Yasiel Puig Introduces Himself to San Francisco Giants with 3-Hit Night

So much has already been written about Los Angeles Dodgers right fielder Yasiel Puig recently that one would think he's been around as long as LeBron James or Kobe Bryant.

Both James and Bryant continually top the sports pages and have done so for many years.

Puig is a daily read, especially after another three-hit night in the Dodgers' 3-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants. He is now hitting .442 with seven home runs and 14 RBI in just 20 games played. 

On Monday, I wrote about Puig's indoctrination into the long-standing rivalry between the Dodgers and Giants. Now, he's a major part of that rivalry with his first foray into the battle between the two franchises.

In the first of a three-game series at Dodger Stadium, Puig introduced himself to the Giants by launching an opposite-field home run off starting pitcher Madison Bumgarner to open up the scoring.

It would be the only run the Dodgers would manage against Bumgarner until the eighth inning. He breezed through his outing following Puig's blast until he gave up a double to Nick Punto to lead off the inning.

Following a sacrifice bunt by Mark Ellis that moved Punto to third base, Giants manager Bruce Bochy called upon George Kontos, who had just been called up from Triple-A earlier in the day.

The first batter Kontos would face would be Puig.

Puig greeted Kontos with a sharply hit ground ball to left field, plating Ellis with the go-ahead run. It was Puig's third hit of the night—he also singled off Bumgarner in the sixth—and the fifth three-hit game of his very brief career.

The accolades keep pouring in for Puig from his growing fanbase on Twitter.

The Giants, now losers of seven of their last 11 games, are 3.5 games behind the Arizona Diamondbacks in the NL West.

And they won't be sending Puig a "Welcome to the Rivalry" basket anytime soon.

Doug Mead is a featured columnist with Bleacher Report. Feel free to talk baseball with Doug anytime on Twitter.