St. Louis Cardinals at San Francisco Giants

At long last, the Giants managed to pull off their first three-game sweep of the season -- and they finished it without Rafael Devers, to boot.  On the same day that the red-hot Devers received his first day off of the season, the Giants erupted for six runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to erase a five-run deficit and rally for an improbable 7-6 win over the Cardinals on Wednesday afternoon at Oracle Park. “It’s hard to describe what went on,” manager Tony Vitello said. “It kind of came together in one inning, but whether it looked like it or not in the dugout, the guys were positive. They were still in the fight. Fortunately, the gates kind of opened at one point.” The Giants entered Wednesday as the only team in the Majors without a three-game sweep this year, but they finally got to bust out the brooms on their 147nd game of the season. (San Francisco also went 3-0 against the Braves at Truist Field, but that series wasn’t considered an official three-game sweep since the finale was postponed from June to August due to rain.) The elusive achievement was even more incredible considering the Giants deployed a patchwork lineup that featured four rookies (Turner Hill, Bryce Eldridge, Jonah Cox and Drew Cavanaugh) and only one player who started on Opening Day (Jung Hoo Lee). “I think the young guys just bring a lot of energy,” third baseman Shay Whitcomb said. “I think you’ve seen that even in our losses the last couple weeks. We’ve been fighting until the very end. It’s been really fun to have such a hungry group.”   The band of youngsters had their work cut out for them after the Cardinals knocked rookie right-hander Blade Tidwell out of the game in the fifth and took advantage of multiple errors to build a 6-1 lead by the next inning. But they showed their burgeoning resilience by coming alive late against St. Louis relievers Cade Winquest and George Soriano in the bottom of the eighth.  Cavanaugh led off with a single, Brett Harris reached on a hit-by-pitch and Hill walked to load the bases with two outs for Eldridge, who bounced a two-run single to center field to cut the deficit to 6-3.