An Eye-Burning Ending for Pittsburgh as San Francisco Walks Off With Victory

The Pittsburgh Pirates tried to shake off the effects of nearly being victims of a perfect game on Saturday night.  Left hander Barry Zito was on the mound for the Giants.  The lefty was coming off a phenomenal complete game shutout in Colorado against the Rockies.

Sounded like trouble…

But the Bucs wasted no time jumping on Zito’s soft stuff, and it appeared that the team would give him a head start to his gig with the musical group Train.

But Zito would settle down,  and managed to go seven innings while giving up just two earned runs.  Despite some well hit balls and making some defensive gems, in the end it was the Bucs fielding, poor hitting, poor situational pitching and some questionable managerial moves that were the culprits in their latest loss, giving the Giants their third straight win with a 4-3 walkoff.  In other words, the Bucs have plenty of blame to go around.

In the first inning, the Bucs put together some two-out lighting with hits from Andrew McCutchen and Casey McGehee that would lead to a two-run RBI single off the bat of Neil Walker.

The Giants jumped on Charlie Morton in the bottom of the second with their all left handed lineup as Nate Schierholtz had an RBI triple.  He was singled home by Emmanuel Burriss.   Just when it appeared that Morton was on the ropes, he was able to work out of a first and third, no-out jam to keep the game tied at two.

The Bucs grabbed the lead in the fifth, the key play happening when Jose Tabata dribbled a ball off the glove of 3B Pablo Sandoval.   The Giants threw the ball around allowing Alex Presley to score.  The poor fielding by the Giants, who had three errors, definitely kept the Bucs in the game.

Angel Pagan crushed a triple in the bottom of the fifth.  Sandoval was able to redeem himself when he plated  Pagan to tie the game, and Pagan kept his ownership of Morton alive with two more hits off the Bucco right hander.  Morton allowed just the one run in what would be his last inning pitched.

The Bucs got scoreless relief from Tony Watson, Juan Cruz, and Jason Grilli.

In the bottom of the ninth, the Pirates

went with their best reliever Joel Hanrahan to get the game to extra innings

decided to go with Chris Resop.  Burriss singled.  Brandon Belt was announced, but called back by Giants skipper Bruce Bochy who sent Ryan Theriot to the plate.  Theriot failed in his attempt to advance Burris with a bunt, and with two strikes battled the Bucs reliever, ending up with a critical base knock that moved Burris to third.

Clint Hurdle came to the mound and huddled up the Pirates infield.  Then Angel Pagan was walked to load the bases with nobody out.  Joel Hanrahan watched from the bullpen.

Resop fell behind 2-0 to Melky Cabrera.  After Cabrera fouled off three straight pitches, he took a low pitch to run the count full.

And then the perfect scenario happened, Cabrera grounded sharply to shortstop Clint #AlwaysSmooth Barmes.  The Bucs free agent pickup grabbed the ball, but appeared to not square up as he threw to catcher Rod Barajas, who moved his glove to his right to grab the ball.  Barajas pivoted to turn the double play ball, but didn’t have the ball as the Giants stormed the field.

We hope a win on Sunday will provide a salve for our burning eyes – we sure could use it.