Photo credit: @SFGiants

By Jeremy Harness

The last time the Giants saw the Philadelphia Phillies, it got ugly very quickly and did not get much better for the rest of the series.

The end result was a three-game sweep at the hands of the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park, and the Giants hope to make that a very distant memory this time around. They start a three-game series at AT&T Park Friday night.

The Giants (26-30) currently sit four games behind the first-place Colorado Rockies, with whom they won only one of a three-game series at Coors Field, in the National League West. Meanwhile, the 31-23 Phillies are in third place in the highly-competitive NL East, but they are only a game behind the front-running Atlanta Braves.

For the series opener, Chris Stratton (6-3, 4.07 ERA) will take the hill for the Giants opposite Phillies righty Nick Pivetta (4-3, 3.26 ERA). Pivetta was a hard-luck loser in his most previous decision, a 5-3 loss at the hands of the Toronto Blue Jays, during which he went five innings and surrendered only two runs on four hits.

Stratton, meanwhile, has won each of his previous three outings, going five innings in each of them. In his last outing, a 5-4 win over the Chicago Cubs, Stratton gave up three runs on only four hits, walking three and striking out six but gave up a pair of home runs in the process.

On Saturday, Ty Blach (3-5, 4.96 ERA) will face Philadelphia righty Vince Velazquez (4-5, 4.08 ERA). For the Sunday finale, left-hander Andrew Suarez (1-4, 5.65 ERA) will face Phillies righty Jake Arrieta (5-2, 2.16 ERA), who came over from the Cubs and was the Phillies’ biggest free-agent acquisition.