manager Bruce Bochy said. "He was a little off at times but he competed so well tonight. He got in some jams and had to work hard, but he found a way to get it done."

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Having limited the damage, Lincecum joined in as the Giants lineup thumped Beckett in the top of the third. Gregor Blanco's leadoff single and Brandon Crawford's double, the first extra-base hit of the season for the Giants, set the table. Blanco scored when Lincecum grounded out to shortstop and Crawford made it 2-1 when Schumaker booted Angel Pagan's grounder to second.

Two batters later, Pablo Sandoval did what he does better than anybody in baseball. Sandoval's recent elbow soreness bothered him the most when he swung left-handed, but hitting from that side against theright-handed Beckett, he jumped on a neck-high fastball and rocketed it into the right-field seats.

"I don't know what a pitcher is going to think when he puts one up and in and Pablo still hits it," said Hunter Pence, who also homered. "It's a lot of fun to watch."

The two-run shot gave Lincecum a three-run cushion. After throwing 40 pitches in the first two innings, Lincecum set the Dodgers down on nine pitches in the third. He put two runners on again in the fourth, this time escaping thanks to Marco Scutaro's sliding stop of a sharp two-out grounder.

The Dodgers tacked on a second unearned run after Buster Posey's error in the fifth, and Bochy jogged out to the mound to check on Lincecum.

Bochy tends to give his