Chicago Cubs clobber San Francisco Giants 11-4 in series opener: MLB Update
The Chicago Cubs romped to an 11-4 victory in the first outing against the San Francisco Giants at the Wrigley Field on Friday, May 13, to take a 1-0 lead in the three-game series.
Ryan Dempster tossed a total of six splendid innings, struck out eleven while gave away just two runs on six hits and walked one to earn his second game of the season. Dempster, who now has a 2-4 record with 6.71 ERA in six starts, was excited to perfume
as per the expectations of the teammates and the Coach.
The 34-year-old veteran hurler expressed his feeling saying, “I think I'm probably a lot more aggressive. For some reason, it felt like before I was trying not to lose the game rather than win it,” He further added. “I don't know the reason why and I don't
really care what the reason is, but I went there today and attacked the strike zone and got after guys.”
Out of the two runs the right-hand pitcher allowed, first was a led-off single by the Giants' slugger Aubrey Huff in the first inning. However, he struck back and did not let the Giants touch another run until the fifth innings, when Aubrey Huff added another
RBI single.
While Dempster held the opposition scoreless, the Cubs' bat came to life and they scored three important runs in the second inning. First, Koyie Hill hit a sacrifice fly for a tying single and then Starlin Castro earned an RBI single, while Darwin Barney
made another RBI single to take his team to a 3-1 lead.
The Cubs were leading 3-2 in bottom of the seventh inning and Darwin hit another RBI single, followed by the Jeff Baker’s one-run RBI and Reed Johnson’s RBI triple; the flurry of runs took the club to an unassailable 8-2 lead.
However, the Giants top slugger Cody Ross hammered a splendid two-run homer off the Cubs reliever Sean Marshall, who relieved Kerry Wood just in the eighth inning, to trim the lead to 8-4.
Nevertheless, the Cubs’ bat was not ready to stop and therefore Castro, Barney and Johnson, all hit an RBI single each to take their team to 11-4 in the bottom of the eighth inning. On the other hand, Marco Mateo pitched a perfect ninth last inning to earn
his club their seventeenth overall triumph in the 2011 season.
The Giants starter, Madison Bumgarner, yielded three runs on five hits, allowed two walks and made six strikeouts over the six innings to bear his sixth straight defeat this season. Bumgarner is still looking for his first win of the season and now has a
0-6 record with a 4.25 ERA.
Relievers Jeff Affeldt and Guillermo Mota both remained costly too in their short less-than-an-inning spells. Affeldt gave four runs on two hits while Mota yielded one run. Closer, Dan Runzler, also gave three runs on five hits over just one inning.
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