After dropping Game 4 in blowout fashion, Ned Yost and the Kansas City Royals knew how tall the task they were faced with in Game 5 was – beat Madison Bumgarner and the San Francisco Giants at home in the postseason.
The 25-year-old southpaw lived up to his reputation on Sunday night, twirling a complete-game shutout, pulling his team within a third World Series title in five years, as San Francisco cruised to a 5-0 win on Sunday night at AT&T Park.
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With the four-hit gem, Bumgarner added to his already-impressive career numbers in the Fall Classic, moving to 4-0, while dropping his earned run average to an unthinkable 0.29 – while holding opposing batters to a minuscule .120 mark. All night long, Royals hitters flailed at the southpaw’s breaking pitches, failing to ever get any type of rhythm going.
His counterpart, Kansas City right-hander James Shields, pitched well, but could not match Bumgarner’s dominance, surrendering a pair of runs on eight hits over six innings of work. In what was likely his last start as a member of the Royals, he walked just one and struck out four before being lifted for Kelvin Herrera in the seventh.
While the game was being played, the tragic death of St. Louis Cardinals prospect Oscar Taveras broke. His winter ball teammate and Giants outfielder Juan Perez, who entered the game late as a pinch-runner, reportedly broke down in tears when he saw the news, shortly before he stepped to the plate in the bottom of the eighth inning.
In his career, Bumgarner is now 4-0 with a 0.29 ERA in World Series play.
With Kansas City set-up man Wade Davis on the hill, Perez, who is primarily noted for his defense, cracked a ball to center field, missing a three-run home run by mere inches, plating Hunter Pence and Pablo Sandoval and breaking the game open to a 4-0 Giants lead. After advancing to third on a throwing error on the play, Perez pointed toward the sky in honor of the young Cardinals outfielder.
Brandon Crawford added an RBI single to score Perez, making it 5-0, putting the finishing touches on a night that was dominated – top-to-bottom – by the Giants.
Just one batter reached second for Kansas City against Bumgarner, when Omar Infante doubled in the fifth. The San Francisco southpaw recorded the only World Series shutout that included at least eight punch outs and no walks, never allowing multiple hits in an inning and setting down the Royals in order on five separate occasions.
Crawford, who finished the night 2-for-3 with a trio of runs batted in, also accounted for the team’s first two runs with an RBI groundout in the bottom of the second and a run-scoring single two innings later, pacing the Giants offense.