By Alex Pavlovic, San Jose Mercury News –
SAN FRANCISCO — After winning six elimination games to reach the World Series, the San Francisco Giants said they wanted to take an easier route this time around. They got off to a crushing start Wednesday, making it look easy against the best pitcher in baseball.
Pablo Sandoval homered in his first three at-bats and Barry Zito was dominant again as the Giants cruised past Justin Verlander and the Detroit Tigers 8-3 in the first game of the World Series.
Sandoval hit two homers off Verlander, and in his third at-bat he took Al Alburquerque deep to join one of the most elite lists in sports. He’s the fourth player in MLB history to hit three home runs in a World Series game, along with Hall of Famers Babe Ruth (who did it twice) and Reggie Jackson and future Hall of Famer Albert Pujols. Appropriately, Sandoval’s bat — which broke late in the game — was donated to the Hall of Fame.
“I still can’t believe it,” Sandoval said. “I don’t try to hit home runs. I’m not trying to do too much right now, especially at this time of the season.”
Sandoval did plenty, and he did it on a stage that had previously represented the low point of his career. Out of shape and out of sync, Sandoval had just three at-bats and played in one game in the 2010 World Series. That was much more action than the Giants gave Zito, who was left off the roster altogether.
On Wednesday, the redemption train rolled right through the Tigers.
Verlander, the reigning American League MVP and Cy Young Award winner, had given up just two runs in his first three postseason starts. Sandoval and the Giants doubled that number in the first three innings. With two outs in the first, Sandoval crushed an elevated 95 mph fastball over the center field wall, becoming just the sixth player to homer on an 0-2 pitch from Verlander.
“We’ve seen a lot of stuff from Pablo,” Zito said. “It’s kind of hard to impress us with what we’ve seen, but we were all very impressed tonight.”
Others in a dugout that celebrated with group dancing and sunflower seed showers used different words.
“We were all kind of shocked,” Brandon Crawford said.
“He hit that ball to dead center — that’s the most amazing thing,” Aubrey Huff said. “You’re taking a ball to center against a pitcher that’s the best on the planet. It was a great pitch, too.
“We were looking at it on the (scoreboard) and going, ‘How did he hit that? How?’ I don’t know who hits that ball, maybe just Barry Bonds in his prime. It was astonishing.”
The stunning show was only just beginning.
The Giants had another two-out rally in the third, and it started with a play that confirmed any suspicions one might have that something special is at work at AT&T Park. Angel Pagan hit a grounder to third that bounced off the bag and ricocheted into left field for a double. Marco Scutaro followed with a single to center, scoring Pagan.
“I think we’ve kind of earned those breaks,” Crawford said, smiling. “We had some balls early in the playoffs that didn’t go our way.”
Everything went the Giants’ way on this night. Sandoval stunned Verlander again a batter later, lining another 95 mph fastball into the seats, this time in left field. Verlander, who had allowed only one multi-homer game all season, stood on the mound and muttered, ‘Wow,’ before turning to the Tigers dugout, frowning and shaking his head.
“It was unbelievable,” Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. “This guy had one of those unbelievable World Series nights that they’ll be talking about for years. I tip my hat to him.”
With his second blast, Sandoval became the first player since Andruw Jones in 1996 to hit two homers in the first three innings of a World Series game. He wasn’t done, but first Zito would add a historic footnote of his own.
Zito added to Verlander’s pain in the fourth with a two-out RBI single to left on a 97 mph fastball. Zito, a .097 career hitter, has an RBI in his last two starts, helping make the Giants the first team in MLB history to get an RBI from the starting pitcher in four straight postseason games.
“Yeah, Zito is more surprised than anybody,” said Tim Lincecum, who later relieved Zito.
Sandoval padded his historic night in the fifth, hitting an Alburquerque pitch out to center. He made some AT&T Park history, too. The only previous three-homer game at AT&T Park came when the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Kevin Elster did it on April 11, 2000.
That was the very first regular-season game on the shores of McCovey Cove.
Zito earned a Game 1 start with a brilliant outing in Game 5 of the N.L. Championship Series, and he was nearly as good Wednesday night. Zito limited the Tigers to one run on six hits over 5 2/3 innings, twice getting help with diving catches from left fielder Gregor Blanco.
The Giants tacked on two more runs in the seventh, with Sandoval contributing a scorched single to center. Sandoval fell short in his bid to become the first player in baseball history to homer four times in a World Series game, but that hardly mattered on this night.
Since falling behind 3-1 in the NLCS, the Giants have won four straight, outscoring opponents 28-4.
“We’re having fun right now,” Sandoval said. “When you get that mindset, everything goes your way.”
