After manager Bob Melvin dressed down his players following a season-worst sixth loss in a row Tuesday night, they responded the next afternoon with an onslaught against the Diamondbacks' starter, Jordan Montgomery, and stopped the bleeding at six games with a 9-3 win to avoid being swept for a second straight series.
Bringing a dozen men to bat, all six of the Giants' runs in the inning came on a pair of powerful swings from Heliot Ramos and Wilmer Flores. Ramos launched a towering two-run shot on to the concourse in center field, an estimated 424 feet away, to open the scoring, and four batters later Flores turn the ambush into a full-blown assault, depositing a hanging curveball into the left-field seats for the Giants' third grand slam of the year.
Ramos became the first Giants player besides LaMonte Wade Jr. (who has done it twice) to come to the plate at least six times and not make an out since Pablo Sandoval in 2013. Since being moved to the top portion of the lineup four games ago, Ramos has come to bat 20 times and reached safely in 12 of them with three home runs, raising his batting average to .304 and OPS to .918.
With a line-drive single to go with his grand slam, Flores has reached base five times in the past two games, and his five RBIs were a season-high. The .211 average and .573 OPS that Flores took into Wednesday's contest would have each been the worst marks of his career since he was a 21-year-old rookie, but his recent performances have shown improvement.
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