© Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
The Giants celebrated the fourth of July in the desert by beating a very bad team very easily. No team is as bad as the Arizona Diamondbacks, and no team is as successful as the Giants. Aside from the absolutely horrific combination of red hats and star-spangled spangled belts forced upon San Francisco, it was another uncomplicated win, in 5-2 fashion, over their embarrassingly bad divisional opponent.
You’d like to think the Diamondbacks could at least turn themselves into one of those pesky teams for entertainment purposes, but they do not seem capable of entertaining with any sort of consistency. Anthony DeSclafani failed to yield a baserunner until a Pavin Smith single in the bottom of the fifth inning, and no threat ever seemed imminent from a team which has a fairly threatening namesake.
The Giants, for their part, got down to business immediately and then seemed to sink into the comfortability of the air-conditioned, 48,687 capacity dome.
Before the mid-inning doldrums, both Austin Slater and Darin Ruf put their fingerprints on the game. Slater’s effort started the scoring, as he led off with a single, then tagged from first to second on a first-inning flyout from Thairo Estrada. Buster Posey singled him in, then Ruf gapped a double to left-center, which found a home in that cavernous part of the stadium. Even the 34-year-old Posey felt no pressure scoring from first to make it 2-0.
The scoring continued in the third, when Austin Slater, fresh off a 463-foot homer, jacked yet another into the low atmosphere of Phoenix. This one, apropos of the holiday, was four feet further. It was another one of those typically atypical Slater home runs, which leaps out the stadium further and faster than seems possible given his 6’1′, 205-pound frame.
There was radio silence until Smith decided the Diamondbacks should have the decency to not get no-hit and singled in the fifth. San Francisco responded promptly with another burst, as Buster Posey walked and Ruf hit his own long home run, good for 439 feet and a 5-0 lead.
It was easy sailing until the bottom of the sixth inning, when the Giants endured the only thing which will actually concern them.
A foul ball nicked Posey on his catching hand, which clearly stung despite the glove and batting glove he wore. After a couple of warmup pitches from DeSclafani, he opted to stay in the game for the final pitch of a strikeout on Daulton Varsho, but as the broadcast showed, he was in significant pain.
After that grimace, Posey gestured immediately to the dugout that his night was over, promptly exiting the game and heading down the tunnel to be examined. He was relieved by Curt Casali, who declined any warmup pitches. DeSclafani drew a ground ball two batters later for his sixth shutout inning.
Arizona at least had the self respect to get on the board after a bizarre, organ-only rendition of God Bless America in the seventh inning. Asdrubal Cabrera doubled to center, and was later driven home by Josh Reddick, who was, in very Diamondbacks fashion, thrown out at second without a manager’s challenge.
Aside from that hiccup, DeSclafani, or “Disco” as he despises being called, came as close as possible to tying Colorado’s German Marquez for the league lead in complete games, going an almost painful 8 2/3 innings. A Christian Walker single drove home David Peralta to cut the lead to 5-2 and end DeSclafani’s night.
It’s DeSclafani’s fifth outing of seven-plus innings, and just the second of those outings in which he’s allowed an earned run, and the first of those in which he’s allowed two or more earned runs. That’s five of 17 starts, roughly 30 percent, which have gone seven or more innings in a revelatory year for the New Jerseyian.
It was a fairly tepid affair and expected outcome for the now 53-30 Giants on a holiday before they head home for a six-game split before the All-Star break.
There was a late scare thanks to some questionable pitching from a not lately preferred Tyler Rogers, who walked Smith, but he got the sole out that was asked of him, on a 3-2 groundout from Josh Reddick.
And according to the Giants, X-rays came back negative for Buster Posey; just a left thumb contusion and a deep breath for the organization.