SAN FRANCISCO–The 2017 San Francisco Giants exist to confound, bewilder and perplex.
So why would Thursday’s Bay Bridge Series finale be any different?
The Giants haven’t seen much coming this year, and they certainly couldn’t have anticipated what took place in Thursday’s 11-2 victory over the Oakland A’s.
In the bottom of the fifth inning, Giants’ southpaw Ty Blach stepped to the plate with runners on first and second and two outs already on the board. Though the game was already decided –San Francisco held an 8-1 lead– the contest’s most exciting moment had yet to take place.
On an 0-1 fastball from A’s righty Chris Smith, Blach uncorked a jaw-dropping cut, and the most powerful swing of his young career. The Giants’ rookie redirected Smith’s 87-mile per hour fastball to dead center field, and deposited it a healthy 17-feet beyond the 399-foot marker sitting at the foot of the center field wall.
“He smoked it, didn’t he?” Giants’ manager Bruce Bochy said. “I think he stunned us all how far he hit that, I’m trying to think the last pitcher that hit one straightaway center. It was the Ty Blach show tonight.”
Blach’s three-run blast was the first three-run home run the Giants have hit at AT&T Park this season, and it all but sealed up a game that was decided in the early innings thanks to an offensive ourburst from San Francisco’s lineup and Blach’s sharp pitching.
“It was just a great win for the guys, everybody played really well,” Blach said. “Awesome to get out to an early lead like that and they played great defense all night and made some really nice plays, so it was a really great game for us.”
Yes, a 42-68 Giants team that began the season with visions of competing at the top of the National League West waited until August 3 to hit its first three-run home run at AT&T Park. And while a team-wide power outage has become one of the Giants’ fatal flaws this season, it was only fitting that their first three-run homer at home came in a demolition derby of their Bay Area counterparts.
“I knew I had it in there somewhere, I just haven’t really found it for awhile,” Blach said. “It felt good to do it when it mattered.”
Blach’s smash was icing on a layered cake for a Giants’ squad that managed to split a four-game set with Oakland, as it built upon the early advantage San Francisco gave its starting pitcher on Thursday.
Blach wasn’t the only source of unlikely offense in the Giants’ win, as a pair of players making their return to the team’s roster helped buoy rallies in the game’s first two innings.
Though rookie Ryder Jones and outfielder Jarrett Parker carried a combined batting average that was lower than the Mendoza Line entering the game, both players recorded key hits that set the tone for the Giants’ offense.
“Honestly just being a part of it again, I’ve never had an injury this significant before so I’ve never missed significant portion of the season so it’s difficult,” Parker said. “I understand what it’s like to be around and be watching your team play and not being able to do anything about it so it was great being able to be back on the field and help out.”
Jones was called up to the Giants’ Wednesday night after starting his career 1-for-21 in his first big league stint, while Parker was activated from the disabled list after missing more than three months with a broken clavicle that he sustained on April 15.
In the bottom of the first, Jones lined a single to left field for the first hit of the game, and scored on a Buster Posey single that put the Giants ahead 1-0. With two on and two out later on in the frame, Parker came to the plate and launched a double into the left center field gap to plate a pair of Giants and give San Francisco a 4-0 edge.
“They did, both of them, a nice job for Ryder,” Bochy said. “He was up here earlier, didn’t have a lot of success. That was big for him the first time out to get a base hit. And the same thing with Parker, it’s been a long time since he’s been here, so it’s good to see those guys have a little success as they get started here.”
In the second, an RBI single from Jones set the table for Giants’ first baseman Brandon Belt, who crushed his 18th home run of the season on an oppo-taco that gave San Francisco’s offense an appetite for a win.
The Giants maintained a large cushion into the fifth, when a two-out double from Parker scored right fielder Hunter Pence to extend San Francisco’s lead to 8-1. After Oakland opted to intentionally walk second baseman Joe Panik to get to Blach with two outs, all he did was deliver the third 400-foot home run hit by a Giants’ pitcher this season. According to MLB’s Statcast, all other teams’ pitchers have combined to hit three 400-foot home runs in 2017.
Blach’s bomb at the plate managed to overshadow another impressive outing on the mound. Over eight innings of work, the lefty surrendered just six hits and two earned runs while striking out four A’s hitters en route to his seventh win of the season.
In each of Blach’s last four outings, he’s thrown at least seven innings, and in three of those four starts, he’s given up two runs or fewer. Blach’s late-season durability is unusual for a rookie, and especially for a pitcher who’s ERA in the month of June ballooned to 5.65. Since then, though, Blach has provided the Giants with impressive consistency in the rotation, and it’s clear that his starts have become some of the Giants’ best opportunities to win games.
For a pitcher who began the season in the Giants’ bullpen, Blach’s emergence, and his three-run home run, are just a few more surprising twists in a season full of them. These two just happen to positive ones.
“Eight innings, three-run homer, sure, we did a lot of good things and scored runs, but what a game he (Blach) had,” Bochy said. “I think we all were just stunned by what happened there.”