SAN FRANCISCO -- At long last, the marathon has ended, and the Giants should feel very good about how it went.
Monday will be San Francisco's first day off since April 10. The 17-day, four-city gauntlet against some of MLB's best teams taught us a lot about the 2025 Giants, who entered Sunday's series finale against the Texas Rangers at Oracle Park alone in first place in the National League West and held onto it at least for one more day -- thanks largely in part to a Little League home run by Heliot Ramos in the bottom of the ninth.
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SIGN UP HERE It also taught us a lot about Jordan Hicks, who toed the rubber against young Rangers righty Jack Leiter on Sunday as San Francisco secured its sixth series victory of the 2025 MLB season.
Here are three takeaways from the Giants' thrilling 3-2 walk-off win, the second in as many games.
Recovered Nicely
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Hicks struggled in his three previous starts, but if you take away three of his 27 1/3 total innings before Sunday's start (ND, 5 IP, 7 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 3 K), his numbers on the season would look pretty good.
Five of the seven earned runs Hicks surrendered in a start against the New York Yankees on April 12 came in the fifth inning alone. All five of his earned runs against the Philadelphia Phillies on April 17 came in the first inning, while three of his five earned runs against the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday came in the third inning, before Hicks departed in the middle of an eight-run top of the sixth in an eventual 11-3 loss.
His outing on Sunday followed that same trend. Fortunately for Hicks and the Giants, it was just a two-run top of the first inning before four scoreless frames.
As a reliever, one rough inning likely would spell doom for his team on any given day. That's much less likely to be the case for Hicks in his role as a starter.
Procrastination At Its Finest
The Giants entered Sunday's game with four walk-off wins this season, the most in the majors. The last time the Orange and Black had four walk-offs in their first 12 home games was in 2011.
Patrick Bailey delivered the pinch-hit, game-winning single in Saturday's 3-2 victory over Texas, and on Sunday, it was Ramos. Well, kind of ...
With the game tied 2-2 in the bottom of the ninth, Ramos led off with a dribbler up the third-base line into no man's land between the mound and third base. Rangers reliever Luke Jackson, a former Giant, threw an off-balance throw up the right-field line, which allowed Ramos to advance all the way to third before first baseman Jake Burger overthrew third base and Ramos scored a Little League homer to win the game.
San Francisco had a .761 OPS in what Statcast defines as high-leverage situations this season before Sunday's game, which was the fifth-best in baseball.
The Giants also now have 16 walk-off wins dating back to last season, which, unsurprisingly, is the most in the majors.
Bird(song) Is The Word
Hayden Birdsong, who has been nothing short of a revelation for the Giants out of the bullpen this season, continues to show impressive poise in his new role.
With the score tied 2-2 in the top of the sixth inning, old friend Joc Pederson roped a leadoff triple into the gap in right-center. Not a problem for the 23-year-old.
Birdsong then struck out Adolis García before getting Marcus Semien and Nick Ahmed to ground out and pop out, respectively, to end the inning. He was awarded an additional inning in the seventh, another scoreless frame. And then a third in the eighth, also another scoreless frame.
Light work.
The three scoreless frames lowered Birdsong's ERA to 1.13 on the season. It's unclear what the future might hold for the young righty who still hopes to reprise his role as a starter, but for right now, he provides an already elite Giants bullpen with another very, very exciting weapon.