Yesterday
Here are the top 5 moments in August 5 San Francisco Giants history.
1959 home vs. Braves, the second San Francisco Giants are in a dead tie for first in the National League with less than 50 games remaining in what has been a nip and tuck first 2/3 of the baseball season. We're tied with these Braves; the Dodgers are only half a game back; Warren Spahn beat us to open the series the night before. So, it's a big game in an exciting season on a Wednesday afternoon at Seals. Jack Sanford throws a complete game, it's 1-1 in the bottom of the 8th, 2 out, (which side has Willie Mays again?) Mays doubles in the go ahead run off of Bob Buhl and we win 4-1. Sanford signed with the Phillies when he was 19 in '48, spent 9 years in the minors, cup of coffee in '56 and then ten years after becoming a pro ballplayer was the NL Rookie of the Year in 1957, winning 19 games with a 124 ERA+ as a 28 year old rookie. This is his first year as a Giant, we got him in the offseason for Ruben Gomez and Valmy Thomas. He spends 7 years in San Francisco, this is the best, with a 120 ERA+, 3 years from now he wins 24 games and finishes second in the Cy Young vote. Through 2016 Sanford is the 38th greatest San Francisco Giant of all time.
1969 at Philadelphia, on July 3 we were 6.5 out, now we go to Philadelphia for a Tuesday doubleheader with a half game lead. Game One, 1-1 in the 5th, Dave Marshall hits a 3 run homer off of John Boozer. We win it 6-2 and then take the back half as well. Last season of 3 as a backup OF with the Giants for Marshall. This is his third, and final, Giants home run. He'll hit 13 homers with the Mets, 2 against us.
1984 at Atlanta, 22 games out of first, let's just get to the end of the season, down 4-3 with an out in the 9th, bases loaded, Jeffrey Leonard hits a grand slam off of Donnie Moore (for whom things would get worse). We win it 7-4. 8 seasons in San Francisco for Hac, half of them as the starting LF, a career Giants OPS+ of 111. 144 career homers for Leonard, a half dozen grand slams. This was his 3rd. You know who Leonard hit? Carlton. 15 hits in 48 AB, .910 OPS. On the other hand, here he is against Welch, 11 of 56, .501 OPS.
1997 at Cincinnati, a month before we were up 6, but coming into this one our lead is down to 1 and a half games, 2-2 in the 8th, bases loaded with 2 out, Bill Mueller triples home everybody off of Turk Wendell. We drafted Mueller in the 15th round in '93; he easily had the best career from that round (best career from the 14th, Keith Foulke, 13th, young Gary Matthews, 12th, Alex Cora, you've gotta go back to the 10th to find a player as good as Mueller, the Braves took Kevin Millwood). Mueller was better in Boston than San Francisco, earned the same WAR in half the time.
2009 at Houston, it's game 108, we're in it, 7 out of the lead and first in the WC race, looking for our 60th win on the season, 3-3 in top of the 6th, bases loaded, Eli Whiteside does what...hits a what...a grand slam off of Brian Moehler. We win this one 10-6. If you think maybe Eli Whiteside didn't hit a ton of grand slams in his career, that would make sense. In his six seasons, the middle 4 of which were as a backup Giants catcher, Whiteside hit a total of 10 homers. This was his only grand slam - this was his first homer period in the bigs. All of Whiteside's career homers were with us.
See you tomorrow. Go Giants!
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