The Giants began the final third of their season Sunday still very much alive in the postseason race, the truncated schedule and expanded format giving even rebuilding clubs like San Francisco a chance to play in October.
Maybe it's too early to scoreboard watch, but it's certainly not too soon to treat every inning _ no matter the point in a game _ with a win-now frame of mind.
"This is where you start to push players to their limits as it relates to their freshness," manager Gabe Kapler said before his team's 4-2 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks, "and you begin to ask more of everyone around you."
Amid a blistering heat-wave that has engulfed the Bay Area, the Giants did not melt when the Diamondbacks scored two early runs.
Chadwick Tromp, Donovan Solano and Brandon Belt hit home runs, Wilmer Flores, Darin Ruf and Alex Dickerson made sensational defensive plays, Johnny Cueto pitched into the sixth inning and the bullpen was on its game.
If Kapler indeed asked more of everyone, they answered the call Sunday.
Even Cueto was making requests, motioning to the stadium's music operator to play something more upbeat than Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. music as he warmed up in the outfield before the game. Cueto tilted his head into his hands as if he were falling asleep.
By the time Cueto woke up, the Diamondbacks had a 2-0 lead.
Tim Locastro deposited Cueto's third pitch, a four-seam fastball, over the center-field fence for a home run. Kole Calhoun followed with a single to right and moved to third when David Peralta singled to center. Twelve pitches in, Cueto had given up three hits without recording an out.
Josh Rojas's fly out to deep right five batters into the game knocked in Calhoun for a 2-0 lead, not exactly how Kapler envisioned the afternoon starting one day after the manager used seven relievers in a narrow victory.
But Cueto isn't 11-3 against Arizona for no reason. The veteran settled in and started to pitch as he did a week earlier against the Diamondbacks when he allowed one run over 6 ? innings.
After giving up three consecutive hits to start the game, Cueto retired 11 of the next 12 batters. He ran into trouble in the fifth when the Diamondbacks put runners on first and third with one out.
Locastro tried to bunt in a run, but first baseman Wilmer Flores scooped up the ball and fired a strike to Tromp, who applied a sweep tag to get Nick Ahmed before the Arizona runner crossed the plate.
A walk loaded the bases, but Cueto's 83-mph changeup on a 3-2 pitch struck out Peralta to keep the Giants' deficit at just one run.
The Diamondbacks loaded the bases again in the sixth, ending Cueto's day. But Arizona came up empty as Caleb Baragar got Jon Jay to hit a shallow fly to left and Ruf sprinted in to make a sliding catch.
Tromp's solo home run in the third cut Arizona's lead to 2-1.
Solano's two-run homer to left in the sixth put the Giants ahead 3-2. Belt finished the scoring with a pinch-hit home run in the seventh.
