‘Last way we wanted to go out’
The faithful came to say goodbye to Hunter Pence. While they were there, they hollered “good riddance and don’t let the door hit your backside on the way out” to the 2018 season.
The Giants could not send their fans home with a warmand-fuzzy moment like Pablo Sandoval’s walk-off homer a year ago.
The Dodgers had nine runs
after three innings and smoked the Giants 15-0 on Sunday to force a one-game playoff against the Rockies in Los Angeles on Monday for the National League West title.
One Giants win over the weekend would have made Los Angeles a wild card. It didn’t happen. The Dodgers swept the three games and won the season series 10-9.
“With the history, we wanted to do well here,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “No question, this is the last way we wanted to go out. It’s disappointing. We wanted to win a game or two. You want all three. We had a chance the last day, but it got away from us.”
In the Giants’ second-worst shutout loss in the history of the rivalry, the Dodgers pounded Andrew Suarez for six runs in 21⁄3 innings. They scored seven in the third against Suarez and Hunter Strickland, who walked off the mound to a fair number of boos.
They then scorched Chris Stratton for five more runs in the fourth and fifth innings, taking a 14-0 lead on Max Muncy’s two-run splash home run. Muncy batted for Justin Turner as Dodgers manager Dave Roberts began removing regulars to rest them for Monday’s game against Colorado.
Suarez ended with a 4.49 ERA and the most innings (1601⁄3) of any major-league rookie in 2018.
The fourth-place Giants ended their second consecutive losing season at 73-89, the ninth-worst record in the majors, a nine-game improvement over last year’s 98-loss season that was not the step forward the math suggests.
The Giants lost nine of their final 10 to end a 5-21 September, their fewest wins in any full calendar month since moving west in 1958, largely a product of punting the season, trading Andrew McCutchen and letting the injured get a head start on their surgeries.
The Giants then fielded what executive vice president Brian Sabean described as “a splitsquad lineup against playoff teams.”
The fans did get to cheer Pence one last time after he struck out to end an 0-for-4 day. He led the team onto the field for the traditional ball toss into the stands and accepted the gift of a scooter, which he drove around the warning track in a slow farewell lap.
Even Pence had to address the game and season in his farewell speech.
“This game was tough. I’m not going to lie,” he said. “This season was tough. It was bad.”
But in Penceian fashion, his final words were positive. He praised the young players who will survive the offseason purge and quoted Thomas Fuller: “The darkest hour is just before the dawn.”
Now, the Giants move into their most uncertain offseason since 1992, when it was thought they were moving to the Tampa Bay area.
General manager Bobby Evans paid with his job this year. The fate of others — coaches, the medical staff and executives — rests in the hands of the new head of baseball operations whom President Larry Baer will hire.
“Everything’s in a holding pattern,” said one Giants official fairly high on the organizational chart. Despite being steeled for this, having experienced it with other clubs, he said, “It’s still not fun.”
In a frank assessment of the team he and Evans forged, Sabean said that injuries aside, “The roster wasn’t strong enough. That lays on the baseball-operations department, including myself. We didn’t have enough depth.”
In the next breath, Sabean got somewhat emotional as he credited the effort of his players who were healthy enough to stay on the field.
“This is the furthest thing from last year’s clubhouse, just the general mood or the professionalism or the work ethic,” Sabean said. “All those guys should be proud of how they hung in there week after week after we took body blow after body blow.”