What we learned as Giants crush four homers, hold on to beat Padres originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
SAN FRANCISCO — For three innings on Sunday, it looked like Joe Musgrove might chase his second career no-hitter.
But baseball can be a very, very strange game.
After striking out six times in their first 10 at-bats, the Giants got a one-out double in the fourth when Fernando Tatis Jr. lost Heliot Ramos‘ routine fly ball in the sun. It ended up being the first of seven consecutive hits, including three homers, that broke the game wide open — at least temporarily.
The Giants did their best to help the Padres complete a massive comeback, but Ryan Walker entered with one out in the eighth and calmed everything down. His seventh save in seven opportunities as the closer wrapped up a 7-6 win and clinched the first series victory since the Chicago White Sox visited Oracle Park in the middle of August.
The three-homer inning (Matt Chapman, Jerar Encarnacion, Luis Matos) was the Giants’ first in exactly one calendar year. Wilmer Flores, Mitch Haniger and J.D. Davis all went deep in the same inning against the Colorado Rockies last Sept. 8. The Giants later on Sunday got a fourth homer from Curt Casali, his first since 2022 and led 7-1 after six innings, but it all started to spin from there.
The big mistake was a dropped ball that allowed two runners to score with two outs in the seventh. Jurickson Profar hit a high pop-up to second but Tyler Fitzgerald and Marco Luciano collided and the ball plopped onto the grass. The two-run error went to Fitzgerald, who ranged far over to the second-base side of the bag. After the inning, Fitzgerald and Luciano appeared to have some words in the dugout.
Marco Luciano and Tyler Fitzgerald exchanged words in the dugout after colliding on an infield fly that resulted in an error and two runs scoring pic.twitter.com/TSqPZR5JFd
— SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) September 8, 2024
Camilo Doval gave up a two-run homer in the eighth and put the tying run on board, but Walker picked him off and then got a grounder to preserve the lead. He had an easy ninth and now has gone 14 innings without allowing an earned run since taking over as closer. Sunday was his fourth appearance of multiple innings during that stretch.
Here are the takeaways from the Giants’ one-run win:
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