San Francisco Giants’ Joc Pederson, right, is congratulated by third base coach Mark Hallberg (91) after hitting a home run against the San Diego Padres during the eighth inning at Oracle Park in San Francisco on Tue Jun 20, 2023 (AP News photo)

San Diego (35-38). 002 010 000 – 3. 10. 0

San Francisco (41-32). 000 100 111 – 4. 8. 1

Time: 2:40

Attendance: 32,060

By Lewis Rubman

SAN FRANCISCO–When the Giants finally salvaged one win out of their three game series against the Chicago Cubs that closed out that last home stand, the 12-2 win still left the home team one game under .500. Many of us were willing to write off their chances of being a contender.

Baseball is, as Joe Garagiola says, a funny game; all we know about la pelota is that, as the Cubans put it, it’s round and comes in a square box. San Francisco woke up this morning at 40-32, in second place in the NL West, three and a half games behind the Arizona Diamondbacks.

The San Diego Padres, who many expected to be the Dodgers’ chief competition in the division were the victims Monday night of the Giants’ eighth consecutive win, a 7-4 10 inning thriller, that left the Pads in fourth place at 35-37, eight and a half games behind Arizona.

The orange and black sent Anthony DeSclafani to the mound. His game time ERA of 4.31 is unimpresssive, but. his four wins was second to only Logan Webb’s six on the Giants staff. His six losses tied him with Webb in that department. The Giants picked up their ninth consecutive win over the Padres 4-3 at Oracle Park in San Francisco on Tuesday night.

Tonight, DeSclafani was, at best, mediocre. He lasted five innings, in which he surrendered three runs, all earned, on eight hits, one of them for the distance, and a walk. He struck out a half a dozen San Diegans. He threw 88 pitches, 61 for strikes. He ended up with a no decision, but his ERA crept up to 4.38.

The Pads went with 3-3, 4,10 Seth Lugo, making his first start since coming off the injured list, where he’d dwelled since straining his right calf on May 16. The Padres’ game notes inform us that his two, four bases on balls per nine innings put him on the top of the Friars’ list in that category.

Like DeScalfani, he went five frames, but they were more effective than his rival. Lugo held the Giants to three hits, which produced one run, which was earned. He struck out five and walked one, leaving the game with a 3-1 lead. He, too, ended the day with a no decision, but he reduced his earned run average to 3.86.

For the first two innings the only base runner for either team was Fernando Tatís, who lead off the action with an infield single. The Padres changed the nature of the game in the top of the third. Trent Grisham singled to center, and ex-Giant Austin Nola bunted him over to second.

Juan Soto sent a liner to left that plated Grisham and sent Tatís to third. Manny Machado shot a grounder to David Villar at first. His throw home was late. The Manny You Love to Hate had his 29th RBI of the season, and Melvin’s Monks had a 2-0 lead.

They threatened in the fourth as well. With one out, Ha-Seong Kim singled to right and went around to third on Grisham’s long single to the base of the right field foul pole. Rookie catcher Patrick Bailey cane to the rescue. With Nola at bat he threw to fellow rookie David Villar at the hot corner, who threw back to Bailey, who returned the throw to Villar, who tagged Kim out. The rest of the frame was anti-climactic.

San Francisco got their first tally in the bottom of the fourth without the benefit of an RBI. Thairo Estrada led off with a double to right center and moved up a base on JD Davis’s soft single to the mound. Michael Conforto bounced into a 4-6-3 double play that enabled Estrada to score, making it a 2-1 game.

Tatís restored San Diego’s two run margin almost immediately. He hit DeSclafani’s second pitch of the fifth inning, a 91.3 mph sinker, 408 feet deep, where it landed in the center field bleachers. DeScalfani managed to get through the rest of the inning without allow another run, but he didn’t come out to pitch the sixth. That task fell to Tristan Beck.

Steven Wilson took over mound duties for the Padres in the sixth. Tim Hill replaced him for the seventh. That’s when the Giants’ bats came alive. Austin Slater led off with a pinch hit walk and went to second on Mike Yastrzemski’s single to center.

Luis Matos singled to left to load the bases. Then the offense stalled. Bailey grounded to Machado at third, starting a 5-2 double play. All, however, was not lost. Crawford singled to center. That drove in Yastrzemski and brought the home team closer to the visitors, 3-2. It also resulted in Nick Martínez coming in to pitch for San Diego.

Martínez retired Villar to end the inning but surrendered a leadoff splash hit into McCovey Cove to tie it all up in the top of the eighth. It was Pederson’s eighth home run and 26th run driven in on the year.

Tyler Rogers, the submarining starboard sibling of Taylor, retired the first two Padres he faced and then yielded a single to Soto. The Manny You Love to Hate beat out a grounder to Crawford, whose throw drew Villar off the bag, putting runners on first and second. Rogers and Xander Bogaerts battled to a full count before the Padres’ short stop bounced out to the mound.

Yastrzemski sent Grisham to the warning track in center to trak down the fly ball with which he led off the bottom of the ninth. Matos and Bailey followed with a walk and a single to left that spelled the end of Martínez’s mound tenure and the arrival of Josh Hader. Right handed Casey Schmitt pinch hit for Crawford against San Diego’s southpaw.

The count went to 3-2, including a pitch clock violation ball, before Schmitt received ball four, which loaded the bases. Hader fanned Villar on three pitches for the second out, bringing up Pederson. The count went full. Pederson fouled off a pitch and then took ball four. A. walk off walk.

The third of this four game series will start Wednesday evening at 6:45pm PT with Yu Darvish (5-5, 4.74) going for San Diego against an as yet not named Giant hurler.