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GIANTS        86-49                        How does it feel?

LA                  85-50      1    GB      Used nine pitchers in loss.  

San Diego      71-62     14   GB      Half a game behind Cincinnati.

Yesterday

Giants defeated LA, 3-2, in eleven innings.

Today

Giants host LA; 9:05 at the O. The Giants have not named a starter, though Sammy Long would appear to be a possibility. Julio Urias starts for LA, his fifth start this year against the Giants. He's pitched excellent ball in three previous starts, and was shelled in one. He's the fourth straight lefthander the Giants will face. 

Last Night's Game

We probably should have seen this coming, but who would have believed our report? Buster Posey beat out an infield single in the bottom of the 11th inning with the winning run on third, and he did so because the throw from Trea Turner pulled impromptu first baseman Will Smith off the bag for a split second. And there it was, confirmed after replay, the Giants' latest can-you-believe-this win, in a game they had to win, to get off first against this powerful opponent in this critical series.  

Anyone who thinks Dave Roberts doesn't take the Giants with utmost seriousness may now be excused. The Dodgers burned through their entire lineup and bullpen plus Walker Buehler (who pinch-ran in the tenth and scored a run), trying to win this series opener and take full possession of first place. That will have to wait at least two more days. But their effort was a relentless and frightening one, as they rallied in the ninth to wreck Jake McGee's save and erase San Francisco's oh-so-fragile 1-0 lead. They survived two-- and almost three-- runners thrown or tagged out on the bases. And they got two-- well, almost two-- innings out of a pitcher who joined the team just this week, one Evan Phillips, who if not for that errant throw might still be pitching this morning because they had nobody left.

Let us praise Anthony DeSclafani's outstanding return to the rotation, at the time he was needed the most, as he pitched six shutout innings against the team that's tormented him twice this year.  But let us also acknowledge the Giants went an appalling 3-for 22 with runners in scoring position. Yes, you read that right: two runners per inning for 11 innings reaching second or third, and three runs to show for it. This has to stop, and it has to stop soon. Our opponents will not always oblige us by putting catchers at first base in every critical situation.

If there were hitting stars, they were Austin Slater and Brandon Crawford. "Craw" went 3-for-5 and drove in the tying run in the tenth after LA had finally seized the lead. Slater, who pinch-hit for LaMonte Wade in the third when the Dodgers changed pitchers-- a nervy move by Gabe Kapler-- came through with a RBI single, the second time in two days he's put the Giants on the board first. It held up until the ninth thanks to Tony Watson and Tyler Rogers, and McGee really deserved better in the ninth.

With one out and Justin Turner on first, Corey Seager dropped one into left-center and Darin Ruf took a bad angle to it, then threw late and wide to third, allowing Seager to take second. Smith grounded sharply to second and Thairo Estrada's throw home had Turner dead to rights. He retreated back to third just as Seager reached the bag himself, and Posey tagged both runners. Umpire  Nestor Seja properly called Seager out. And then both runners stepped off the bag thinking they were out! Posey swung his glove and tagged Seager, and Turner quickly jumped back on third. Had Posey tagged Turner instead, the game would have been over and the weirdest of double plays a matter of record. Instead, with two out, Chris Taylor singled Turner home and off we went into extra innings-- after the Giants left two men on in the bottom of the ninth against Kenley Jensen, of course. Turner would be thrown out at the plate again, for real this time, in the eleventh. So it went, and so it goes.