The San Francisco Giants headed into Saturday night's game against the Arizona Diamondbacks with some very large Chase Field demons to exorcise. In the end, thanks in part to Matt Cain providing his own run support, the Giants won their first game this season against their divisional rivals by a final score of 5-2.
The Giants got on the board in the top of the first, when Gregor Blanco drew a leadoff walk and advanced to third base on a throwing error from pitcher Trevor Cahill while attempting a pickoff toss. Blanco came home on a Buster Posey RBI groundout to give the Giants a 1-0 lead.
Arizona tied things up in the bottom of the third inning on a Willie Bloomquist sacrifice fly. The Giants reclaimed a 2-1 lead in the top of the fifth when Melky Cabrera hit a ground-rule double to drive in Blanco. In the top of the sixth, the Giants tacked on two huge insurance runs with a clutch Matt Cain double.
Brandon Crawford allowed a run to score on a two-out throwing error in the bottom of the seventh to cut the lead to 4-2. It was Crawford's eighth error of the season. The Giants picked that run back up in the top of the ninth when Brandon Belt led off the inning with a triple (off of a left-handed pitcher!) and came home on another Cabrera double.
Santiago Casilla came in for the ninth inning and made things more interesting than Giants fans would have liked. He got a ground out before allowing a single to Jason Kubel. He got a potential double-play grounder out of Aaron Hill that only eliminated the lead runner but resulted in the second out of the inning. Giants-killer Paul Goldschmidt was the next Arizona batter and he grounded into a 6-4 fielder's choice to finally secure the win.
The Giants amazingly had four walks in the game. Angel Pagan was 3-for-3 with two walks (one intentional). Matt Cain allowed one run in six innings on three hits and two walks, while striking out eight. San Francisco can try for the series win on Sunday.
For more on the Giants, head over to McCovey Chronicles. For the D-backs side of the story, check out AZ Snake Pit.
