SAN FRANCISCO — Sixty-three years after moving west from New York to San Francisco, the Giants have won three World Series titles, hosted some of the game’s all-time great hitters in Willie Mays and Barry Bonds and watched elite pitchers such as Juan Marichal and Tim Lincecum overwhelm their opponents.
In the franchise’s storied San Francisco-era, the 2021 Giants have now carved out their own place in the local history books.
After matching the record for single-season wins set in 1962 and 1993 on Tuesday, the 2021 club won its 104th game of the year Wednesday with a 1-0 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
“I think our players can and should be proud of setting the San Francisco Giants’ single-season mark for wins,” manager Gabe Kapler said. “It’s a huge accomplishment. This team has done so many good things and to say that this club has won more games than any other San Francisco Giants team, it’s quite fulfilling.”
Starter Alex Wood tossed six scoreless innings, Kris Bryant hit a tie-breaking sacrifice fly and rookie Camilo Doval picked up his second save in as many nights to lower the Giants’ magic number to clinch the National League West to three with four games left to play.
“It’s crazy to have as many wins as we do and still fighting for a division,” Bryant said. “I’ve got to give credit to the Dodgers, they’ve been doing it all year too. It’s certainly a really weird year in terms of we don’t have anything locked up yet. So we’ve just got to keep going.”
The Giants blasted past their single-season franchise record for home runs over the weekend at Coors Field, but have won back-to-back games at home against the Diamondbacks with a different approach at the plate. With leading home run hitter Brandon Belt sidelined for at least the next few weeks with a fractured thumb, the Giants’ lineup had to prove it can still play “small ball” on Wednesday.
After Leone tossed a scoreless seventh inning, pinch-hitter Tommy La Stella led off the frame with a single into shallow right field. La Stella was out of the starting lineup due to Achilles soreness, so outfielder Steven Duggar replaced him as a pinch-runner on the bases and promptly stole second.
Right fielder LaMonte Wade Jr. has been one of the Giants’ most consistent clutch performers this season, but instead of swinging away, Wade dropped down a sacrifice bunt to advance Duggar over to third base. That led to a seven-pitch battle between reliever Noe Ramírez and Bryant, who ended the plate appearance by lofting a 276-foot flyball to right field that was deep enough to bring Duggar home ahead of the throw from right fielder Henry Ramos.
“That’s more what you see in the postseason,” Bryant said. “Obviously there’s big homers, but usually the teams that win it all do the little things right and that was kind of drawn up perfectly that inning in terms of LaMonte bunting him over and me working an at-bat, hitting a lazy flyball that does the job.”
In his third start back since returning from the COVID-19 injured list, Wood turned in one of his best outings of the season as the veteran lefty held the Diamondbacks to just three hits over six innings on Wednesday. Wood showed outstanding command against Arizona as he threw 58 of his 74 pitches for strikes and didn’t issue a walk.
The start marked Wood’s longest scoreless appearance since he tossed seven shutout innings for the Dodgers against the Rangers on August 29, 2018.
“We understand the magnitude of what we’ve done to this point, having 104 wins and how hard it is to win 100-plus games in a season,” Wood said. “But I think one of the coolest things about our group of guys is we’re so micro-focused. It’s show up the next day, give everything we’ve got and try to win a baseball game.”
The only inning the Diamondbacks threatened to score against Wood was the third when the lefty hit center fielder Jake McCarthy with a slider before giving up a single to shortstop Geraldo Perdomo. After striking out opposing starter Merrill Kelly, who was attempting to bunt, Wood induced a 6-4-3 double play off the bat of leadoff man Ketel Marte, who entered Wednesday’s game hitting above .400 on the season against left-handed pitchers.
The Giants had plenty of opportunities to score against Diamondbacks starter Merrill Kelly, but went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position and failed to cash in with the bases loaded and one out in the third inning.
One run proved to be enough, however, as right-hander Dominic Leone pitched a scoreless seventh inning and earned the 15th win for a member of the Giants’ bullpen this month, which ties a major league record for bullpen wins set by the Tampa Bay Rays in May of this year.
