By: Joe Lami

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.

For the second night in a row, the San Francisco Giants bats came a live at AT&T Park, as they defeated the Washington Nationals 12-6 on Saturday night. 

They were led offensively by the top of the lineup once again, as Gregor Blanco and Matt Duffy had a huge impact on the victory.

Gio Gonzalez was coming off his best performance of the season, as he tossed eight shutout innings against the Dodgers on Monday. He started hot, retiring the first six batters he faced in order, but it all went down hill from there as he was unable to finish the third inning, even with a two run lead.

The monstrous third inning started with a bang, as Kelby Tomlinson ended Gio’s chance of a perfect game with a lead-off triple into right center. Tomlinson later commented, “it’s always fun when you can put a big inning together, but it just adds to it when you’re the one who starts it”.

Gonzalez walked the next two batters, including a walk to pitcher, Jake Peavy, loading them up for Blanco. Giants’ manager, Bruce Bochy, mentioned during post-game that the Peavy at bat was the most important of the night.

Blanco earned his only RBI of his three hit night with a base hit up the middle. The bases would remain loaded for Duffy, until he unloaded them by blasting a double down the left field line making it 4-2.  The rally continued for San Francisco with a Brandon Belt single to center, bringing in Duffy.  Brandon Crawford would later bring in Belt to make it 6-2, marking the end of Gio’s night.  “You don’t expect to score all of these runs off of these guys, but they’re human and they make mistakes. You have to give credit to our hitters for capitalizing,” added Bochy.

The Giants were able to put another crooked number up in the fifth inning, with Tomlinson getting the key hit.  Following an intentional walk to Crawford, Tomlinson was up with runners on second and third and two outs.  Tomlinson was able to find fair territory down the left field line on the double that would score both runners, making it 9-2. “He reminds me a lot of Duffy, he fits well on this team,” added winning pitcher, Peavy afterwards.

Washington attempted their comeback in the sixth inning, where they scored three runs of their own to make it 9-5. Jose Labton hit a two-run double, and would be later brought in by a Michael Taylor triple that ended Peavy’s night.

The hit of the night came in the second inning off the bat of Ian Desmond. Desmond launched his 15th home run of the season 477 ft. over the left field bleachers and coming very close to hitting the Coca-Cola slide. “You see shots like that in bp sometimes, but that’s one of the longest I’ve seen,” Bochy commented. Peavy also mentioned that he couldn’t have throw a worse pitch to Desmond.

The Giants’ dominance over the Nationals continues, as they have faced three of Washington’s aces these last three games in Stephen Strasburg, Max Scherzer and Gio Gonzalez. In those three games, San Francisco has scored 14 runs on them in a combined 11.2 innings. \

The start of the lineup has been the key, as Gregor Blanco is batting .600 from the lead-off spot i the last two games, and Matt Duffy, batting in the two hole, is batting .500 over his last 12 at bats that include eight RBI.

With the Giants’ dominance of late, they have still yet to be able to make a move on the Dodgers or Cubs for a playoff spot, as both Los Angeles and Chicago won on Saturday.

The Giants look for the four game sweep over the Nats tomorrow, sending out their ace, Madison Bumgarner to face Joe Ross.