SFGate/San Francisco Chronicle
Did the Giants build their ballpark on an old burial ground? Are the spirits of the aggrieved finally deciding to go all Amityville on this franchise?
In less than 24 hours, Edgar Renteria hurt a hamstring, Travis Ishikawa got smacked in the eye with a tennis ball during a batting-cage drill and could not play, and Tim Lincecum hit a foul ball that slammed Emmanuel Burriss in the back of the head as he stood on deck.
How the poltergeists must have cackled Friday night as the Giants built a 5-1 lead by the second inning for Lincecum, failed to hold it and lost 8-6 when closer Brian Wilson melted down in the ninth inning of a tie game for the second night in a row.
After singles by Gary Sheffield and David Wright, who had tied it 6-6 with a three-run double in the seventh off Merkin Valdez, Wilson fielded Ryan Church's bunt and had a play at third. But he threw the ball away.
Sheffield scored on the error and Wright scored on Omir Santos' sacrifice fly. When Wilson left the game after a Fernando Tatis double, he was booed by a sellout crowd of 41,684 that cleared its throat by booing Aaron Rowand's one-out grounder that failed to score Randy Winn from third in the eighth.
Now, the Giants have closer worries as well as offensive worries. Manager Bruce Bochy, who was ejected for the first time this year after arguing a check-swing call, gave Wilson the standard vote of confidence.
"He's our closer," Bochy said. "We had the right guy out there last night and the right guy out there tonight. He had a couple of groundballs (for singles) to start the inning then he killed himself with the throw.
"We need him. We need him to go out and pitch well. His stuff is fine, but he's run into some deep counts and made some mistakes."
The same could be said for Lincecum, who was not his dominating self for the second start in a row. He allowed 10 hits and five runs in six-plus innings after letting the first batter to reach in five of the seven innings he started. That puts enormous pressure on a pitcher, particularly against a team that catcher Bengie Molina described as "fearless" and has stolen 10 bases in two nights.
"I didn't throw all that well," Lincecum said. "I just gave them too many pitches to hit. That's a big-swinging club. They're very aggressive, and I didn't get the pitches where I wanted to."
With Lincecum's second consecutive no-decision, the Giants have their first three-game losing streak in a month and, for the first time this season will not win a home series.
Wasted was a fine offensive night by the Giants, mostly against Livan Hernandez.
Fred Lewis doubled to start the four-run first and an inning later hit his first homer in eight months, a 430-foot drive into the Barry Bonds triangle.
Aurilia spelled Ishikawa and hit a two-run single and a double that set up an RBI hit by Lincecum that gave the Giants a short-lived 6-3 lead.
The only good news for the Giants was that Burriss and Ishikawa survived their ball-on-noggin contact. Ishikawa had a bruised left eye after a tennis ball shot from a machine that helps hitters track movement deflected off the bat-like stick he was holding, bounced on the floor and hit him.
Burriss said he was more stunned than hurt after Lincecum's second-inning foul ball hit him in the back of the head.
"I got lucky as hell," Burriss said. "If I wasn't paying attention to that ball and didn't turn, it would have hit me square in the nose."
From: MLB.com
 NY Mets (20-15) Won 2 | NY Mets 8, San Francisco 6 |  San Francisco (18-17) Lost 3 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Standings thru 5/15/09 | Recap: NYM | SF | Wrap | Gameday |
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