W: Randy Wolf (12-11)
L: Madison Bumgarner (5-6)
MVP: Randy Wolf (+.486)
LVP: Corey Hart (-.120)
Win Expectancy Graph and Star of the Game Voting
What up, (Brew Crew) Ballers? Thanks for having me back. Tonight I noticed for the first time that the tagline on the JS Brewers Blog says that it brings fans the latest news and inside dope on the Brewers. How the heck am I supposed to compete with the inside dope? I got nothing like that at my blog, Hang with ‘em Brewers!, but I hope you’ll check it out anyway.
The box score tells the story of this game: A big zero under the Giants run total, a three in the hit column and a two in the error column.
Apparently finding a tempo that he could groove (pitches) to, Randy Wolf continued his late-season turnaround with a three-hit shut out of the first-place Giants. San Francisco took over sole possession of first place in the NL West on Thursday, but looked like anything but a playoff team tonight. The Giants were charged with only two errors but sloppy play and poor decision making contributed to two of the Brewers runs.
For the second game in a row, the Brewers got on the board first. Ryan Braun smacked a two-out double down the left field line and scored on a Prince Fielder single in the first. San Francisco allowed Milwaukee’s second run of the night by failing to complete a double play on a Casey McGehee groundball and making a questionable throw to home when Carlos Gomez grounded to the shortstop in the fifth inning. Both runs were charged to Giants rookie Madison Bumgarner.
The Brewers added an insurance run in the seventh inning when Carlos Gomez ripped a double to center field, stole third base, and scored on a throwing error by relief pitcher Jeremy Affeldt. Gomez went 2-5 on the night.
The Giants best opportunity to score came in the third inning, when Jose Guillen and Cody Ross started the inning with back-to-back singles. A poor bunt by the pitcher Bumgarner, however, led to a double play and Wolf got Edgar Renteria to pop out to end the rally. The double play was of the somewhat unusual 5-6-4 variety. The Giants would have only three runners in scoring position all night.
Wolf needed just 111 pitches to hold the Giants scoreless and collect his first shutout since September 3, 2008 against the Chicago Cubs and the ninth of his career. He walked two and struck out six.
Braun continued his march toward 200 hits with a 3-5 performance tonight. He now stands at 176 hits with 16 games to play. I’ll keep the Braun hit ‘o meter going over on my blog. I hope you’ll stop by. Thanks for having me. It was fun to be one of the cool kids, if only for a few days.