Mercury News
This is no way to feel about a winning month.
Despite blowing a two-run lead in the eighth inning and losing 4-3 to the St. Louis Cardinals on Tuesday night, the Giants were a technical success in May. They finished it with a 16-12 record.
But those gains came at a cost. Pablo Sandoval had hand surgery May 3. Mark DeRosa's wrist ruptured again. Most dear and dire, Buster Posey is out for the season because of a shredded ankle.
Rookie Brandon Belt received the latest scare, when a pitch struck his left wrist and sent him to the X-ray machine. Results were negative, but he probably will miss the remaining two games on this trip.
No wonder the Giants are running away from May like it's a burning fuselage.
"Nobody else is going to feel sorry for us," right-hander Ryan Vogelsong said.
Nobody ever does for the defending World Series champs, although the Cardinals were thoughtful house guests when they visited AT&T Park in April. Their closer, Ryan Franklin, blew two save chances in the ninth inning and allowed the Giants to celebrate consecutive victories when they raised the World Series banner and received their rings in gold-threaded jerseys.
This time, the Giants brought the fruit basket and bottle of Cabernet, as Sergio Romo and Javier Lopez allowed a two-run lead to unravel in the eighth.
Jon Jay led off with a grounder on an 0-2 pitch that hugged the first-base line. Giants catcher Eli Whiteside
Romo could only kick himself for the next pitch he threw, a hanger that Albert Pujols lashed for a double. Allen Craig doubled off Lopez to tie it.
Then Skip Schumaker's two-out grounder found a seam along the right side. Second baseman Freddy Sanchez made a diving stop, but his hurried throw was off-line as Belt and Lopez double-covered the bag.
"I thought we were out of the inning," Bochy said. "When Lopez didn't react to the call, I knew he couldn't find the bag."
Lopez said it was "not a routine play. I don't think we've had that since spring training."
Baseball has a way of evening out. Franklin, who was stripped of his closer role in April, struck out the side in the top of the eighth to get credit for the victory.
Until the Cardinals' rally, the win belonged to Vogelsong. He labored while throwing 92 pitches over five innings but allowed just one run -- and that came in the third when Pat Burrell whiffed on a ball in left field.
Cardinals pitcher Chris Carpenter had gotten a running start off second base on Jay's single; Burrell would have had a shot at the plate, but in a brutal lapse, he allowed the ball to get past him and roll to the wall.
It was the only run allowed by Vogelsong and just the second earned run against him over his past five starts, spanning 311/3 innings.
"I could never get comfortable. I just couldn't adjust to the slope of the mound," said Vogelsong, who nonetheless held down one of the league's most productive lineups. "It was luck, and I made some pitches when I had to."
If the Giants received any other luck, it was Belt's X-ray results. He stayed in the game after left-hander Trever Miller struck him on the outside of his left wrist in the seventh inning. Trainers checked him again after his diving attempt on Schumaker's grounder in the eighth.
Belt said he couldn't make throws toward the end of the game. But the Giants already had used Aubrey Huff as a pinch hitter and had no other first basemen on the roster.
"There's probably going to be some swelling," said Belt, examining his bright red arm after he finished icing it. "We'll be on it tonight and all day tomorrow and hope to get back out there."
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