Jeff Hoffman got absolutely destroyed by the Arizona Diamondbacks the last time he took the mound, giving up nine runs in one inning, starting a spiral of six straight losses for the Colorado Rockies. Since then, his club has felt like a different team than the one that was cruising along in first place for much of the season and still buzzing over the late-game heroics of Nolan Arenado. On Tuesday night, though, Hoffman was given a chance to show everyone from his teammates to his manager to the Giants what he is made of. Turns out, when punched in the mouth, he knows how to punch back.
Hoffman and Matt Cain engaged in a pitcher’s duel through the first several innings but the youngster outdueled the veteran, exacting a bit of cathartic redemption though it would all come crashing down late as the Giants walked-off as winners after 14 innings.
The Giants got the first run of the game on a two-out single from Denard Span in the third. It scored Gorkys Hernandez who had singled and moved up on a sac bunt from Cain. The definition of scratching out a run.
In the fourth, DJ LeMahieu had to be removed from the game after pulling up lame trying to leg out a ground ball. Alexi Amarista, who started in right field, moved to second and Raimel Tapia came in to play right field. He was later diagnosed with a groin cramp. We will update you as soon as we know anything more.
In the top of the sixth, Tapia lined an opposite-field single with one out in his first at-bat of the game. After Tapia stole second, Cain and the Giants decided to intentionally pass on Nolan Arenado, bringing Mark Reynolds to the plate. Apparently, as ballplayers so often do, Reynolds took the IBB personally and on the very first pitch he saw smashed one into the left field seats, breaking through the thick air of San Francisco.
Mark Clutch Reyn?lds.#BeLikeMark pic.twitter.com/FhGtED5KkP
— #VoteNolan Right Now (@Rockies) June 28, 2017
It was the 19th home run on the season for Reynolds and the RBI 58, 59, and 60, leapfrogging him over Arenado and placing him in third place in MLB.
San Fransisco got one right back in the bottom of the sixth. A one-out walk to Buster Posey came back to bite Hoffman when he was able to move to third on a Brandon Belt single and then score on a sac fly from Brandon Crawford. But Hoffman limited the damage there, keeping it at 3-2, Rockies.
Hoffman got into a spot of trouble in the bottom of the seventh, giving up a single to Austin Slater with one out and walking Joe Panik with two, bringing his outing to an end. Scott Oberg was called upon to deal with the two-on, two-out situation and got Hunter Pence to pop out to left, ending the threat. Interestingly, Oberg used predominantly sliders despite the fact that the fastball is his go-to pitch typically. It worked, though, as Pence was clearly hunting the heater and it cost him.
Oberg stayed on to face Posey to lead off the eighth but surrendered a groundball single. Jake McGee then replaced Oberg and induced an incredibly odd play, getting a pop up to no-man’s-land in shallow left. It looked for a moment like Arenado would make a spectacular over-the-shoulder basket catch but instead, he dropped the ball. Insistent on making a fantastic play, however, Arenado barehanded the ball (of course) spun and fired to second to get Posey on the force out. But the Giants just kept staying in it, getting back-to-back singles from Crawford and Kelby Tomlinson to tie the game at 3-3. McGee followed that up with a pair of punchouts to end the inning, but the lead had been lost.
Neither team could score in the ninth with Mark Melancon and Chris Rusin trading beautiful 1-2-3 innings.
Ian Desmond reached base to lead off an inning for the fourth time in the 11th on his fifth infield single of the past week. He went 3-for-4 with a walk in this game but never scored. He was immediately thrown out trying to steal. Again, the Rockies got nothing out of the lead-off baserunner. They left 18 men on base in the game.
Rusin ended up giving the Rockies three innings, giving up just one hit and striking out two before handing the ball to Mike Dunn in the 12th. Dunn faced just two batters before giving way to Greg Holland who had to stay on for the 13th with the Rockies getting another lead-off runner aboard, Tapia on a bunt single, and failing to score him.
Holland sailed through the bottom of the frame.
Trevor Story came through with a one-out single in the top of the 14th and reached second on a fielder’s choice from Tony Wolters, but again, the Rockies stranded the runner at second.
The Rockies then turned to Chad Qualls in the bottom of the 14th who immediately struck out Tomlinson but the surrendered a double to Hernandez over Desmond’s head in left, momentarily getting lost in a flock of seagulls that had descended on the park. Qualls struck out Cory Gearrin but Denard Span finally came up with the two-out base hit both teams had been looking for, for hours, giving the Giants a walk-off 4-3 win.
Colorado fell to 47-33, have now lost seven straight games, and are five-and-a-half games back of first place in the NL West. They still hold a six-and-a-half game lead in the Wild Card.
