The San Francisco Giants were in Denver looking to gain ground in the division, and began their 3 game series with the Colorado Rockies with a serious bang. The G-Men absolutely dominated the Rox tonight, knocking off the NL West leaders by a score of 8-1. The Giants jumped all over Colorado’s starter Esmil Rodgers (L 2-1) early in the game, knocking him out after three innings of work, giving Tim Lincecum more than enough room to work with.
Aubrey Huff’s RBI single started the scoring frenzy in the first, followed by a 3 run jack by Pat Burrell to make it 4-0. Than Nate Schierholtz, who got the start tonight in RF as Brandon Belt sat the bench, blasted an absolute moon shot to the upper deck in Coors Field to make it 5-0 after one inning. Only 31 homers have ever made it to that part of the park in Denver, with 3 of them at the hands of Giants. Barry Bonds had the other two, but Nate’s 467-foot shot was longer than any Bonds ever hit there. Nate finished 3-4 for the night.
Freddy Sanchez kept it rolling in the second with a solo shot to right field, followed by an RBI single from Nate Schierholtz in the third and a Miguel Tejada sacrifice fly made it 8-0 Giants.
Tim Lincecum (W 2-1) was dealing on the mound this evening, not allowing a hit through 6.2 innings of work until giving up a single to Carlos Gonzales. Timmy lasted for 7.2 innings allowing 3 hits, one run, 3 walks, and 10 strikeouts. It marked the 28th time in Timmy’s career that he had 10+ strikeouts in a game, tying the mark set by Giants legend Christy Mathewson in 1903-1905. Ryan Vogelsong made his first appearance since being called up, finishing off the last 1.1 innings scoreless
Full box score can be found here.
The Giants will have their second game of the series tomorrow with Jonathan Sanchez (1-1 3.24 ERA) on the mound to take on Ubaldo Jimenez (0-0 7.50 ERA) in his first start after his stint on the DL. First pitch is at 5:40 PT and can be seen on CSN Bay Area and heard on KNBR 680.
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