Giants beat:
Foot could keep Longoria out for some time.
DENVER — Third baseman Evan Longoria will not be on the field for the Giants anytime soon. An MRI exam Monday morning showed that one of the Giants’ hottest hitters of late has a strained plantar fascia in his left foot.
The Giants placed Longoria on the 10day injured list, and though manager Bruce Bochy could not provide a hint of a prognosis or treatment plan after Game 1 of Monday’s doubleheader, he said, “Obviously, it’s going to be more than 10 days.”
Bochy and Longoria both hoped the third baseman could return Monday night, but that seemed optimistic the way Longoria described the pain that prompted his removal from Sunday’s 83 win in Milwaukee.
He said he has dealt with plantarfascia issues since last year, but not like this.
“Usually if I come out of a game, it’s something I can’t really tolerate,” he said Sunday. “It was pretty sore by that point. … If it’s nothing serious, I’ve played through a lot of things before. I can figure it out.”
Longoria generally has had foot issues for eight years. Blame Tropicana Field, partly. He believes that playing on artificial turf in Tampa Bay for so many years has contributed.
For now, Pablo Sandoval will be the everyday third baseman. He started both ends of the doubleheader. Donovan Solano can play there, too. Although Austin Slater played a lot of third base in Sacramento this year, Bochy winced at the suggestion of playing him there in the bigs.
Bochy also said the team has no immediate plans to summon another infielder from TripleA. The Giants have a 25yearold, Zach Green, who had hit 22 home runs through Sunday for his hometown River Cats this season. He is an option for down the road. Rout by the numbers: In the daygame win, the Giants scored 19 runs for the first time since 2003 and had 21 hits for the first time since 2016.
The 17run victory margin was the Giants’ largest since an 180 victory against the Expos in 2000. The Giants also scored 12 runs over the first three innings for the first time since a 2009 game against the Astros. The Rockies allowed 19 runs to the Giants for the first time.
Their pitching really has struggled at Coors Field. Including Monday’s opener, opponents had averaged 9.9 runs a game at Coors since June 12. Rough stretch: Reliever Ray Black was demoted to TripleA twice in two days. The Giants optioned him to make room for Tyler Beede on Sunday, recalled him when they put Longoria on the IL, then demoted him again to clear a spot for Game 2 starter Dereck Rodriguez.