BOX SCORE
SAN FRANCISCO ? Just a few seconds before the first pitch of every game, Pablo Sandoval writes something in the dirt behind third base, he swipes it away with a brush of his hand, then he flings a cloud of red dirt in the air.
Shortstop Brandon Crawford knows the ritual well. He?s never asked about it. Neither has left fielder Gregor Blanco or second baseman Marco Scutaro.
?Man, he?s got so much ... stuff,? Scutaro said. ?He is doing something all the time.?
What Sandoval did in Game 1 of the World Series Wednesday night was something transformative, something historic and maybe a bit mystical. He wrote his name alongside Babe Ruth, Reggie Jackson and Albert Pujols -- heavy hitters, all -- as the only players in history to hit three home runs in a World Series game.
[RELATED: Sandoval joins rare list]
It cannot, will not be swiped away.
?Man, I still can't believe it,? said Sandoval, after his haymakers knocked out Justin Verlander in the Giants? tone-setting, 8-3 victory at AT&T Park. ?I'm enjoying this World Series. I'm enjoying all my moments.? You never know when it's going to happen again.?It means a lot for my family, my friends, my teammates. They all pull together to be here.?
Sandoval did not have these moments two years ago. He went from starting third baseman to chief towel waver, untrusted to pick up a ground ball because he had gotten too heavy. He was out of breath after taking a half-dozen grounders. Giants manager Bruce Bochy pulled the plug after Game 2 of that NL Division Series against Atlanta, moving Juan Uribe to third base and putting a forgotten, injury-marred veteran, Edgar Renteria, at shortstop.
That move worked out pretty OK. Renteria became the only World Series MVP in Giants history, after all.
Now Sandoval is the leader in the clubhouse for that honor. He homered to center off a searing fastball from Justin Verlander in the first inning, shocked the Tigers' ace by taking an outside fastball the opposite way for a two-run shot in the third, then backspun a slider from Al Alburquerque over the center field wall in the fifth to become the first player in World Series history to homer in each of his first three at-bats in Game 1.
A single in his final at-bat completed a 4-for-4 game and his 13 total bases stands alone in second place, behind Pujols (14, on three homers and a double) for the most in a World Series game.
?He killed the whole mood,? joked left-hander Jeremy Affeldt. ?I mean, if you?re going to hit three home runs, you don?t hit the single fourth.?
Sandoval already looked to be locking in this postseason. He hit three homers in the first two rounds, and in the Giants? six elimination victories, he was 10-for-24 (.417) with two doubles, two home runs and five RBIs.
Sandoval had produced when the Giants most needed him. And against Verlander, a pitcher who was more terminator than man, Sandoval picked him up and flung him into a vat of molten steel.
?That?s the most amazing thing,? Giants pinch hitter Aubrey Huff said. ?You?re talking about a guy who?s the best on the planet right now. He took a pitch up and in, hard, and hit it out to center. I mean, how did he hit it? I can see how you?d get lucky and pull it, but to dead center? It?s hard to do that. I don?t know many guys in the league who can hit all off that. The first one I think of is maybe Barry Bonds in his heyday.
"I?m astonished, really. We all were.?
Not even Bonds hit three home runs in a game at AT&T Park. It hadn?t been done since the very first regular-season game here, 13 years ago, when the Dodgers? Kevin Elster parked a trio and everyone assumed the little waterfront stadium would play like a bandbox.
Well, that didn?t happen. In fact, the Giants hit just 31 home runs in 81 home games all season -- far and away the fewest by a home team in the major leagues. No Giant had hit three home runs at home since Bonds in 1994, at Candlestick Park.
?Barry never did it? Now that?s impressive,? Giants hitting coach Hensley ?Bam Bam? Meulens said. ?This is not a home run park, but it was warmer today than usual.?
With the 5 p.m. start, the early innings are usually the time when the Giants take batting practice before a night game. The ball always carries better before the temperatures drop. And Verlander was providing power with his upper-90s fastball.
Sandoval managed to backspin pitches off the barrel, and physics did the rest -- even if Verlander, wow-face and all, couldn?t quite believe it.?It was extremely impressive,? Verlander said. ?I wish I hadn't contributed.?
Sandoval?s home run in the first inning came on an 0-2 pitch that Verlander tried to run above Sandoval?s hands. He didn?t get it high enough. It was just the fourth home run Verlander had allowed on an 0-2 pitch in his career; he hadn?t given one up all season.
Verlander entered with a 3-0 record, a 0.74 ERA in three postseason starts and an unbeatable air. Two years ago, the Texas Rangers? Cliff Lee had that same aura, along with a 3-0 record and 0.75 ERA in three postseason starts.
The Giants won Game 1 then, and they won it now.
?This was a big hyped game with Justin, probably a lot of pressure on him,? Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. ?But I don't think it had anything to do with the pressure. His fastball command was not good, he got out of sync, he got on fast forward.?He just did not pitch well tonight, it's that simple.
?But I go back, I want to start by giving the Giant hitters credit. I would not take anything away from them.?
Especially Sandoval.
?He?s an outstanding hitter, obviously, and he just had one of those nights where anything we threw, he hit,? Leyland said. ?I think you certainly tip your hat to what Sandoval did tonight.?You can't sit up here and say what he did tonight was a fluke. I mean, it was unbelievable. The guy had one of those unbelievable World Series nights that they'll be talking about for years.?So I tip my hat to him.?
Sandoval hit just 12 home runs in a regular season interrupted by injuries. He missed six weeks with a fractured hamate bone in his left hand. It?s a boo-boo that a player can have only once -- unless you are a switch hitter, and you break the other hand. It was Sandoval?s misfortune, and his penchant for resting the meaty part of his palm on the barrel, that led to hamate fractures in each of the past two seasons.
Then there was the hamstring injury that sent him to the DL after the All-Star break, when he did the splits while receiving a throw at first base.
It was frustrating, disheartening. But not more than 2010, when his issue wasn?t injury but a perceived lack of commitment. He didn?t start any of the three postseason series clinchers, and his World Series experience consisted of three hitless at-bats as the DH in Game 3.
?He didn?t play in the four most important games of the year,? Meulens said. ?When he didn?t play in the World Series, he said, 'That?s not going to happen again.'?
Sandoval is heavier than last season, but better conditioned than before. In a sense, though, he?s never been bigger.
?He?s skinny for me right now,? said Meulens, eliciting laughs.
Said Giants manager Bruce Bochy: ?Well, I'm happy for him. I'm sure he looks back at that time, that experience he had, and I'm sure he wasn't too happy with how it went there in 2010. He looks very determined to show that not just us, everybody, what a great talent he is.
?We've always thought a lot of Pablo, but at that time we had to make a change.? But we need him. I think the time from his surgery, he's gotten stronger the last month and is swinging the bat the way we know he can.?
But three home runs in a World Series game? The frenzied dugout reaction said it all.
?The second and third one, I think it was more shock that he hit another one,? shortstop Brandon Crawford said. ?So each time it seemed to build and build. But he?ll hit a slider off his front foot and put it in the water. So nothing he does surprises me.?
Buster Posey had the best view of anyone from the on-deck circle.
?Just the other day I was telling somebody I couldn?t believe it?d been done three times in the World Series,? Posey said. ?You look up and 24 hours later, I was right there to see it. I had a great look at it.?
And what did Posey see?
?Well, I looked in the dugout to see all their faces, and I was watching Pablo enjoy the moment, taking in his reaction and his expression,? Posey said. ?It was great. I mean, Pablo?s always happy. But he was really, really happy.?
Meulens was most happy about the second homer, on a Verlander pitch away after Sandoval didn?t bite on two change-ups in the dirt.
?He?s got an uncanny ability to hit the ball in all nine quadrants of the zone,? Meulens said. ?The ball down in the zone is the one he hits the hardest, the one we want him to focus on. But when he?s locked in, he can hit anything. That was as far down and away as you can go and Pablo stayed on it.?
Sandoval cracked his bat on a foul ball during his third at-bat. So he retired that one and picked up a new one. He used the new bat to take a right turn on Alburquerque. The Hall of Fame gladly took possession of the broken one, which he used to hit his two homers off Verlander.
?Yeah, man.?I use that bat all my postseason,? said Sandoval, who usually employs more bats than the Carlsbad Caverns. ?I don't get too much superstition.?There's more bats in there to swing. It's not the bat. It's you.
?It's everything you've got inside you.?
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