San Francisco – Despite a tumultuous season where things haven’t gone the Giants way, they catch a break tonight. Kai Correa recorded his first win as a manager and San Francisco defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers 2-1 Saturday night behind a crucial error on the Dodgers third baseman, Max Muncy.
“It was great to see the joy on some of these people’s faces from positive results,” Correa said after notching his first win. “It was great to see the dugout after (Tyler) Fitzgerald’s home run. It was great to see them embrace Tristan Beck after his quality start. That’s what excites me the most and that’s what makes it slightly different.”
With runners on the corners and one out in the top of the sixth inning, Wilmer Flores hit a routine grounder to Muncy at third. Muncy, looking to start the double play, dropped the ball, allowing Austin Slater to score from third, then dropped the ball again trying to pick it up, keeping the runners safe on the play.
On the next at-bat, Muncy managed to field the routine grounder by Marco Luciano, but again couldn’t turn the double play as his throw to first was short of first baseman Freddie Freeman. He did, however, manage to force out Thairo Estrada who was coming in from second base prior to the short throw to first.
And to seal their victory on the night, Giants catcher Patrick Bailey caught Chris Taylor stealing second to end the game.
San Francisco opened the scoring earlier off of Fitzgerald’s solo home run to left-center in the third inning on an 0-1 curveball. LA tied the game in the fifth on an RBI single by Mookie Betts, scoring in David Peralta.
“Last time I faced him he threw me one early in the count that I kind of froze on and I’ve never seen his curveball before and how big it was,” said Fitzgerald. “So I had an idea that it was coming today at some point and I just wanted to take advantage of it.”
Clayton Kershaw went 5 ⅓ innings on the mound, allowing both Giants runs on five hits with five strikeouts and two walks in what might’ve been the final regular season start of his career.
“He’s LeBron,” Correa said. “He is that kind of caliber player of this generation. Always cool to compete against somebody that great.”
His counterpart, starter Tristan Beck, held strong on the mound through five innings, allowing just one run on six hits with three strikeouts and a walk.
Beck managed to work his way out of a few jams early on. He struck out J.D.Martinez to end the first after allowing a double to Muncy with two away, then in the third he forced Freddie Freeman into an inning-ending double play to third to work out of a situation with a pair of runners on.
“I think he’s shown up in quite a few big games,” said Correa. “There’s an element of rising to the occasion that you see with him.”
“It’s always good to eat up innings,” Beck said. “You want to feel like you put your team in the best chance to win a game and leaving that tide, handing off to Ryan Walker gives you a lot of confidence the way our bullpen throws it.”
Beck also mentioned, he has a tendency to show up against the Dodgers, specifically. Tonight’s win was his third appearance against LA this season. He’s allowed just three runs in 13 1/3 innings against the Dodgers.
“I grew up not a big Dodger fan,” he explained. “I know what this rivalry means to the area, my mom grew up here, I went to school up here. I know what it means to not like the Dodgers and it feels really good to go out there and be able to get a win against them anytime.”
San Francisco evened the season series, improving to 6-6 against LA and can become the only team since 2020 to win multiple season series against the Dodgers.
Kyle Harrison (1-1, 4.85 ERA, 31K) is set to take the mound in tomorrow’s season finale for the Giants, while LA is scheduled to send out Bo Miller (11-4, 3.89 ERA, 115K).
Photo by SFGiants/Twitter
