Giants have something to feel good about — win over Dodgers, Kershaw

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SAN FRANCISCO — It was hard to discern who needed the win more, the Giants or Drew Pomeranz.

In danger of being pulled from the rotation, Pomeranz pitched his way out of a bases loaded situation in the top of the first inning Friday night and ended up pitching five scoreless innings in a 2-1 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Pomeranz didn’t actually get the win — it went to Reyes Moronta, the first pitcher out of the bullpen — but he was a winner in the eyes of manager Bruce Bochy as the Giants prevailed before a crowd of 35,157 at Oracle Park.

“To me, that was the ballgame there,” Bochy said.

The Giants managed to scratch out two runs against Dodgers starter Clayton Kershaw (5-1) in the sixth inning, handing the left-hander his first defeat of the season. Moronta improved to 3-5, and was followed out of the bullpen by Sam Dyson, Tony Watson and finally Will Smith for his 14th save.

The Dodgers got their lone run of the game when Chris Taylor hit his fourth home run of the season over the center field fence off Watson leading off the eighth. The Giants scored on a run-scoring single by Kevin Pillar in the sixth and then when Evan Longoria scored from third on Brandon Crawford’s grounder to second against a drawn-in infield.

Considering Pomeranz came in with a 1-6 record, an 8.08 earned run average and was 0-3 with a ghastly 19.16 earned run average in May, Giants fans had every reason to fear disaster when Max Muncy singled with one out, then was followed by a another single by Justin Turner on a smash that went off the glove of second baseman Joe Panik.

Had Panik come up with the ball, it was an easy double play. Instead, there were runners at first and second, and then Pomeranz missed on a close 3-2 pitch to Cody Bellinger to load the bases.

It was then that the 6-foot-5 left-hander suddenly found himself. Pomeranz struck out both David Freese and Corey Seager to end the inning, starting a string of 10 straight batters retired. Having thrown 30 pitches in the first inning, Pomeranz was done after five innings and 92 pitches, but he didn’t allow a run, walked just the one batter and struck out seven.

The difference? Pomeranz said he changed his arm slot to throw more over the top, and that the past year and a half he’d begun to drop his arm, resulting in his pitches flattening out.

“I think my four-seam was better, my curve was better,” Pomeranz said. “I was getting some swings I hadn’t seen in a long time. You can tell by the strikeouts. It was huge for me today to be able to work on something and bring it to the game and get results pretty quickly.”

And just as big to escape the first inning.

As for the long-term ramifications if Pomeranz had imploded in the first inning, the veteran knows the score.

“There’s always concern,” Pomeranz said. “We’ve all been in situations like that here when you don’t know what’s going to happen. All you can do is show up every day, put your work in and focus on getting better.”

The Giants two-run rally started with a walk by Kershaw against Brandon Belt, who earlier in the at-bat had lofted a foul pop down the left field line for an apparent out. Dodgers outfielder Chris Taylor stumbled over the mound and fell, however, and Belt remained a live to get on base.

Longoria followed with a single, and Pillar’s single to left brought home Belt, showing no ill effects from a troublesome right knee and sliding in safely, Longoria scored off a great jump from third on a grounder to Max Muncy, whose throw was a shade late to the plate.

“Hopefully we do continue to play well in these types of games, because this is our type of ball,” Bochy said. “We’re not a team that can go out and slug it too often.”

NOTES

— Belt was in the lineup batting second even though he entered the game 4-for-54 lifetime against Kershaw (.074).

“It’s been a tough go against him, but what are you going to do when a guy gets lucky 55 times?,” Belt said in a perfect deadpan. “Can’t do anything. Just got to go out there and keep battling.”

Belt was joined by left-handed hitters Panik and Crawford, Kershaw be damned.

“It’s not like there’s a lot of guys that hit Clayton, and wiwth Buster (Posey) out, you want your guys out there, so Craw was out there, Belt, Panik. We didn’t score a lot of runs. We scored enough.”

— Belt was happy to be the beneficiary of the play where Taylor stumbled over the left field bullpen mound, but only to a point.

“It did go our way on that particular one, but honestly it’s going to get somebody hurt and you don’t want to see anybody hurt out there,” Belt said. “Thankfully I got another shot in that at-bat.”

— Moronta, who took a loss in New York against the Mets pitching in some tough luck, got a break when Turner hit into a line drive double play to Belt to double off Muncy, who had walked to open the inning.
 

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