by
Greek Giant
It’s not shame to be Ohtanied. It happens to the best of teams. Getting Ohtanied means getting beat with a homer or a big hit. It can also mean, as it did for the Giants last night in their 4-1 loss to the Angels in Anaheim, getting beat by Shohei the dominant pitcher. With the Giants stuck in a more or less months-long scoring and hitting slump, the result against an elite pitcher is no surprise really. The funny thing about this loss is that the Giants out-hit the Anaheimers 5-4. But hits don’t matter in baseball. Runs count. Runs win games.
Last night Ohtani pitched six innings and gave up three hits and zero earned runs. He struck out five Giants and earned his tenth win in the process with an ERA of 3.17. If, all of a sudden, this sounds like a post about Shohei Ohtani’s greatness, it is.
The Giants, meanwhile, threw four pitchers into the sacrficial Ohtani fire. Ryan Walker started the game and pitched a scoreless first inning. Then came Sean Manaea’s four inning and one-run outing, a very good one at that. The fateful pitcher, however, was Tristan Beck, who surrendered a three-run homer to Mike Moustakas just as I tuned in to watch the game. That was in the bottom of the sixth inning which the Giants entered leading 1-0.
Bummer.
The Giants scored their run on a sacrifice fly that scored Michael Conforto. Brandon Crawford hit the fly ball in that top of the second inning. Conforto was on third base thanks to an error by the Angels catcher attempting to pick off Patrick Bailey at first base.
I wish I could tell you there were Giants highlights in this game but there weren’t any. We don’t sugarcoat things here at TWG Central.
The Giants are off today.
Wilmer Flores has a 20-game On Base Streak. Wilmer Flores is the Giants hottest hitter, by far.
Go with the Flo 2⃣0⃣ pic.twitter.com/0kjq8Uzj3j
— SFGiants (@SFGiants) August 10, 2023