KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- It took just 3 hours, 21 minutes for the Giants to get blown out of Kauffman Stadium on Tuesday night. They didn't need much longer to shift gears into underdog mode.
After a 10-0 loss to the Kansas City Royals, manager Bruce Bochy embraced the fact that the home team has won Game 7 of the World Series nine straight times. He'll likely address the team Wednesday night, and he already knows what he wants to say.
"They're going against the odds -- we've done that before," Bochy said. "You go back to 2012 and look at this postseason. I think a lot of people had us getting beat in the first and second round. This club is so resilient. They're so tough. They'll put this behind them."
San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Jake Peavy heads for the dugout in the second inning against the Kansas City Royals in Game 6 of baseball's World Series at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, Mo., on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2014. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group) (JOSE CARLOS FAJARDO)
Bochy did it as Jake Peavy walked quickly back to the clubhouse at the end of the second inning, glove in hand, a pained look on his face and a seven-run deficit on the scoreboard. It's all hands on deck in Game 7, but that meant some key hands had to stay clean in Game 6. Bochy got just four outs from Peavy, so he turned to Jean Machi for a career-high 51 pitches. Hunter Strickland threw two innings for the first time since having Tommy John surgery. Ryan Vogelsong made his first relief appearance since 2011. Buster Posey was the first starter to hit the bench, and others followed.
The Giants got as much rest as they could as Kauffman Stadium turned the penultimate game of the season into a party. As the Royals circled the bases and their 23-year-old right-hander, Yordano Ventura, blossomed from tantalizing talent to star, the Giants started to embrace all that a Game 7 means. This is just the sixth one in the past 26 World Series.
"A Game 7 in a World Series is a gift for everyone," Hunter Pence said, smiling. "It's pretty special. It's incredibly entertaining for fans and incredibly entertaining for the world and the game of baseball. It's incredibly fun to play in and compete in."
To guarantee a dynasty instead of disappointment, the Giants will need to be far more competitive than they were Tuesday. Bochy was able to make so many rare moves because this one was over after the top of the third.
The trouble actually started two innings earlier, when Peavy gave up a walk and hard-hit ball to left. The Royals failed to score when Lorenzo Cain missed third-base coach Mike Jirschele's send and held up as Travis Ishikawa, who had slipped, threw the ball back into second instead of toward the plate. Cain's lapse would be forgotten an inning later.
The Royals set franchise postseason records with eight hits and seven runs in the 33-minute second inning, and they did damage off both Peavy and long man Yusmeiro Petit, who had previously been perfect in the postseason. The nightmare frame started innocently enough, with a broken-bat single by Alex Gordon. Salvador Perez followed with a rocket to right-center, and Petit immediately got up in the bullpen. Mike Moustakas hit a bouncer just inside the first base line that was a couple of inches away from a diving Brandon Belt's glove and went for an RBI double. At that point, Javier Lopez joined Petit on the bullpen mound. The late-innings lefty would sit down soon enough as the game quickly got out of hand. Alcides Escobar hit a hard grounder to first, and Belt moved toward home, ready to throw Perez out. But the catcher stayed at third, and when Belt turned back toward first, he didn't have enough time to beat the speedy Escobar to the bag.
"I saw him break for home, and that's when I made the move," Belt said. "He just kind of stopped. He did his job right there. It was just a weird play."
With the bases now loaded, Nori Aoki fouled off four pitches before lining a single into left.
That was it for Peavy, who has a 7.98 career ERA in the postseason and has allowed nine runs in 61/3 innings this series. His catcher felt he deserved much better.
"I thought that was as crisp as I've seen him this postseason," Posey said. "They were able to get the bat on some tough pitches and make things happen."
Peavy gave up six hits, but only one went for extra bases. In a strange way, he said, it would have been better to constantly be turning and watching balls leave the yard.
"It's almost easier if you go out there and take a beating," he said. "This was hugely disappointing. The only thing you can do other than strike guys out is hope they make contact and you're able to defend it. You're excited (Eric) Hosmer and Cain and Alex Gordon hit the ball the way they hit it. It takes some good fortune -- a ball right at somebody. That wasn't the case tonight."
Petit hasn't needed any serendipity this month. He gave up just four hits to the 42 batters he faced before Tuesday, but the Royals welcomed him with three straight hits. Bochy tries to save Petit for the start of innings, but he had little choice but to use him in a bases-loaded jam and hope for some more of that October magic. It had taken the night off.
Cain was Petit's first batter, and he hit a single to center that scored two. The Giants pulled the infield in for Hosmer, and he bounced a ball off the dirt in front of the plate and over shortstop Brandon Crawford. Hosmer hustled for a double as two more runs scored. Billy Butler scorched a double that made it 7-0.
The Giants briefly flirted with a comeback. Ventura went nearly 40 minutes between pitches, and he walked the bases loaded ahead of Posey in the top half of the third. Posey hit into a double play on the first pitch. The missed opportunity meant Petit would be saved for Game 7. Ditto for the rest of Bochy's regular relievers. Posey finally got a breather after catching the first 149 innings of the postseason.
"You hate to have a game go like this, but no question it does allow you to do some things you probably normally wouldn't," Bochy said. "So we're loaded tomorrow, I feel, and they are, too."
That was thanks to Ventura, who wore Oscar Taveras' initials on his blue cap and later said the game was dedicated to the 22-year-old Cardinals player who died as the result of a car crash Sunday. Ventura and his 100 mph fastball allowed just three hits in seven innings.
"That's one of the best arms you'll see in the game," Pence said.
The Giants won't see it Wednesday, but just about everyone else on both sides will be available. That includes Madison Bumgarner and Royals ace James Shields. The numbers say the Giants are in for a tough task. The road team hasn't taken Game 7 since 1979.
"Listen, this bunch doesn't care," Peavy said. "We'll show up tomorrow and find any which way to win."
For more on the Giants, see Alex Pavlovic's Giants Extra blog at http://ift.tt/1eY3IDU. Follow him on Twitter at http://ift.tt/Q42sCv.
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