Down nine runs with six outs left Wednesday afternoon at Oracle Park, Bryce Eldridge hit a walk-off grand slam off a left-handed pitcher to become the youngest player in MLB history to do it — and gave a franchise that has been sleepwalking for years its first legitimate reason to believe.

The Giants' 2023 first-round draft pick, who was protected from left-handed pitching when the club called him up in early May, cemented himself as the franchise's future with a swing that completed one of the most improbable comebacks in modern baseball history — and set a record that had stood since Roberto Clemente in 1956.

Down nine runs with six outs left Wednesday afternoon at Oracle Park, Bryce Eldridge hit a walk-off grand slam off a left-handed pitcher to become the youngest player in MLB history to do it — and gave a franchise that has been sleepwalking for years its first legitimate reason to believe.

The Giants' 2023 first-round draft pick, who was protected from left-handed pitching when the club called him up in early May, cemented himself as the franchise's future with a swing that completed one of the most improbable comebacks in modern baseball history — and set a record that had stood since Roberto Clemente in 1956.

The numbers don't really compute. The Giants trailed the Washington Nationals 9-1 heading into the eighth inning at Oracle Park, then 10-6 with three outs to play. Teams in that position — down eight or more runs with six outs left — had won just once in 3,090 tries over the previous 20 MLB seasons, according to ESPN Insights. Make it twice now.

Bryce Eldridge made it happen. The 21-year-old — exactly 21 years and 233 days old on Wednesday — stepped to the plate in the ninth inning against Nationals left-hander Mitchell Parker with the bases loaded and San Francisco trailing by three. He put a ball off the top of the right-field wall.

Walk-off grand slam. Giants win, 11-10.

In doing so, Eldridge became the youngest player in Major League Baseball history to hit a walk-off grand slam, eclipsing Hall of Famer Roberto Clemente, who accomplished the feat at 21 years and 342 days on July 25, 1956 — a full 109 days older than Eldridge was Wednesday, per the Elias Sports Bureau. Per OptaSTATS, the Giants are also the first team in MLB history to walk off on a comeback from eight or more runs down in the eighth inning or later.

The stat is staggering in isolation. In context, it's barely believable: the Giants had never, in their entire franchise history, done anything like it.

"It's Chapman," Eldridge said on "Giants Postgame Live" on NBC Sports Bay Area after the game, crediting veteran third baseman Matt Chapman. "Chapman's been such a great leader. He's been awesome to me, picking me up when things aren't going well for me. He had a whole lot of faith that we were going to win that game."

Chapman had reason for that faith — he had predicted it. The night before, after yet another loss, the two sat together in the batting cages at Oracle Park. "He said he's going to hit three home runs today," Eldridge recounted. Chapman came up one short, going 4-for-5 with two home runs and three RBI. His second solo shot in the eighth inning started the comeback that ultimately put Eldridge in the record books.

That Chapman — a veteran leader who has kept believing through a miserable season — lit the fuse before the 21-year-old closed it out tells the story of how this Giants roster is structured. There are expensive pieces that haven't delivered (Rafael Devers, Willy Adames), grinders who have never stopped competing (Chapman), and a young core just beginning to arrive. Eldridge is the clearest signal yet of where the organization is heading.

When the Giants called him up in early May, the organization was careful with Eldridge against left-handed pitching, managing his workload and protecting him from matchups they weren't sure he was ready for. Seven weeks later, he hit a franchise-altering grand slam off a lefty, in the highest-pressure situation imaginable, in front of a packed Oracle Park and an entire baseball world watching.

He didn't look like a prospect finding his footing. He looked like the guy.

"He's a stud," Eldridge said of Chapman. "He's been a great leader for us. No matter what the situation is, we've always got faith that we can win the game."

The Giants are 28-41 and well out of playoff contention — as SF Standard columnist Tim Kawakami noted in his column, they're still on pace for roughly 96 losses. There is no straight line from Wednesday's win to October. But Kawakami framed the moment correctly: this is a dividing line between what came before and what might come next.

The record books are unambiguous. For a team that has been grinding through one of the longer droughts in recent franchise history, that matters. Bryce Eldridge is in those books now — the youngest in MLB history to do what he did Wednesday — and the Giants aren't going to stop reminding you of it.