SAN FRANCISCO -- Jung Hoo Lee has officially entered the conversation for catch of the ... decade?
The Giants’ center fielder made an incredible catch between his knees to rob Yandy Díaz of extra bases in the top of the fourth inning of a 7-1 win over the Rays in Sunday’s series finale at Oracle Park, which snapped San Francisco’s seven-game losing streak.
Díaz led off the inning by smoking a 105 mph drive out to right-center field, but Lee quickly raced into Triples Alley and went into a slide to try to secure the ball. The ball ended up popping out of his glove, but Lee somehow managed to keep it trapped between his legs and hang on for the out.
“The wind was pretty heavy, and the ball was reaching out a lot, so I went for the slide,” Lee said via interpreter Justin Han. “I did catch it, but I felt like it was going under my body, starting from the chest. It was a funny catch, for sure.”
After carefully rising to his feet, Lee took the ball out from between his knees and held it up in the air to confirm the astonishing catch, which drew an amazed grin from right fielder Drew Gilbert.
“That was pretty crazy,” Gilbert said. “That was very impressive. That’s a winning play from a winning player.”
Gilbert knew Lee caught the ball between his knees right away, but most people didn’t fully process what had just happened until they saw the replay.
“I thought he just went down,” manager Bob Melvin said. “I was worried that he may have hurt something like his ankle. I wasn’t really sure because he was down for a while. The replay took a while, but our people were talking about it and realized he caught it between his knees. Pretty good. Haven’t seen that one before."
“I thought it was 200 percent a double, but I had the bad luck that he caught the ball,” Díaz said. “I think he’s the only player who’s ever done that. It was a very weird play.”
Not even longtime Giants broadcasters Mike Krukow and Duane Kuiper could remember seeing a grab quite like that.
“He caught it between the knees!” Krukow said.
“I don’t care what anybody says. That’s the catch of the decade,” Kuiper declared. “Not of the year, not of the day, not of the week, not of the homestand -- the decade.”
Lee’s circus catch was just one of many highlights in a palate-cleansing afternoon for the Giants, who had dropped 15 of their previous 16 games at Oracle Park before rebounding to deliver their most complete game in weeks.
Logan Webb earned the win after striking out seven over scoreless innings, and San Francisco’s maligned offense finally came alive with a four-run rally in the sixth that featured a rare go-ahead, three-run single from Dominic Smith.
“We needed that,” Melvin said. “It was nice to give [the fans] a good game to go home to.”
Smith came up with the bases loaded and two outs and broke the scoreless tie by lining a broken-bat single to right field that easily brought home Heliot Ramos from third and Rafael Devers from second. Smith was then credited with a third RBI when Willy Adames came out of nowhere to aggressively score from first, sliding in ahead of Ha-Seong Kim’s throw to the plate to extend the Giants’ lead to 3-0.
“[Third-base coach Matt Williams] was telling him, ‘Look at the read and where the ball is coming in,’” Melvin said. “The way things are going for us right now, you’re going to take an opportunity. It was great awareness. Willy never let up, and it gave him a chance to score.”
“I feel like it’s a good example for the younger guys to kind of see the anticipation of the plays and just show them that you can take advantage of what they give you every time,” Adames said.
Christian Koss capped the four-spot with a two-out RBI double before the Giants padded their lead even further behind back-to-back solo shots from Gilbert and Tyler Fitzgerald in the seventh. Gilbert hammered a 1-1 fastball from Rays reliever Mason Englert out to the right-field arcade to collect his second hit and first career Major League home run in his eight game with the Giants.
Fitzgerald then joined the party by cranking a hanging cutter out to left field for his fourth homer and first since July 6.
“That was really cool, especially to do it in front of the fans today,” said Gilbert, who made the milestone day even sweeter by adding an RBI single in the eighth. “A lot of things went right for us today, and we played a good game.”