Samardzija impressed by Sandoval's pitching: 'Couple more mph, he's serviceable'

Pablo Sandoval made his pitching debut at the end of a long Saturday doubleheader and is earning some praise from a member of the starting staff.

"A couple more miles an hour, he's serviceable," Jeff Samardzija told Manny Randhawa of MLB.com following Sandoval's perfect performance.

With the San Francisco Giants trailing 15-6 to the division-rival Los Angeles Dodgers in the day's second game, manager Bruce Bochy opted to send a position player to the mound and knew the former World Series MVP would be game.

"I knew without question (Sandoval) would want to do it. He just loves playing baseball," Bochy added postgame. "It did bring some levity to a real long game. With that said, it was pretty impressive what he did."

In the ninth frame, the third baseman affectionately referred to as "Kung Fu Panda" tossed a scoreless frame on 11 pitches, hitting 88 mph at times and even mixing in a curveball. Facing Max Muncy, Yasmani Grandal, and Chris Taylor, Sandoval recorded three consecutive groundouts.

"He was hitting corners," Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford added. "You do that, it's tough to hit, tough to drive a ball, even if it's 87 (mph) or whatever it was that he hit. He got us some ground balls."