The Giants were without their hottest hitter on Tuesday night after Donovan Solano was forced to sit with abdominal soreness. Their plucky offense managed to pull off another wild comeback, anyway.

A pair of struggling veterans, Hunter Pence and Brandon Crawford, delivered the biggest hits as the Giants rallied for a 7-6 win over the Astros in 10 innings at Minute Maid Park.

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Pence crushed a pinch-hit, three-run home run to breathe life back into the club in the seventh inning, and Crawford capped the comeback with a go-ahead single in extra innings. Submariner Tyler Rogers rebounded from a rough outing in Los Angeles to post a scoreless 10th and convert his first career save in the Majors.

“That’s kind of been something that we’ve done pretty well here this first start of the season,” Pence said. “We’ve been scoring a lot of runs late. We do have a team mindset of keep fighting. Be as scrappy as you can. Grit it out and keep going.” 

The Giants trailed, 6-2, in the seventh inning when manager Gabe Kapler sent Pence up to hit for Alex Dickerson with a pair of runners on and two outs. Pence entered Tuesday only 2-for-32 over his first 11 games of the year, but he broke out in a big way against lefty reliever Blake Taylor, driving a slider out to the opposite field for a three-run shot that brought the Giants within one. 

It was Pence’s first home run of the season and his first in a San Francisco uniform since Sept. 25, 2018. Despite Pence’s slow start, Kapler has continued to show faith in him, pointing to his long track record of producing in the Majors and his diligent preparation before games. Pence, 37, trained for his pinch-hit appearance against Taylor by setting up a slider machine and hitting off a left-handed angle as part of his pregame work on Tuesday. 

“He’s expressed confidence and understands these kinds of things go on in baseball,” Pence said. “It’s about the process, it’s about doing the work and having good approaches. I’m really enjoying a lot of the work these hitting guys have done, and also the support of Kap. It’s been really a big lift for me, and they’ve definitely helped me out a lot.”

The Giants tied the game in the ninth on an RBI single by Darin Ruf. After Mike Yastrzemski and Pence reached on a walk and a single, respectively, Ruf shot a slider from Ryan Pressly through the left side to make it 6-6. Trevor Gott worked around a walk to Alex Bregman to post a scoreless ninth and force extra innings.

Wilmer Flores, who put the Giants on the board with a solo homer in the second inning, opened the 10th at second base as the automatic runner and advanced to third on a single by Austin Slater. That brought up Crawford, who produced another single off Cy Sneed to put San Francisco ahead, 7-6. Crawford entered Tuesday hitting .178 on the season, but he went 2-for-4 with a walk to bump his average to .204.

Kapler again showed his trust in his players in the 10th, when he summoned Rogers to protect the Giants’ one-run lead. Rogers blew a save at Dodger Stadium on Sunday after surrendering a three-run homer to AJ Pollock, but Kapler maintained that Rogers was one of the Giants’ best options in high-leverage situations because of his ability to make hitters feel uncomfortable with his unique delivery angle.

Rogers responded Tuesday by retiring Yuli Gurriel, Carlos Correa and Kyler Tucker in order to strand the automatic runner at third and seal the win for the Giants.

"He came to me and was like, 'I haven't lost any confidence in you, you're still one of my guys,'" Rogers said. "That's big when a manager does that. After a couple tough games, to be able to validate his decision tonight to put me back in there was just rewarding for me."