Koss’ grand slam leads SF Giants’ three-homer day to break cold spell
SAN FRANCISCO — Christian Koss, in his words, “panicked a little.”
Koss had just hit his first career home run, a grand slam that flipped a deficit into a lead. Oracle Park erupted; Koss blacked out. As Koss trotted, Willy Adames stood waiting. Adames, the Giants’ resident curator of good vibrations, initiated a multi-step handshake. Koss, wearing an ear-to-ear smile, forgot the choreography.
“It’s all right,” said Koss, his smile having yet to fade. “We’ll get the next one.”
Adames, a hype man at heart, didn’t mind in the slightest. Neither did his teammates, a group suddenly invigorated with new life after stumbling into play with a four-game losing streak.
Koss’ slam represented the first of three homers the Giants hit against the Arizona Diamondbacks, the other two off the bats of Adames and Jung Hoo Lee — on Korean Heritage Night, no less. It was a cathartic swing that paved the way for a 10-6 win, their first in their new City Connect jerseys and their ninth win in nine attempts when Robbie Ray toes the slab.
“You definitely don’t draw up a grand slam as the first one,” Koss said. “Even in that situation, I wasn’t really trying to put a big swing on it. I was trying to stay out of a double play and elevate something. I put a good swing on it.”
“He’ll never forget that moment,” Ray said. “He’ll be telling his grandchildren about it.”
Given how recent days unfolded, the Giants were in need of someone to get their dugout fired up. They were swept by the Minnesota Twins over the weekend, their offense scoring one run apiece on Friday and Saturday. Manager Bob Melvin shook up the lineup on Monday, but that new-look order mustered just one run.
Koss’ swing also arrived at a timely juncture in the course of the game. Ray allowed three runs in the first on four consecutive hits. At the end of one inning, the Giants were looking at the possibility of a fifth straight loss right in the face. Koss gave them a lead they’d never lose. Following the game, he traded a couple bats with the young fan who made the catch in exchange for the ball.
“We were just going nuts,” said Robbie Ray, who allowed three runs over six innings with a season-high nine strikeouts. “It was an awesome moment. You could just kind of feel in that moment that he was going to do something. He’s come up in situations like that and gotten base hits and moved guys. He put a great swing on it and it found the seats and we were just losing it.”
Added Lee through team interpreter Justin Han: “That home run brought in a different vibe, a different energy in the dugout.”
From there, his teammates padded the lead. Adames, who was dropped from second to sixth in the lineup on Monday, hit his own homer, a two-run shot for his fifth of the season. The struggling LaMonte Wade Jr. followed up with a single, then scored on a wild pitch. In the eighth, Lee provided the dagger with a three-run shot, a home run made possible by Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo’s gambit.
With a base open and left-hander Joe Mantiply on the mound, Lovullo intentionally walked Heliot Ramos to get to Lee. The move made tactical sense. Ramos has a career .920 OPS against lefties while Lee, entering play, had a .466 OPS in May. With the “Hoo Lee Gans” cheering him on in the upper deck, Lee provided the dagger in the form of a three-run homer, his first home run at Oracle Park this season.
“When (Matt Chapman) got out, I was thinking in my mind that I felt like the Diamondbacks were going to face me instead of Ramos,” Lee said through team interpreter Justin Han. “I went in there and I just wanted to help out the team by scoring a run. I never thought it was going to be a big run like that.”
Amidst the long balls, Ray rebounded from the first and held the Diamondbacks scoreless over the next five frames en route to recording his fourth consecutive quality start. With several pitchers unavailable — right-hander Tyler Rogers and left-hander Erik Miller pitched on Sunday and Monday — Ray kept Melvin from further depleting the bullpen.
Camilo Doval was the only high-leverage reliever that Melvin used on Tuesday, but he found himself in danger of allowing his first run in more than a month — and blowing the game in the process.
With the Giants leading, 7-4, the Diamondbacks loaded the bases with one out against Doval, setting the table for the top of their order. With no margin for error, Doval used a 100.2 mph cutter to induce an inning-ending 1-2-3 double play off the bat of Ketel Marte to end the threat and extend his scoreless streak to 15 games.
“You give up three in the first, it’s not ideal,” Ray said. “At that point, you’re trying to get as deep as you can into the game, save the bullpen, give your team a chance to win, keep us in it. It felt like we had some good at-bats and were just waiting for that one breakthrough. We got it and were able to shut it down after that.”
