Pence announces retirement

SAN FRANCISCO — Four-time All-Star outfielder Hunter Pence announced his retirement Saturday following 14 major league seasons.

The 37-year-old Pence wrote on his Twitter page: “Nothing can really prepare you for this part of your career when you have to say: I am retiring from baseball. Forever thankful and Gr8ful.”

Most recently he was a fan favorite for the San Francisco Giants, helping the club to a pair of World

Series championships in 2012 and 2014 after being acquired from the Phillies at the 2012 trade deadline.

A career .279 hitter, Pence had 244 home runs and 942 RBIs playing for Houston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Texas.

The Giants released him last month from a second stint with the club after Pence batted just .096 with two homers and six RBIs in 17 games. He always believed he would be back with the Giants — it just took a season-long detour with the Rangers last year for his reunion to come together. Pence reinvented his swing during 2018 with San Francisco, played winter ball in the Dominican Republic to further perfect it, then batted .297 with 18 homers, 17 doubles and 59 RBIs over 83 games for Texas in 2019.

Pence signed a $3 million, one-year contract in February to return to San Francisco.

His retirement was hardly a surprise. Pence had accepted his far lesser role that meant he worked more as a veteran leadership presence helping the young Giants prepare and know how to make it in the big leagues. Mike Trout is out again. Out of the postseason, that is. For the ninth time in 10 years, the Angels superstar will spend October on the couch. “I don’t like losing,” he said Saturday. “It’s frustrating and it sucks.” The Angels were rolling in the final weeks of the pandemicshortened, 60-game season, winning 14 of 20 to revive their slim playoff hopes. Trout hit his first career home run off Clayton Kershaw and the Angels led the Dodgers 5-3 Friday night. They ended up blowing three leads altogether and lost 9-5 to be eliminated, even with the playoffs expanded to 16. Cavan Biggio broke up a no-hit bid with a solo home run in the sixth inning, Randal Grichuk added a three-run shot and the Blue Jays beat the Orioles 5-2 Saturday night. The Blue Jays need another victory in Sunday’s regularseason finale, and a Miami win over the Yankees in New York, to move up to second place in the AL East and the fifth seed in the league. If not, Toronto will drop to eighth, and a firstround playoff meeting with the top-seeded Rays. Jays have won four straight and six of seven after a six-game losing streak. The Giants released veteran r i g h thander Jeff Samardzija on Saturday, a day after he returned from a lengthy shoulder injury and rehab. Samardzija, an 11-game winner in 2019, was designated for assignment and placed on unconditional release waivers days before his contract was to expire. The 35-year-old pitcher signed a $90 million, fiveyear contract with San Francisco in December 2015, but spent much of his Giants tenure injured. The Mets were eliminated from playoff contention in a mistakefilled loss to the Nationals in the opener of a doubleheader on Saturday, and not much changed in the nightcap as an error extended a big inning for the Nats, which won 5-3 to sweep the twinbill. Entering Saturday, the Mets (2633) needed to win their three remaining games and receive help from multiple teams to sneak into the final wild-card spot in the expanded playoffs. Instead, Mets arein danger of finishing tied with the Nats in the NL East cellar. Major League Baseball suspended Sox reliever Jimmy Cordero for three games Saturday and fined him an undisclosed amount for hitting the Cubs’ Willson Contreras with a pitch. Manager Rick Renteria was suspended for one game, and he and pitching coach Don Cooper were fined. DJ LeMahieu is on the verge of a first in more than a century of Major League Baseball: the first player to win undisputed batting titles in both the American and National Leagues. Luke Voit is about to become a more common name atop the leaderboards but part of an illustrious list, joining Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris and Alex Rodriguez as Yankees to top the majors in home runs. “I’ve always admired the Babe,” Voit said after the Yankees woke up from their latest slump to beat the Marlins 11-4 Saturday.