You gotta love these kids! Remember that slogan from the 80’s. Well, it was the kids that got it done today. Nothing like an extra inning walk off against the hated Dodgers by, the King of Clutch, Ryan Rohlinger.

I totally dug this game. Perfect weather, perfect lighting for photography, great baseball, and of course the Giants come out on top.

Diamond Notes:

- I’m going to keep the notes short today because I have another entry from this morning’s MiLB workout to do.

- No doubt Ryan Rohlinger is the hero of the game, but to me the player of the game is “Big Tex” himself, Roger Kieschnick. I have been wondering what the heck was going on with his playing time the past week. He only had 2 PA  and hadn’t got a whole lot of work in during games. Today, he got subbed late in the game, I believe it was either the 8th or even the 9th inning when he ran out to RF. It was a great decision to put him in though, as his arm and his bat were the turning points of this game.

Ultimately, he gunned down Ronnie Belliard at the plate by about 4 feet after a single to RF. The throw was on the money and Buster handled that bad boy with ease. That not only saved a run but also recorded a much needed out in the top of the 10th. It’s plays like that that squash rallies, as the Dodgers had some serious momentum against Denny Bautista. Giants then head to the bottom on the 10th unscathed.

Roger leads off the inning with a single, which ultimately turns in to the winning run after Torres bunted pinch runner Francisco Peguero to 2nd. Rohlinger came in to battle and laced a double down the RF line to send the Dodgers, and their fans, home with a loss.

- Speaking of Ryan, I don’t know what’s going on but the past couple of years in March the stars have aligned for him to come through with the big hit. It was great to see the team run out of the dugout and give him some love.

- I think this was Guillermo Mota’s first outing this Spring…dude, he was lights out. He made the first 2 hitters look plain silly. 1IP, 2K’s and the last out was a little foul nubber caught on the fly on a great sliding play by Buster Posey at 1B.

- Lastly, we still won the game but I believe we could have won it sooner. In the bottom of the ninth, Darren Ford came in to pinch run at 1B with 1 out. No doubt the green light was given to Darren. One thing I noticed is he is a very smart baserunner. Testing the pitcher, making sure the time is right. In fact on the second pitch, he started to jump but saw it was going to be a semi-pitchout and got back safely without a throw. He then saw his opportunity and let ‘er loose.

The ump said he was out… I believe the ump was wrong. I got pictures of the slide and tag, and you can see Darren is clearly there way ahead of time. Unless the ump said he came off the bag, which it didn’t look like to me, we should have had a runner at 2B and 1 out instead of nobody on and 2 outs. I’ll let you be the judge from the photos.

In the end, a CS for Ford turns in to a GW RBI for Rohlinger, not a bad trade. In the end, it doesn’t matter how we win, it’s just that we do win when we are playing the Dodgers.

CLICK HERE for full gallery.