Giants capitalize on Red Sox's costly errors to secure series win

Justice delos Santos, The Mercury News on Jun 22, 2025

Published in Baseball

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

SAN FRANCISCO — It will go down as one of the odder offensive outbursts of the season.

The Giants scored nine runs in their 9-5 victory over the Boston Red Sox on Sunday afternoon at Oracle Park to secure a series win, the most they’ve scored since acquiring Rafael Devers exactly one week ago.

The Giants played both big ball and small ball — Casey Schmitt, Mike Yastrzemski and Willy Adames hit solo homers while Tyler Fitzgerald executed the squeeze play — but five of San Francisco’s runs could be traced directly to two errors by Boston’s defense.

The Giants didn’t have their finest defensive inning in the top of the first and gifted the Red Sox the game’s first run.

With runners on first and second, catcher Patrick Bailey spiked a throw to Ray that he couldn’t corral, allowing Roman Anthony to advance from second to third. The Giants looked like they’d get out of the inning unscathed when Jarren Duran hit a two-out line drive to Heliot Ramos, but Ramos muffed the catch and allowed Anthony to score, giving Boston a 1-0 lead.

Two innings later, Ramos and the Giants took advantage of the Red Sox’s own miscue. Following Schmitt’s leadoff single, Bailey skied a fly-ball to shallow left field. Duran, the left fielder, and third baseman Nate Eaton both converged on the ball. Neither defender hauled it in, and an error was given to Eaton. Four batters later, Ramos lined a single that scored Schmitt and Bailey, giving the Giants a 2-1 lead.

As errors were responsible for the game’s first three runs, home runs accounted for the next six.

In the top of the fifth, Boston’s Rob Refsnyder and Romy Gonzalez hit a pair of home runs off Ray — Gonzalez’s being a two-run shot — to give Boston a 4-2 lead. In the bottom half of the frame, Schmitt and Mike Yastrzemski tied the game at four apiece with a pair of solo homers.

For Schmitt, his 111.6 mph line drive that barely cleared the left-field fence was tied for the hardest-hit ball of his career. For Yastrzemski, his towering blast to the right-field arcade was his first home run since April 30.

The game didn’t remain tied for long as Ceddanne Rafaela’s solo homer off Spencer Bivens gave the Red Sox a 5-4 lead in the top of the sixth. But in the bottom of the seventh, the Giants once again took advantage of another costly error from Boston — and used a bit of small ball.

To tie the ballgame at five apiece, manager Bob Melvin put on the squeeze play. With Adames on third and Schmitt on second with one out, Tyler Fitzgerald laid down a bunt right in front of home plate, Adames dashed home, and Schmitt advanced to third.

Boston manager Alex Cora subsequently went to left-handed pitcher Justin Wilson to face the left-handed hitting Yastrzemski, who entered play with a .488 OPS against lefties.

For about two seconds, it appeared Cora’s call to the bullpen would pay off. Yastrzemski lunged at a slider from Wilson that was out of the zone and pulled a line drive right at Gonzalez. Gonzalez didn’t even have to move his feet; all he had to do was catch the ball, and the inning would be over.

The ball instead rolled into right field. Gonzalez — like Ramos several innings prior — straight up missed the catch, and the ball rolled away. Schmitt scored easily, and the Giants led by a run.

Following Rafael Devers’ single, Ramos drove in two more runs with an opposite-field double that extended Ramos, then followed Gonzalez’s error with a two-run, opposite-field double to extend San Francisco’s lead to 8-5.

Adames provided insurance in the bottom of the eighth inning with a solo home run, his ninth homer of the season.

____