A’s blank Giants to clinch playoff berth; sights still set on AL West crown
Giants: Offense punchless in loss to Bay rival without Yastrzemski
For the first time this season, the Giants played without Mike Yastrzemski, their best player and a force behind their resilient mojo.
Yastrzemski played in the first 49 games but was forced out of game No. 50 with a calf strain. His absence was felt when the punchless Giants fell 60 Friday night to the A’s at the Coliseum.
The Giants are known for their comebacks and ability to overcome deficits, obstacles and, well, rough performances by their teammates, but they failed to climb from the hole starter Logan Webb put them in, a hole that got deeper as the evening progressed.
With the loss, the Giants dropped to a tie with the Reds for the final National League wildcard spot — but actually
are on the outside looking in because they’d lose the tiebreaker — and fell to 04 against their crossbay rivals with two weekend games in Oakland remaining.
In perhaps his most important start of the season, Webb retired just 10 of 19 batters and gave up six runs in 31⁄3 innings. Matt Olson’s threerun homer in the third was the big blow, but Webb never fully grasped his arsenal and repeatedly missed his targets.
The Giants needed the righthander to pitch deep into the game because their bullpen has been overworked and their starters this weekend, Kevin Gausman (elbow) and Johnny Cueto (hip), have had physical issues.
Manager Gabe Kapler stuck with Webb, hoping the stuff and command would reappear, but it didn’t. Finally, after Marcus Semien lined Webb’s 90th pitch for an RBI single that made it 60, the call went to the bullpen.
The loss wasn’t just on
Webb, of course. The hitters never figured out A’s starter Chris Bassitt, who pitched 62⁄3 innings, gave up three hits and permitted six baserunners, just one in the first four innings, courtesy of Brandon Crawford’s double.
Without Yastrzemski, whose MRI Friday showed his calf mildly strained, Alex Dickerson led off and Darin Ruf played right field. As Kapler said, “I don’t think it’s the most comfortable outfield configuration right now. In a perfect world, we’d have Yaz out there.”
Doling credit to his corner outfielders, Kapler said, “I don’t think Ruf and Dick are Gold Glove winners, but they both worked really hard for this moment.”
All true, but the Giants aren’t the same with Yastrzemski on the bench. Before the game, he made a telling comment when he said, “I know these guys have been working so hard, and they’re going to keep playing their tails off. I have all the confidence in the world in them to make sure that I can get another chance to play this year.”
It’s no sure thing Yastrzemski will play again in the regular season, which has nine days and 10 games remaining. The Giants hope his absence will be short, but if it’s at least a week, his teammates will need to reach the playoffs without him.
To do that, they can’t play more games like Friday’s.
In the first inning, second baseman Donovan Solano made a bad decision and bad throw after fielding Mark Canha’s grounder. With his momentum taking him to first base, Solano made an offbalance throw past Crawford at second, where Marcus Semien might have been safe even with a perfect throw.
It was costly because Jake Lamb hit a twoout RBI single.
Andrew Suarez and Shaun Anderson, both of whom were promoted Friday from the team’s Sacramento camp, pitched in relief of Webb and combined for 32⁄3 hitless innings.