1 Apr 14
When your team loses the pitching and the offensive battles, you assume you’ve lost the game. And so it was last night in Arizona. Cain struggled in his first start of the season, and Gutierrez lost the game and blew the save. Four runs in the first certainly seems to promise more, but that was not to be. Neither team scored an error.
But to that trio (pitching, offense, defense), perhaps this season we should add a fourth category, replay challenges. The Giants challenged the “safe” call after a Cain pickoff throw in the fifth inning and lost the challenge. They were out of challenges for a clearer umpire error in the bottom of the same inning that cost the Giants a run, the very margin of the loss. Replays and still photos indicate that Cain indeed did tag out A. J. Pollock after a pitch squibbed by Buster Posey.
On the brighter side, Brandon Belt lifted a three-run homer far into the desert sky that landed in the Arizona swimming pool in the first inning. On the night he went 2 for 4, and his slugging average rests at 1.222.
The D-backs’ lefty Wade Miley improved his record to 1-1, and Addison Reed claimed his first save of the season.
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