San Francisco Giants 3 Up, 3 Down: Series Loss Against Cubs
The San Francisco Giants lost their first series in four chances, dropping three out of four to the Chicago Cubs. Here are some positives and negatives from the series.
The San Francisco Giants’ series winning streak is over. After taking three straight series to start to climb closer to .500, they dropped three in a row to the Chicago Cubs after taking the first game. 3 Up and 3 Down from the series:
3 UP
1 – Blach Holding Strong
Ty Blach had big shoes to fill in Madison Bumgarner’s spot in the rotation, but he has done quite admirably in his first six starts. In the series opener on Monday, Blach was fantastic in seven-plus innings of work against the defending World Series champions. He held them off the scoreboard through seven innings before running into trouble in the eighth, when he allowed three runs without recording a win. He earned a victory in the Giants’ only win during the series.
Since moving from the bullpen to the rotation, Blach owns an even 4.00 ERA and 1.194, both very respectable numbers for a fill-in. He has four quality starts in his last five outings, with the lone exception being his blow-up in Cincinnati. Since that start on May 6th, during which Blach allowed 10 runs (eight earned), he’s thrown 21 innings while allowing 21 baserunners and six runs.
2 – The Solo Home Run Streak is Over
The Giants were approaching a major league record that they set in 2011 when they hit 21 straight solo home runs. Denard Span hit a solo home run on Wednesday that brought their current streak to 19, but Mac Williamson changed those fortunes in the ninth innings.
Williamson battled hard against Cubs’ closer Wade Davis, fouling off six pitches with a two-strike count before getting a pitch he could hit on the 11th offering of the at-bat. When Davis’ fastball wasn’t low enough or away enough, Williamson put a good swing on it and just reached the basket hanging over the right field wall. It was the Giants’ first multi-run home run since May 8th.
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3 – Nunez Stays Hot
After making a slight adjustment in the box earlier in May, Eduardo Nunez has been red hot. He’s in the midst of an 11-game hitting streak, the longest streak of his major league career, and kept in going against Chicago. Over the first three games of the series, he picked up four hits and scored a pair of run. When his hitting streak began, he was hitting .246, and has raised that way up to .277 since.
Unfortunately, a tight hamstring kept him out of the lineup on Thursday. Hopefully it isn’t anything serious and he can return to the lineup on the homestand, because the Giants need a hot bat like that in the lineup.