McCutcheon homers to spark 6-5 comeback win over Giants

The ever-reliable Matt Joyce came to the plate and brought home two runs with a ground-ball single, cutting the lead to 4-3 with the Pirates’ first hit of the inning. Not only is that the most in the major leagues, but it’s more than the Giants had blown in their previous two seasons combined.

The Giants, who had led the division since May 10, have the worst record in baseball since the All-Star break at 9-20. At least for Cain’s outing, they had an explanation: The right-hander lost his release point in the fifth, and by the time he regained it, the Pittsburgh Pirates had scored six times against him.

They ll need to salvage something out of this series with the Pirates behind Matt Cain on Wednesday, because they don t want to carry a four-game losing streak into a four-game home series against the Mets in which they ll face Jacob de Grom, Steven Matz, Bartolo Colon and Noah Syndergaard. Neftali Feliz pitched the eighth and Tony Watson worked the ninth to earn his sixth save.

We re in a funk. It’s not something that we haven’t seen before.

Starting tomorrow we’re going to get after it. He walked 3 batters and struck out 4. It took one pitch, a fastball, for McCutchen to hit a home run, his 17th of the season, to give the Pirates a lead.

“We’re taking some blows right now”, manager Bruce Bochy said. This club is a resilient club. We have no choice. We have to keep our heads high and know we re going to come out of this.

Bochy shouldered some of the responsibility for Wednesday’s loss, saying he probably left Cain in too long in the fifth. Pinch hitter Matt Joyce had a two-run single, and Josh Harrison lofted a sacrifice fly that tied the score 4-4.

The more you win, Pittsburgh Pirates star Andrew McCutchen says, the more you win.

I like the way they re going about it, Bochy said. “I felt he had enough to get through it”. It didn’t play out. “That’s a tough one for us”.

The Giants handed Cain a 4-0 lead after three innings. They scored a pair of runs in the first inning when Angel Pagan doubled and scored on Posey s single, then Posey lumbered home on Crawford s double to left-center. Recently, however, Posey has been dealing with some back pain that kept him out of the lineup for two straight games.

“I’ve turned something”, he said.

The Giants have a decision to make regarding Cain’s next start.

The Giants were contemplating skipping Cain’s next rotation turn anyway in order to line up their top three starters – Madison Bumgarner, Johnny Cueto and Matt Moore – for a crucial three-game series against the Dodgers in Los Angeles beginning on Tuesday.

This story will be updated with quotes and post-game material from the Giants clubhouse at AT&T Park. Cain was honest when asked if that move would be hard to swallow.

“Yeah, it definitely would”, he said. “Those are big games in L.A., and those are the games that you look forward to and you compete in”. We ve got to find a way out of it soon, we know that.

Cain’s injury concerns and recent struggles pose a challenge for the Giants, who are now trailing the Dodgers in the battle for the NL West. Instead the Giants were left waiting to learn if they would fall further in the standings.