Sanchez's Fourth Hit Completes Wild Night for Giants

(July 14, 2012) -- Catcher Hector Sanchez capped a career night Saturday with a walk-off single to give the Giants a 3-2 win over the Astros in a marathon 12-inning game at AT&T Park in San Francisco.
 
Sanchez's career-best fourth hit of the game scored Pablo Sandoval with the game-winning run.
 

The bottom of the 12th inning started with Sandoval hustling down the line to beat out a slow chopper to Astros shortstop Brian Bixler for an infield single, He then advanced to second on Angel Pagan's single to center to set up Sanchez's winning hit.

That helped make up for Sanchez's role in a wild ninth inning that nullified a masterful outing from starter Tim Lincecum, who departed after eight shutout innings with a 2-0 lead.

The Astros once again jumped on closer Santiago Casilla for a pair of two-out runs to tie the score in the ninth and send the game into extra innings.

Justin Maxwell's two-out double to right field scored Scott Moore, who had walked. Casilla then struck out Chris Snyder, but his wild curveball got past Sanchez, allowing Snyder to reach first and Maxwell to score on Sanchez's off-balance throw to first.

The victim of his first wild pitch of the season, Casilla has now blown four of his last six save opportunities.

 Sanchez's game-winning single, though, came back to save Lincecum's gem. After getting pulled after 3 1/3 innings in both of his two previous starts before the All-Star break against the first-place Nationals and Pirates in which he gave up a combined 13 earned runs, Lincecum ony walked one batter and set a season-high with 11 strikeouts in his best statistical start of the season.

 Now with a 15-inning scoreless streak at home, Lincecum has a 2-4 record and a 3.43 ERA at home compared to going 1-6 on the road with a 9.00 ERA.

Lincecum came in with the game's first run in the fifth when he scored from third base on Miguel Cabrera's single to right field. Back-to-back doubles from Pagan and Sanchez to open the sixth inning to give the Giants another run in support of Lincecum's fifth quality start of the season.

 The Giants are now 5-1 in extra-inning games this season, while the Astros fell to 0-9.

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