San Francisco Giants pitcher Keaton Winn works against the Colorado Rockies during the first inning at Oracle Park in San Francisco on Sun Sep 10, 2023 (AP News photo)

Colorado (51-91. 030 000 000 – 3. 6. 0

San Francisco (73-70). 023 010 00x – 6 11. 0

Time: 2:32

Attendance: 31,781

Sunday, September 10, 2023

By Lewis Rubman

SAN FRANCISCO–The Peter Stuyvesant character in Kurt Weil’s “Knickerbocker Holiday” could have been talking about baseball when he sang that Broadway show’s biggest hit, “The September Song:” “Oh, the days dwindle down/To a precious few.”

It’s September and after the Giants’ 6-3 win over Colorado Colorado, the magic number for San Francisco’s elimination from the NL Wild Card race remains 18. That means that any combination of Giant losses and wins of whoever is in fourth place spells doom for the Giants, who can’t afford to lose more than a very few of the 19 games remaining in their schedule.

The Giants sent rookie Keaton Winn (0-2, 3.33 at game time) to the mound for his third big league start. The 25 year old righty missed the 2021 season while he recovered from Tommy John surgery. His arsenal includes a splitter (used 56.7% of the time), a four seam fastball (26.2%), sinker (15.7%), and slider (1.4%). He has mid 90s velocity on his fastball and slider.

He weathered a rough first inning, in which he gave up all three of the runs he would yield, runs which, by the way, were earned but not entirely his fault.

The Rockies managed to get five hits over Winn, but he didn’t give up any walks. He threw 80 pitches, of which only 18 were balls. The win improved his won-lost balance to 1-2 but raised his ERA to 3.55.

The visitors went with 26 year old right hander Peter Lambert, 3-6, 5.03 for the year and 6-13, 6.34 lifetime before today. He pitched six frames in his last appearance allowing all of the Diamondbacks’ runs in Arizona’s 4-2 win last Monday. All of those runs were earned.

Lambert wasn’t any more impressive this evening, lasting five frames during which he threw 91 pitches, 57 of which went into the books as strikes. He gave up half a dozen runs, and all of them were earned. Three of the eight hits he yielded were home runs. He chalked up two strikeouts and issued an equal number of walks. He was the losing pitcher and now has a record of 3-7, 5.36

Although San Francisco wasted a one out triple by Tairo Estrada in their half of the first, Colorado’s Hunter Goodman’s three bagger was the key to the three runs they scored in the top of the second. Elehuris Montero led off with a line drive that bounced off Winn’s leg for a single.

Nolan Jones laid down a perfect bunt short of third to make it runners on first and second when Goodman sent his shot into triples alley. He came home on Sean Bouchard’s sacrifice fly that Mike Yastrzemski hauled down with a nice catch at the right field wall. The Rockies now had an early 3-0 lead.

The home team got two of those runs back at their next turn at the plate. Lamonte Wade, Jr. led off with a single to right and went to third on Mitch Haniger’s double, also to right. After Bake Sabol flew out to left, Brandon Crawford’s bouncer to second drove in Wade and a single by Luis Matos to left center brought Haniger home.

Estrada’s 12th home run of the year, a 412 foot wallop to left center that led off the bottom of the third, followed, two outs later, by back to back dingers to left by Wade (his 15th HR of ’23) and Haniger (his sixth), put San Francisco on top, 5-3.

Joc Pederson, whose opposite field fly to the warning track in left ended the Giants’ threat in the first, pulled a 352 foot fly over the right field fence in the fifth. It was the 13th round tripper of the year for San Francisco’s designated hitter and added a run to the Giants’ lead, which now stood at 6-3.

Lambert finished up the inning and didn’t come out for the sixth, when southpaw Brent Suter relieved him and kept the orange and black off the board for the one inning he pitched before giving way to Nick Mears, who somehow managed to get through his frame without being scored on in spite of issuing a walk, allowing a hit, committing a balk, and letting pinch hitter Austin Slater send a drive to warning track in center.

Tyler Kinley gave up an automatic double to Yastrzemski in the Giants’ eighth, but that was all the offence that San Francisco could offer.

Ryan Walker took over for Winn at the start of the visitors’ seventh, set the side down in order, and ceded the ball to Tyler, the right handed submariner, Rogers for the eighth. His eight pitches were three less than it had taken Walker to put the Blake Street Bombers down in order. That meant it was a safe situation, and that meant it was Camilo Doval on the mound for the top half of the ninth. He had to face the heart of the Rockies’ batting order.

Doval fanned McMahon, their number three batter but yielded a double to cleanup man Montero. Jones, batting in the fifth slot, grounded out to second, which advanced Monero to third. But Doval was on top of things tonight and earned his 37th save of the year while bringing his ERA down to 2.98.

Estrada, Pederson, Wade, and Haniger had two hits apiece. Haniger’s pair consisted of a double and a homer; Estrada’s, a triple and a homer.

The Cleveland Guardians come to town Monday night and will send righty Gavin Williams (2-5, 3.34) against an as yet unannounced Giants hurler. First pitch 6:45pm PT.