Logan Webb retires 19 in a row to lead SF Giants over Diamondbacks

SAN FRANCISCO — While the reigning National League Cy Young Award winner, Blake Snell, is spinning his wheels at the starting line, last year’s runner-up, Logan Webb, is off to a flying start.

Webb was in mid-season form on Thursday night, as the San Francisco Giants’ ace was whipping out nasty changeups and backdoor two-seamers as he carved through the Arizona Diamondbacks and led the Giants to a 5-0 win in a tidy 2 hours, 12 minutes, at Oracle Park.

After back-to-back singles to start the game, Webb retired 19 consecutive batters, striking out five, until he walked Christian Walker in the seventh inning. Then he picked Walker off first base.

Webb completed seven innings while allowing just two singles and a walk as he dominated a potent Diamondbacks team that has averaged 5.6 runs per game this season.

All night, the Giants’ pitching and defense was outstanding.

Shortstop Nick Ahmed, facing the Diamondbacks for the first time since he left the organization after becoming the longest-tenured shortstop in franchise history, made a pair of sensational plays to keep Webb’s gem intact.

When Arizona put two men on base in the first, Ahmed handled a bullet and flipped it to second to get Webb out of trouble. Then in the fifth, Randal Grichuk hit a grounder up the middle that Ahmed sprinted to reach, then he turned his body in midair and fired a perfect strike to retire Grichuk by a hair.

Ahmed ranks near the top of the majors in defensive runs saved (two) and fewest errors by a shortstop (two). He also added a leadoff double to the left-field wall to get the Giants going in a four-run eighth.

In center field, Jung Hoo Lee put on a clinic in route-running when he chased down a blast by Jake McCarthy that would’ve been at least a double, if not a triple had Lee not caught it.

In the fifth inning, McCarthy hammered one that looked destined to find the gap, but Lee ran a perfect route as he sprinted to the spot and made a leaping grab 371 feet from home plate. According to StatCast data, the expected batting average on that hit was .670, and it would’ve been a home run in at least one other ballpark.

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