Giants observations: Rocky day for San Francisco’s Opening Night hopeful Kevin Gausman.
PHOENIX — As Kevin Gausman said, he has “been a lot sharper” than he was Monday.
Gausman, the Giants’ potential Opening Night starter, allowed four runs in the Giants’ 72 loss to the White Sox at Camelback Ranch, facing the bulk of Chicago’s regulars. In 32⁄3 innings against one of baseball’s best lineups, he gave up seven hits — six for extra bases, including homers by Tim Anderson (leading off the bottom of the first) and Eloy Jimenez (a tworun shot) — and most of the outs in the first two innings were hit hard, too.
“My goal is always to kind of pitch up in the zone with my fastball and those first couple of innings, I was trying to go up and just leaving it belt high and against these guys, you have to have your ‘A’ game,” Gausman said, calling the outing frustrating.
After making an adjustment, Gausman worked a 123 third. In the fourth, he allowed a leadoff single and a twoout double before Matt Wisler replaced Gausman and got Anderson to pop up.
Gausman put down a good sacrifice bunt in the third — batting lefty. That’s the side from which Gausman’s older brother, former Kansas City farmhand Brian Gausman, hit. Kevin Gausman followed suit, though he does nothing else lefthanded, even swinging a golf club. “My righty swing was pretty ugly,” Gausman said.
Gausman said that Monday’s bunt was the first he’s ever put down in a game. In 61 bigleague plate appearances, he has a grand total of two singles, with no sacrifice hits or sac flies.
Gausman’s next outing is likely to be in a simulated game. Johnny Cueto, also an option for the opener, worked five innings in a sim game Monday and threw 80 pitches.
⏩ LaMonte Wade Jr. has struggled this spring while working on some adjustments, but he singled in the fifth. He said he’s trying to hit the ball out front a bit more but “I’m going a little too far out, so I’m trying to blend it back and let the ball come to me a little bit.” Wade said he was fine after landing hard trying to make a facefirst diving catch on a shallow flyball by Nick Madrigal in the sixth. ⏩ Alex Wood, who had a spinalablation procedure last week, threw a bullpen session and felt good.
⏩ Rule 5 pitcher Dedniel Núñez will have Tommy John surgery next Tuesday in Los Angeles with Dr. Neal ElAttrache performing the procedure.
⏩ Evan Longoria (plantar fasciitis) is still on track to play third base in a game this week; Brandon Belt (mono) is likely to get a pinchhit atbat to begin, then play in the field later in the week.