarber hit a two-run homer in the fourth — but former Cleveland Indians pitcher Kyle Crockett pitched out of a two-on jam in the sixth in his Reds debut.
The Cubs managed only four hits in the game, David Hernandez pitched two scoreless innings and Raisel Iglesias finished in the ninth for his 12th save.
The Cincinnati bullpen has pitched 6 1/3 scoreless innings in the series so far.
“That was one of the cleaner games we’re played — offensively, defensively, we ran the bases well … and got timely hits,” Riggleman said. “When you do that, you’re probably going to win.”
Now, the Reds have the improving Anthony DeSclafani (2-1) pitching Saturday. The right-hander missed the first two months of the season with an oblique injury after sitting out all of last season with an elbow injury, but he has won his last two starts while lowering his ERA from 7.60 to 4.20.
He’s 2-2 in seven career starts against the Cubs http://www.greenbaypackersteamonline.com/kevin-king-jersey , and he handles Chicago cleanup hitter Anthony Rizzo (2-for-20, .100) especially well.
It’s expected to be a bullpen game for the Cubs, with former Reds pitcher Luke Farrell (2-2) making his first start of the season and only the second of his major league career. The longest he has pitched this season was five shutout relief innings during the Cubs’ 7-1, 14-inning victory over the New York Mets on June 2.
Cubs manager Joe Maddon stayed with his recent experiment of using slugger Kris Bryant as a leadoff hitter — he was 9-for-24 (.375) with three RBIs in that spot going into the game — but he went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts.
“He gets on base a lot, he’s possibly one of the best baserunners on the team,” Maddon told reporters. “It’s one of those things — preconceived notions — that you get hung up on. But I like what he’s doing. When the bottom of the order has been productive, there’s a potential for a lot of baserunners in the one-hole.”
Only there wasn’t any such potential Friday as the Cubs’ No. 7-8-9 batters were a combined 0-for-9. It also didn’t help that Rizzo went 0-for-4 and stranded three runners.
And, now, suddenly the Cubs-Reds rivalry isn’t what it used to be.
Grayson Allen Jersey
« Jalen Brunson JerseyAnd why Elway stuck with him. »
Weitere Artikel der Kategorie Allgemein
RSS-Feed abonnieren
Besucher
Forum Statistiken
