


SAN FRANCISCO >> Bob Melvin has never seen a ballgame end in this fashion. Neither has Heliot Ramos. Or LaMonte Wade Jr. Or Jordan Hicks.
Ramos and Melvin and Wade and Hicks — and the thousands of other souls in attendance at Oracle Park — may very well go the rest of their days without seeing another finish like the one that unfolded on Sunday at Oracle Park: a walk-off “Little League” home run on, appropriately enough, Little League Day at the yard.
Thanks to two throwing errors, Ramos scored on a grounder that he hit two mere feet. The Giants beat the Texas Rangers, 3-2, and logged their fifth walk-off of April in the process, capping off a stretch of 17 consecutive games with an exclamation point. San Francisco has won its share of thrillers this season, both in San Francisco and abroad, but Ramos’ mad dash will live on in this ballpark’s lore for decades to come.
“They’re probably going to put it in the hitter’s meeting just making fun of me,” Ramos said with a smile.
An afternoon removed from Patrick Bailey’s walk-off single, Ramos stepped to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning with the game tied at two apiece. The Rangers’ Luke Jackson started Ramos off with a first-pitch slider. Ramos chopped the breaking ball weakly to the third-base side and sprinted up the line to try to beat out a single.
Up to this point, Ramos hadn’t enjoyed his best all-around game. He generated offense in the fourth inning by singling, stealing second and scoring on Christian Koss’ first career RBI. But Ramos got a bad jump on Marcus Semien’s first-inning flare that scored two runs, then was doubled up on the bases in the sixth inning after Adolis García made a highlight catch.
Those miscues would be forgotten thanks to what happened over the next 20 seconds.
Ramos sprinted up the line to try to beat out a single. Jackson barehanded the ball and made an errant offbalance throw. First baseman Jake Burger dove to stop the ball but to no avail.
The ball rolled up the first-base warning track and Ramos cruised into second base, assuming the Rangers had already corralled the ball. As he decelerated, he realized the ball remained loose and Ramos restarted the burners and took off for third.
If Ramos never stopped, he likely would’ve made it to third base easily and Burger would’ve never made a throw. Ramos’ hesitation provided Burger with a window to record an out. So, he unfurled a throw to third baseman Josh Smith. It was around here that Ramos blacked out.
“I remember when I got to second,” Ramos said. “After that, I just blacked out and kept running.”
Smith, like Burger himself, dove for the ball but couldn’t glove it. The ball rolled up the third-base warning track. Jackson, the man who started this sequence, tracked it down, but Ramos was long gone. Ramos could’ve scored standing up; he dove across for style.
“He was unaware when he went to second that he could’ve been easily at third,” said manager Bob Melvin. “Once he was aware of that, then they had to make the play on him. So, for whatever reason, it all worked out as good as you could.”
Added Wade, the on-deck batter: “That was a first, and it was a good view. It was really funny.”
Hicks, who allowed two runs over five innings with three strikeouts, was in the Giants’ clubhouse receiving treatment as the madness unfolded. Before the play developed on the screen, he heard the roar of the sellout crowd.
“I just heard everybody yelling and figured that we did something cool,” Hicks said. “Watching it back, pretty wild ending.”
Ramos’ walk-off was, in a word, abnormal, but San Francisco hasn’t been unfamiliar with winning ballgames in the inning or later. The Giants’ five walk-off victories are the most in baseball, as are their 10 victories when trailing by at least two runs at some point. Entering play, the team’s .871 OPS in high-leverage situations was, appropriately enough, the best in all of baseball.
“Every game, we take it one pitch at a time, one at-bat at a time,” Ramos said. “Obviously, the pitcher always keep us in the game. We take good at-bats, we get on base, we steal — we do whatever we have to do to win the game.”
Ramos and the rest of the Giants will now have the luxury of enjoying a day off on Monday, their first reprieve from playing in two-and-a-half.
San Francisco clashed with some of baseball’s best teams over this 17-game stretch, a list that includes the New York Yankees, Philadelphia Phillies and Milwaukee Brewers, but finished with a 10-7 record. As things stand, their 19-10 record is the second-best in all of baseball behind only the New York Mets (19-9).
“To be able to post up — day games, night games, travel, East Coast, West Coast — it was pretty significant,” Melvin said. “These guys just continue to go out there and fight. Our best work is usually done at the end. I think they handled 17 in a row really well.”