SAN FRANCISCO - It wasn’t just the hits. It was how and where he hit them.
Brandon Crawford was the batter. His first hit came in the bottom of the fourth inning, during the Giants’ 5-3 win against the San Diego Padres. The Giants were losing 1-0 at the time, and the Padres’ left-handed starting pitcher, Matt Strahm, was cruising. He had given up just one hit among the first 13 batters he faced. And now, it was the bottom of the fourth and Andrew McCutchen on first base with one out.
The Giants weren’t prepared to face Strahm. He was a last-minute replacement for Padres right-handed starter Jordan Lyles, who felt forearm soreness before the game.
The Padres put Lyles in their lineup card anyway, but he never pitched. Strahm started warming up in the bullpen during the top of the first inning when the Giants were on the field and starting pitcher Andrew Suarez was on the mound. He would go 5? innings, giving up just one run. But ultimately, Reyes Moronta got the win.
Giants manager Bruce Bochy saw Strahm warming up, but couldn’t do anything about it. It was too late to change the lineup. Bochy already had put all his left-handed and switch hitters in his lineup, and kept four righties on the bench, including Buster Posey, who had the day off.
Bochy needed one of his left-handed batters to get a big hit.
Crawford hadn’t had any hits, big or small, recently. He was 0 for his last 18 coming into Saturday’s game. “Even though it may not have looked like it at times, I did feel like I was seeing the ball well,” Crawford said. “It was just a matter of squaring the ball up, finding a hole, hitting it to a spot where they couldn’t catch it.”
After missing three games due to the birth of his son, Crawford said he lost his timing at the plate. “Today, he found it,” Bochy said. “We needed it. We needed somebody to come through.”
Strahm threw a four-seam fastball high and tight to Crawford, who drove the ball deep to right field. “I knew he hit it good,” said McCutchen, who had a view from first base. “I didn’t know if he hit it far enough, so I was watching the outfielder, seeing what he was doing.”
When Padres right fielder Hunter Renfroe turned his back to the infield to play the ball off the wall, McCutchen started running. The ball ricocheted off the top of the brick arcade in right field, away from Renfroe and toward center field. Renfroe chased the ball like a child desperately pursuing a toy that’s about to roll into the street.
McCutchen scored from first and Crawford dove safely into third base. An RBI triple. The Giants and Padres were tied at one.
Crawford came to the plate again in the bottom of the sixth, with Alen Hanson at second base and Brandon Belt at first. This time, the Padres pitcher was right-handed submariner Adam Cimber.
On an 0-2 count, Cimber threw a fastball high and away, his knuckles almost scraping the dirt on the mound. Crawford recognized the location of the pitch, kept his weight back and drove the ball to the opposite field.
The ball rolled to the left-field wall, Hanson and Belt scored and the Giants took a 3-1 lead. An RBI double, and Crawford had all three of the Giants’ RBIs.
He came to the plate one final time, in the bottom of the eighth with the Giants leading 4-1. Padres reliever Phil Maton was on the rubber. He threw the ball down the middle, and Crawford doubled through the hole between the first baseman and the second baseman. This was Crawford’s third extra-base hit of the game. He scored two batters later, and gave the Giants their fifth and final run.
Ever since the Giants called up Crawford from the minor leagues in 2011, he has been an exemplary shortstop, especially in the field. He was even an All-Star in 2015, when he hit .256.
This season, Crawford is even better than exemplary. He is batting a team-high and career-high .313, and has eight home runs and 35 RBIs. He seems to be getting better, and he’s only 31.
“Watching him work at his craft has been pretty special to see,” said McCutchen, who became Crawford’s teammate this season.
Coming into the season, most people expected McCutchen to be the Giants’ most valuable player, or Buster Posey. But their MVP through the first half of the season has been Crawford. He is keeping the team in the playoff hunt. They are five games out of first place in the National League West with a record of 39-39.
Who would have thought Crawford would be better than Posey this season? Posey was the NL MVP in 2012. That year, he hit .336 and had 24 home runs. This year, he’s hitting .285 and has just five home runs. And he has missed 16 of the Giants’ 78 games so far this season - more than 20 percent.
The Giants would have struggled to win without Posey in the past. But this year when he hasn’t played, the Giants have won five games in a row and nine of their past 12.
As good as Posey still is, the Giants can win without him now, because they have Crawford. The new Crawford.
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