Dan Straily comes within two outs of a shutout; Marlins beat Giants 6-1

The Marlins (39-46) opened their final series of the first half on Friday night in spectacular fashion with a 6-1 victory over the Giants (34-54).

How could Dan Straily (W, 7-4) top a fantastic June where he pitched to a 3.18 ERA in five starts? How about kicking off the month of July with two wins and a 2.55 ERA!

Straily continued his strong pitching on Friday night. After the offense gave him a four run lead before stepping onto the rubber, he never let the Giants get back in the game. Straily took a shutout into the ninth inning before a one out Denard Span home run finally put the Giants on the board. Pure brilliance. He went 8.1 innings, allowing only four hits, one earned run, no walks, and struck out four. From the second batter in the bottom of the second until Buster Posey singled with two out in the seventh, Straily retired 16 straight batters. The Marlins right-hander made things look easy in San Francisco. His ERA is down to 3.31 on the season.

The offense had a pretty good night too. It could have been better, but with Straily pitching so well it didn’t really matter. The Marlins collected 16 hits on the evening; nine of which occurred in the first two innings.

Dee Gordon led off the game with a single, before Giancarlo Stanton did typical Stanton stuff by depositing his 24th homer of the season into the right field seats. After two flyouts, the Marlins put together an impressive two out rally. Four straight singles from Justin Bour, Martin Prado, J.T. Realmuto, and J.T. Riddle plated an additional two runs. 4-0 before the opposing fans warm up their seats; not a bad strategy!

After Straily worked around a Joe Panik double in the bottom of the first, the Marlins gave him an additional run of support in the top of the second. Dee Gordon once again led off an inning with a single and scored thanks to two more singles from Christian Yelich and Bour. Nine hits in two innings is, umm, solid.

Things got quiet until J.T. Realmuto smacked a home run to centerfield in the fifth inning.

After Straily’s night finally came to a close, Dustin McGowan recorded the final two outs to give the Marlins the victory.

Six Marlins batters had multi-hit games. Gordon went 4-for-5 with two runs. Realmuto collected three hits including his eighth home run of the season. Stanton, Yelich, Bour, and Riddle all had two hits on the evening. Marcell Ozuna was the only regular without a hit; go figure.

Here is the one sided Fangraphs win expectancy graph.

Fangraphs

Both teams will be back in action tomorrow at 10:05 PM EST. It will be Chris O'Grady making his MLB debut for the Marlins and Jeff Samardzija pitching for the Giants.