{"id":12390,"date":"2026-05-07T00:45:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T00:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/12390\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T00:45:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T00:45:10","slug":"ty-france-hits-clutch-triple-after-taking-pitch-timer-violation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/12390\/","title":{"rendered":"Ty France hits clutch triple after taking pitch-timer violation"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN FRANCISCO — Ty France<\/a> was in the batting cage just down the dugout steps at Oracle Park when field coordinator Vinny Lopez hurriedly rushed in.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said, \u2018Hey Ty, you\u2019re hitting,\u2019\u201d France recalled in the aftermath of the Padres\u2019 5-1<\/a> victory over the Giants on Wednesday afternoon \u201cI said: \u2018When?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Lopez\u2019s response: \u201cRight now.\u201d<\/p>\n

France went into scramble mode. He grabbed his bat off the rack. He rushed to get his batting gloves on. He hurried up the steps and through the dugout, when manager Craig Stammen stopped him.<\/p>\n

Sung-Mun Song was already in the box, and Stammen had a moment to consider the consequences.<\/p>\n

The Giants had called for lefty reliever Matt Gage to face Song in the game\u2019s pivotal seventh-inning moment. It only made sense for Stammen to counter with a righty bat like France. But, by his own self admission, Stammen was \u201clate\u201d in his decision to pinch-hit.<\/p>\n

So, Stammen could let Song bat in an unfavorable matchup. Or, he could send France to the plate and accept a pitch-clock violation, putting France in an instant 0-1 hole. Eventually, Stammen chose the latter. France didn\u2019t seem to mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been 0-1 thousands of times,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Such is the nature of the Padres\u2019 excellent bench production this season, that even when there\u2019s a snafu in the process — a major snafu in this case, at the game\u2019s decisive moment — they still get the hit they need.<\/p>\n

France, despite starting the count behind, got to work. He battled for eight pitches. (Well, technically seven, not counting the automatic strike.) He worked the count full.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a whirlwind, but it all worked out,\u201d France said. \u201cYou just treat it like another at-bat.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the count full, France got a fastball from Gage and shot it into the right-field corner. The Giants\u2019 Jesus Rodriguez, playing his first game in right field, dove and couldn\u2019t make the play. France sped into third base with his third triple of the season, plating two runs and giving the Padres a 3-1 lead.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if the manager put him in the best spot to succeed,\u201d Stammen said. \u201cBut we got him out there, and he came through, made me look good.\u201d<\/p>\n

To be clear: Stammen was highly accountable. He\u2019s a rookie manager who has pulled plenty of the right strings early this season, especially with his bench. But in no uncertain terms, this was a mishap. The situation called for a righty bat. And the Padres didn\u2019t have a righty bat at the ready.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was looking at the reliever warming up, thought I had a few more pitches, and then he was ready and Song was in the box,\u201d Stammen said. \u201cI was just late on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Or, put more succinctly: \u201cI put [France] down, 0-1. I basically threw a strike to him, first pitch.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were other considerations at play, of course. This didn\u2019t just happen in a vacuum. The Padres were trying to stay away from Luis Campusano after he fouled a ball off his foot in Tuesday\u2019s game.<\/p>\n

So, France was suddenly the backup catcher. The Padres needed to make sure he would stay in the game if he pinch-hit — which he did, replacing Gavin Sheets at first base. (That\u2019s also the reason Stammen didn\u2019t pinch-hit for the light-hitting Freddy Fermin a batter earlier.)<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Stammen was also juggling whether he should use Xander Bogaerts or France in that spot. He was trying to give Bogaerts a full day off — though that didn\u2019t end up happening anyway. Bogaerts entered for Song defensively — and proceeded to mash a towering two-run homer to put the game out of reach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe end up playing him anyway — and he hits a big homer,\u201d Stammen said.<\/p>\n

It was a fairly succinct summary of one of the Padres\u2019 biggest strengths this season — their bench. Stammen has regularly given his starters time off, preferring to keep his bench active.<\/p>\n

As a result, those starters are fresh, and that bench is highly engaged.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of guys that maybe aren\u2019t having everyday at-bats are swinging really well,\u201d Bogaerts said. \u201cSo it just gives the manager more options.\u201d<\/p>\n

Said France: \u201cIf you look just down our entire roster — whether it\u2019s the superstars, the mid-tier guys or the bench guys — it\u2019s just a talented roster. It\u2019s an established group and a veteran group. We\u2019re baseball players. We know our job. We know what they have to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still — for as much as Stammen trusts his bench — he acknowledged being hugely relieved when France\u2019s triple fell in down the right-field line.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe favor of the lord resting upon me at that point,\u201d Stammen said with a self-deprecating grin. \u201cSometimes things work out in your favor.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO — Ty France was in the batting cage just down the dugout steps at Oracle Park…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4658,5,4659,2614],"class_list":{"0":"post-12390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-france","10":"tag-major-league-baseball","11":"tag-mlb"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12390\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}