Giants series recap: San Francisco swept by Pirates, losing streak moves to five

Jun 3, 2015; San Francisco, CA, USA; San Francisco Giants third baseman Matt Duffy (5) throws the ball to first base against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the sixth inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

Swept! Can you believe it? I can’t. The Giants sweeping another team? Sure. I get that. But to have another team come into OUR yard and take all three games in a three-game series? That’s just unbelievable. But it happened. I saw the whole thing.

Game 1

Monday night’s game didn’t hurt just a little–it hurt a lot. We’re talking prescription pain killers hurt. Why, you ask? Well, because Monday was June 1. Monday’s game was the first game in the dreaded—actually, more like despised—month of June.

June—the month responsible for that obnoxious swoon. I don’t know about you, but I vote we do two Mays and skip right to July.

A lot of strange things happened during Monday night’s game. Some of them strange and wonderful. Others…not so much.

The offense got off to an early start. With Nori Aoki and Hunter Pence in scoring position in the bottom of the first, Brandon Belt hit a line drive to right field for a two-out, two-RBI double that scored both runners and put the Giants on the board.

Andrew McCutchen put the Pirates on the board with a pair of sacrifice flies. In the third he hit a deep drive to left-center field but Angel Pagan made a leaping, diving, rolling catch that left the former NL MVP shaking his head…and a certain someone’s hair flying all over the place.

And wouldn’t you know, he turned around and did it again in the fifth. McCutchen, I mean, with the bases loaded—only this time he hit it to right field. I guess he thought he could sneak it past Pence, but boy, was he wrong. Hunter made a sliding catch to save another couple runs.

Ryan Vogelsong was on the mound for the Giants and he did a good job for the most part. Through six innings, he gave up four runs (three earned) and struck out five. The fifth is where things fell apart for Vogey. He hit a batter, walked the next one and the Pirates put up a three spot.

The Giants looked like they were going to work up one of their “magic wand-doo” eighth innings, but they were shut down by something out of their control. Aoki led off with a double and scored on Pence groundout, but with two outs, Buster Posey hit a foul ball to right field and had a fan decked out in Pirates gear from lid to jersey—a Bonds jersey, no less—reach into the field of play and interfered with the Pirates outfielder’s reach.

After the replay review, the umps ruled fan interference, and sent Mr. Pirate, along with Posey, packing.

Final score: Giants 3, Pirates 4

Next: On to slide 2