Webb shines behind 3 homers
SAN FRANCISCO — For those unfamiliar with their wily ways, the Giants provided some instructive moments Friday about how they won 107 games this season.
Logan Webb, who turned himself into the team’s top starter in the second half, bulled his way through the Dodgers’ lineup three scoreless times in the Giants’ 4-0 victory in Game 1 of the National League Division Series, the first-ever playoff meeting between the traditional rivals.
“The energy today was awesome,” Webb said.
Buster Posey provided the regular old-guy contribution with an oppositefield homer in the first that would have splashed had it not been for the water cannon in the way. And Brandon Crawford, a daily delight at shortstop, combined with Tommy La Stella on a “how-the-heck-did-theydo-that?” double play in the fourth and, for good measure, homered himself in the eighth at Oracle Park.
The only thing that was missing was the standardissue Giants pinch-hit homer, but maybe San Francisco is holding that in reserve for future use. Instead, Kris Bryant emerged from a recent funk with three hits, including a solo shot to left in the seventh, his seventh career playoff home run but his first with the Giants.
Webb, 24, wielded his changeup more Friday than he had since early in the season; it was his best pitch during a stingy spring, but he fell a little too in love with it and went to it so often, teams were sitting on it. His slider and sinker have improved since then. His pitch mix is topnotch, and now he can go back to throwing the changeup with two strikes liberally. In his first three starts against the Dodgers, he didn’t use it more than 28 percent of the time.
Friday, in 72⁄3 scoreless innings against Los Angeles, Webb threw the changeup 41 percent of the time, and he got the Dodgers to bite, inducing 23 swings and 12 misses with it, plus four called strikes and four foul balls. He allowed five hits, struck out 11 and, key against the Dodgers, didn’t walk a batter.
“He was out there pretending like it was a game in the backyard,” Bryant said.
Webb credited Posey’s presence with helping him excel.
“Just having him back there, honestly,” Webb said. “He’ll calm me down.”
Posey, who might start every game of the postseason, pulled a smooth veteran move by getting his team on the board early, a boon to his young batterymate. With La Stella at first after a walk, two outs and a 3-0 count from Walker Buehler, Posey went the other way for his fifth career postseason homer and his first since the 2012 World Series — when he hit one in Game 4 off Detroit starter Max Scherzer, who is projected to start Game 3 of this series for Los Angeles. The 3-0 homer was the first Buehler ever has allowed, regular season or post.
“Obviously it’s on me to try to create some momentum, and I kind of sucked that out of our dugout,” Buehler said.
Between Webb’s mastery and the Giants’ defense, that advantage held up. Not to say that the defense was perfect: Crawford made an error in the first, Webb in the fourth. But with one out in that inning, La Stella and Crawford turned as sweet a double play as one will ever see. Justin Turner hit a hopper that banged off the back of the mound and headed up the middle, where La Stella, charging to his right, corralled it and, with his back to the plate and his momentum going the other direction, made a backward glove flip to Crawford. It looked like a magic trick.
Crawford, on the move, had to reach for the ball with the runner bearing down on him, but he never broke stride, stepped on the bag as he made the catch and threw to first, fast and fluid, for the out.
“I just think, to be quite honest with you, we didn’t make adjustments,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.
Crawford’s solo shot off Alex Vesia traveled 407 feet out to center, prompting “MVP, MVP!” chants, followed in short order by “Beat LA, beat LA!”
The Giants’ 141 homers led the National League, and they set a major league record with 17 players hitting at least five homers.