Jeff Samardzija bounced back from a shaky outing to earn his first win of the season and the Giants’ run-starved lineup backed the right-hander with plenty of offense while beating the Cincinnati Reds, 8-3, at AT&T Park on Sunday.
Brandon Belt homered for the third time in four days, Eduardo Nunez, Brandon Crawford and Joe Panik drove in two runs apiece and Buster Posey reached base four times in his return to the lineup for San Francisco following a day off Saturday.
“When the guys swing it like that and play the defense that they played out there, it makes the game a whole lot of fun,” Samardzija said. “It’s one of those days you can actually enjoy. We played well today.”
Samardzija (1-5) gave up three runs on nine hits over 6 2/3 innings while keeping Cincinnati’s lineup quiet most of the afternoon. The right-hander had eight strikeouts, did not walk a batter for the third consecutive game and didn’t allow a runner past second base until the fifth.
“[Samardzija] looked like he was really commanding the ball well,” said Reds catcher Devin Mesoraco, who left the game in the fifth inning with hamstring tightness. “Everything was in the zone. He was really living in the zone, a lot of strikes. He’s always had primo stuff, but today his command was pretty darn sharp.”
Scooter Gennett drove in two runs for the Reds, who lost starting pitcher Tim Adleman to a stiff neck after one inning in which he allowed four runs. Reliever Barrett Astin entered in the second and allowed three more, putting Cincinnati in a seven-run deficit early.
“It was unrealistic to think [Adleman] could go out for more,” Reds manager Bryan Price said. “Astin took a little bit of time to settle in, and by that point it’s 7-0 and we had kind of an uphill battle from that point in time.”
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