National League Preview from The Sports Network
Saturday, August 4th
(All times eastern)
San Francisco Giants (57-49) at Colorado Rockies (38-66), 8:10 p.m.
Probable Starting Pitchers: San Francisco - Madison Bumgarner (11-6, 3.09)
Colorado - Jeff Francis (3-3, 5.43)
(Sports Network) - Madison Bumgarner has to be jealous of the run support
rotation mate Ryan Vogelsong received in the series opener against the
Colorado Rockies at Coors Field.
The San Francisco Giants' left-hander, though, has enjoyed his share of
offensive outbursts as well and will take the mound Saturday in the second
installment of a three-game set. Vogelsong benefited from a 16-4 outburst on
Friday despite yielding four runs and five hits in 6 1/3 innings.
Vogelsong struck out seven and walked two batters to improve to 9-5.
Buster Posey hit a three-run homer, Ryan Theriot and Melky Cabrera both drove
in a pair of runs and Brett Pill homered for the Giants, who are in first
place in the NL West despite going just 2-7 over their last nine games. San
Francisco sits just one-half game ahead of Los Angeles and is two games in
front of hard-charging Arizona.
"We don't score like that very often," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said of the
season-high in runs. "We were in a pretty good funk there. It was a matter of
time."
Posey has driven in 22 runs since the All-Star break and finished with four
hits last night.
The Giants, who went 3-7 on its recent homestand, will also visit St. Louis
for four games on this seven-game road trip and hope Bumgarner can work on his
mediocre road ledger this evening. Bumgarner is 4-5 with a 4.24 earned run
average in 11 road assignments this season and has posted back-to-back no-
decisions overall.
Bumgarner threw six innings of two-run ball in an 8-7 loss to the New York
Mets at home on Monday and is 11-6 with a 3.09 ERA in 21 total starts. The
young left-hander defeated Colorado back in mid-April and is 3-3 with a stingy
1.93 ERA in eight career starts in this series.
Colorado has dropped 12 of 15 games and fell to 1-6 on a nine-game homestand
with last night's embarrassing loss.
Jonathan Sanchez was on the mound for the Rockies and faced his former Giants
teammates for the first time, as he was reached for two runs -- one earned --
in only three innings of work. The bullpen then yielded 14 runs the rest of
the way for the Rockies.
"(Sanchez) used a number of pitches through three innings and his command was
erratic," Rockies manager Jim Tracy said. "We saw velocity up to 91 mph, but
he was still fairly erratic."
Wilin Rosario hit a two-run homer during a four-run seventh inning. The
Rockies hope Michael Cuddyer (oblique) can return Saturday after missing the
previous three games.
Jeff Francis will try to even this series when he takes the ball for Colorado
tonight and is 3-3 with a 5,43 ERA in 11 starts. He allowed five runs and six
hits in four innings of an 11-6 setback to St. Louis on Tuesday, and has been
reached for 12 runs over his previous three starts.
The left-hander has made 16 career starts against San Francisco, going 7-6
with a 4.83 ERA in 98 2/3 innings.
The Giants have taken four of six meetings with the Rockies this season and
went 13-5 in this series a year ago.
08/04 10:46:44 ET

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