San Francisco Giants need the ‘big hit’ if they hope to advance

Oct 12, 2014; St. Louis, MO, USA; San Francisco Giants shortstop

(right) celebrates with catcher

(28) after scoring a run against the St. Louis Cardinals during the 7th inning in game two of the 2014 NLCS playoff baseball game at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports

The San Francisco Giants have been scratching and clawing their way to some thrilling victories this postseason. There’s no doubt that small ball is their game and has been quite effective in all of their playoff runs. The problem this time though is that the St. Louis Cardinals are just as capable of scratching and clawing their way back into games and the San Francisco Giants haven’t been able to get that big hit, despite multiple opportunities, to blow open these games.

There is no doubt in my mind that this team is hungry and perfectly capable of defeating the St. Louis Cardinals to move on to their 3rd World Series in the last 5 years. Bruce Bochy has done an excellent job of instilling a winning mentality in that clubhouse and it doesn’t matter who it is, they step up in October and help this team win playoff games.

“The Giants drove up pitch counts against the Washington Nationals and St. Louis Cardinals, fouled off put-away strikes, made a general nuisance of themselves and felt good about it. They also entered Sunday night with a .177 average with runners in scoring position this postseason.” -Andrew Baggarly

One obvious thing that has eluded them in the playoffs is capitalizing with runners in scoring position. In last night’s game if Buster Posey or Pablo Sandoval get a hit in the 9th then we aren’t watching Sergio Romo give up that walk off home run to Kolten Wong. Instead we are watching Santiago Casilla go for yet another save and possibly leave St. Louis up 2 games to 0. That wasn’t the only opportunity they had with runners in scoring position though. There have been quite a few times that the San Francisco Giants have loaded the bases and not been able to cash in the runs.

Remember when they were the kings of the 2 out hits? Remember when they were awesome at getting runs in with 2 outs and with runners in scoring position in general? I’m hoping they can remember that before Tuesday and start making it happen again. We absolutely have to capitalize on scoring runs early in the game because then all of the pressure is on the Cardinals. There will be even more pressure on the Cardinals without Yadier Molina. And correct me if I’m wrong, but we owe it to the 2002 San Francisco Giants to cuff John Lackey around a bit. DO IT FOR 2002 GUYS!! Do it for everyone who still has nightmares about the awful rally monkey!

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We need to see Gregor Blanco get on base more and help set the table. Buster Posey needs to do what he does and keep getting hits but hopefully with runners on instead of with the bases empty. Pablo Sandoval lives for October baseball and he will keep hitting crazy pitches that blow us all away because no one hits pitches out of the zone like he does. Michael Morse hit the ball pretty hard last night when he came in to pinch hit and I think he can continue to be a great threat off the bench.

Stop freaking out. The San Francisco Giants are still in a great position to win this series. It would have been awesome to come home up 2 games to 0 but this team is as hungry as ever and determined to dominate. Gear up because it’s going to be a dog fight all the way to the end!