Belt's blast brings Giants marathon triumph

Brandon Belt smashed a solo home run in the 18th inning to power San Francisco over Washington 2-1 in the longest playoff game in Major League Baseball history.
Winning the marathon encounter, which ended just after midnight Sunday morning, gave the Giants a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five National League Division Series and San Francisco can complete a sweep with a home victory in game three on Monday.
The winner of the series will face either the Los Angeles Dodgers or St. Louis Cardinals for the National League title and a World Series berth.
The game lasted six hours and 23 minutes to shatter the previous time mark for a major league playoff game, five hours and 50 minutes, set by a 2005 Houston victory over Atlanta in 18 innings, an innings playoff record the spectacle matched.
Belt, who had been 0-for-6 at the plate, smacked a slider from Nationals relief pitcher Tanner Roark over the right-field fence to snap a deadlock that had been at 1-1 since the ninth.
"It was a hard effort by both teams," Belt said. "It was just nice to see that ball go over the fence. We're just happy to get out of it alive and go back to San Francisco."
Washington could not push across a tying run in the bottom half of the 18th and, as a result, the Nationals fell to the brink of elimination after having earlier been only one out from victory.
The Giants stretched their National League-record playoff win streak over multiple seasons to 10 games and their record road victory run to six, but only after going down to their final out in regulation play before tying the game.
"We just battled our butts off today," Belt said. "It was freaking awesome."
Washington opened the scoring in the third inning when Asdrubal Cabrera doubled, took third on Denard Span's ground out and scored on Anthony Rendon's single to left field.
Rendon had four hits to set a team playoff record, his mark dating to the club's 1969 origin as the Montreal Expos before their 2005 relocation to the US capital.
Nationals starting pitcher Jordan Zimmermann struck out six and allowed only three hits over 8 1/3 innings but was pulled after issuing a two-out walk in the ninth inning to Joe Panik.
Zimmermann, coming off a no-hit victory on the final day of the regular season, set a team record by retiring the prior 20 Giants batters.
Washington relief pitcher Drew Storen could not produce the final out before the Giants equalized.
San Francisco catcher Buster Posey singled and Pablo Sandoval followed with a double to left field that brought in Panik with the tying run that forced extra innings.
Posey raced home trying to put San Francisco on top but a throw to catcher Wilson Ramos resulted in a tag out before the sliding runner could touch the plate, a call verified by a video replay appeal that kept the score at 1-1.
- Sandoval stretches hit streak -
Sandoval stretched his playoff hit streak to 13 games, two shy of the National League record.
Cabrera and Nationals manager Matt Williams were ejected in the 10th inning for arguing an umpire's strike call, the first time since 2005 one team had a player and manager tossed from the same playoff game.
San Francisco starter Tim Hudson, who was 4-0 in his five prior starts against the Nationals, struck out a career playoff high eight batters and scattering seven hits over seven and one-third innings.
Source: AFP