San Francisco Giants Lose After Lengthy Rain Delay

In a game that ended after four and half innings, the Giants lost to the Cubs in a frustrating way. After the Giants hit in the fifth, the rain started to come down. Since the Giants had five official innings to hit and they were down 2-0, the game was considered official and after an extended delay of over four hours.

The Cubs ground crew was heavily scrutinized for their attempt to cover the field. They rolled out the tarp but the infield was not entirely covered. It was not lined up correctly and the entire ordeal was a disaster. A large area behind third base was left uncovered to get soaked and this area turned into a swampy mess.

Mike Krukow, the television broadcaster for the game, was very critical of the grounds crew at Wrigley Field. He originally said, “They completely botched this and I don’t think it was by accident. It’s a total joke,” but then later apologized, saying that his accusations were too harsh.

This was an aggravating rain delay to watch. It rained for less than twenty minutes and if the Cubs grounds crew had been quick and efficient then the game could have easily been continued. Wrigley Field, being 100 years old, does not have a competent drainage system and the crew tried numerous ways to dry the field. Tractors were brought in, squeegees pushed gallons of water off of the infield dirt, and bags of dirt were paraded in to try to fix the mistake of the Cubs grounds crew.

Before the rain delay, there was four and a half innings of lackluster baseball from the Giants with some missed opportunities. The Giants had six hits and three of them were doubles. Unfortunately, the team was never able to string a few hits together, and made the Cubs’ left-handed starting pitcher Tsuyoshi Wada look like a top-notch pitcher. The ball was carrying early in the game and the Giants just missed a couple home runs. Buster Posey had an impressive batting practice but this did not translate to the game tonight. He was 0 for 3, and all of his at bats came with runners on base.

Vogelsong has been on a hot streak lately, managed to fight through four innings. He threw seventy six pitches and didn’t have his best command. In the first inning, he walked rookie Javier Baez, which ended up being costly. The next hitter ripped an absolute shot to right field. The ball left the stadium, and the Giants were down 2-0.

The delay was not a short one. Four and a half after the game was stopped, it was officially called. The grounds crew tried many different fixes to dry off the field, and none were good enough. Giants management believed that the game should be resumed because it was not an ordinary delay, and the home team was at fault. There was much deliberation to figure out the future of this game. According to the MLB rule book, this was not grounds to suspend this game. The game was officially called and the Giants, therefore, lost in disappointing fashion after just half of a full game.