SAN FRANCISCO — When Joc Pederson tied Tuesday night, three Giants rookies had the quickest path to the second straight celebration.
Luis Matos was third and scored the winning point. Patrick Bailey was second after a single and Casey Schmitt was first after a second straight night of walking in the ninth. But the most impactful rookie of that evening was back at the clubhouse.
Like Keaton Winn a night earlier, Tristan Beck shut down the mighty San Diego Padres long enough for his own roster to catch up. Beck took over with the Giants trailing 3-1 in the sixth. By the end of the night it was 4-3 and the winning streak was extended to nine.
“We talked about Casey a lot, Casey shone a lot. Pat too, for a very good reason. Luis is here now and especially brilliant. He’s fun to talk about and does cool things on the baseball field,” said said manager Gabe Kapler. “Tristan was just as good as those guys and didn’t get as much attention. It’s normal, isn’t it? lots of length. If you look on the scoreboard, he’s got tons of innings, he’s got a high strikeout rate, he’s got a low walk rate. He’s the stuff of a good major league pitcher and he deserves a lot of credit for where we are right now.”
Beck allowed one hit in three innings, lowering his ERA to 3.05 in 15 relief appearances. In those 15 games, he pitched 38 1/3 innings. Winn can deliver a similar workload and has been even more efficient in his two outings. Combined, the rookies have saved a staff that misses Alex Cobb and Ross Stripling, has been without Alex Wood at times and Sean Manaea plays an unknown role.
“They were great,” pitching coach Andrew Bailey said. “We’ve been able to hold on to leads and keep deficits where they are.”
That last part has been key lately. Beck made sure the hole didn’t get any deeper, and the Giants salvaged a run on Brandon Crawford’s single, then tied the game on Pederson’s eighth-inning homer.
In the ninth, Kapler made what he called a “particularly uncomfortable” decision. He sent Schmitt for Crawford, who has come up several times in recent weeks, and the rookie rewarded faith with a march against Hader. After drawing just one walk in his first 133 plate appearances, Schmitt has been huge the past two nights.
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A night after the Padres headed for a loss without their closest, Hader did the same. He wasn’t particularly close against Pederson, missing wide on the outside going 3-2 with two outs in the ninth.
The win was the fifth of nine games the Giants have trailed in the seventh inning or later.
“It’s like we have 26 guys pulling the same string,” Pederson said. “It’s someone new every night.”
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