Scherzer no match for Giants’ Crawford
Shortstop leads way to victory with four hits, three off Nationals’ ace
WASHINGTON, D.C. >> Hitters will turn to teammates, coaches, managers and even analytics gurus to find any piece of information they can use to their advantage, but very few can offer tips on how to succeed against threetime Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer.
Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford didn’t need any advice ahead of his matchup against Scherzer on Sunday. Instead, he just needed to be reminded of a crucial fact.
BeforeCrawford pounded four hits and blasted a tworun home run to lead the Giants to a 2-0 series-clinching victory against the Nationals, his wife, Jalynne, told him he’s the toughest hitter in baseball.
Scherzer knows she’s right. “All home runs feel pretty good,” Crawford said. “But a guy like that who’s been rolling all year, I mean it feels great. He’s a tough at-bat. He has four plus pitches to get you out with and you just try to shorten up and see the ball over the plate.”
In a conversation with Jalynne on Saturday night, Brandon told her the Giants would be facing the toughest pitcher in baseball Sunday. Like any supportive spouse, Jalynne offered words of wisdom for her significant other.
Her words ring true. Crawford finished Sunday’s
victory with three extra-base hits and nine total bases and since May 1, the sweetswinging left-hander is 58for-132 (.439). After hitting .189 through April 30, Crawford’s average has spiked to .338, which is two points shy of National League leader Freddie Freeman’s .340 mark.
“It’s been fun to watch him these last six weeks,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “You see the numbers, what they are, it’s hard to do against major league pitching. Against a guy like Scherzer tonight, what great atbats he had.”
Scherzer won back-toback National League Pitcher of the Month Awards to open the season after claiming consecutive Cy Young Awards in 2016 and 2017, but he was no match for Crawford, who joined Scooter Gennett of the Reds and Martin Prado of the Marlins as the only players to record three-hit games against Scherzer this season.
“He deserves more credit than he really gets,” starter Derek Holland said. “He’s not talked about as much as he should be is really where I’m going with that. He’s backing it up. Both defensively and now he’s really doing a lot with the offense.”
A near-lock to return to Washington and start the All-Star Game next month, Crawford is the first Giants player to ever record three hits off Scherzer. For the Giants to take their second series from the Nationals this season, they needed more than an impressive day from a middle infielder.
Holland opened the afternoon with five scoreless innings before four Giants relievers — Mark Melancon, Sam Dyson, Tony Watson and Hunter Strickland — put up four more zeroes to finish off the club’s seventh shutout of the year. In the bottom of the ninth, Strickland faced Bryce Harper for the first time since their May
2017 brawl at AT&T Park and rolled a groundout to Crawford.
“The past is the past, I think everybody has moved on from that,” Strickland said. “The best part of our job is to get whoever it is out.”
Scherzer pitched two innings deeper into Sunday’s contest than Holland and allowed only four hits, but the 407-foot blast Crawford smacked into the second deck in the fourth proved decisive.
“He has such good movement that you really have to focus on that, on just seeing it over the plate and trying to find a good pitch to hit,” Crawford said.
Holland knew he wouldn’t open the contest against the Nationals as the favorite to pitch his team to a win with a three-time Cy Young Award winner in Scherzer opposing him, but he refused to back down from the challenge and locked in with an impressive start to
his outing against Washington.
After a 1-2-3 first inning, Holland allowed a pair of singles in the second before inducing a 5-3 double play and striking out Wilmer Difo to end the inning.
By the time Holland induced Scherzer’s groundout to end the fifth inning on his 95th pitch of the day, he had racked up a seasonhigh 15 swing-and-misses, which tied the Giants’ season high, set by Johnny Cueto on April 17 against Arizona.
“I knew going into the game I can’t make any mistakes,” Holland said. “He’s Max Scherzer. He’s been doing a great job this year and he held us to two runs. The main thing is I wanted to try to go pitch for pitch.”
After defeating Scherzer and fellow Nationals starter Stephen Strasburg in a three-game set to open their trip, the Giants travel to Miami for a four-game set against the