Thairo Estrada gave the San Francisco Giants a walk-off win in their home opener Friday afternoon, lacing a one-out double to left-center field to score Matt Chapman from first base for a 3-2 victory over the San Diego Padres.
The win completed a happy homecoming for new Giants manager Bob Melvin, the former Padres skipper who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and played three of his 10 big-league seasons with the Giants.
Chapman set the stage for Estrada’s heroics by getting hit on the left elbow on a 1-2 pitch from Padres reliever Enyel De Los Santos (0-1).
Estrada then swung through a changeup before sending a fastball to the wall in left-center, just far enough to allow Chapman to beat Fernando Tatis Jr.’s strong throw to the plate with a head-first slide.
Camilo Doval (1-0), the third Giants pitcher, got the win after escaping a jam in the top of the ninth, striking out Ha-Seong Kim and Jurickson Profar after a Jake Cronenworth single and Manny Machado walk had put two aboard with one out.
Both starting pitchers threw well enough to win, but neither got a decision.
The Padres’ Dylan Cease limited the Giants to two runs and four hits over six innings, striking out seven and walking two.
Both runs he allowed erased one-run leads. Michael Conforto’s RBI double in the bottom of the first drew the Giants even after the Padres had scored in the top of the inning. Chapman’s infield out scored LaMonte Wade Jr. for a 2-2 tie in the sixth after San Diego had gone ahead again in the third.
Cronenworth and Tatis drove in the Padres runs with singles off Giants starter Jordan Hicks, who surrendered just one earned run (two total) and five hits in seven innings. He struck out five without issuing a walk.
Conforto had three of the Giants’ five hits, including a pair of doubles.
Cronenworth collected two singles among San Diego’s six hits in the homer-less affair.
–Field Level Media
