If it’s not rock bottom, then it’s quite close
Giants out-bungle rebuilding Padres in battle of lackluster teams
It can be so very difficult to pick a low point when watching nine innings of baseball between two teams that are a combined 54 games out of first place.
It was not so hard Sunday afternoon. It happened in the seventh inning of the Giants’ 5-2 loss to the San Diego Padres at AT&T Park.
Brandon Belt hit a two-out fly ball to left field. The Padres’ Jabari Blash dropped it for an error. But the Giants, as they have done all season, managed to outawful a team that was designed to lose.
Eduardo Nuñez had stopped running while Belt’s ball was in the air, either because he forgot there were two outs or was in the throes of a particularly thrilling daydream. Then when Nuñez saw the ball drop, he tried to take third — a particularly bad thought with the Giants trailing by three runs. Padres shortstop Allen Cordoba collected the ball and threw in time to nab him. Groans filled the ballpark to the brim.
“That can’t happen,” said Giants manager Bruce Bochy, who often waits until after the game to discuss a player’s error but immediately confronted Nuñez about it in the dugout. “You’re going to make a few mistakes (but) that’s a mental mistake. He knew it. He owned it. But it was a pretty big mental mistake.”
That lowlight was the clear winner, although the Giants provided several more worthy candidates while falling to 38-62 — their worst record through 100 games since the 1956 New York Giants were 3763.
Take a wade through this murk:
• The Padres’ Wil Myers hit his fifth home run at AT&T Park this season. That’s more than the Giants have received here all year from Buster Posey (two), Brandon Crawford (two), Hunter Pence (zero) and Joe Panik (zero) combined.
• Hector Sanchez abused his former team yet again with two hits, including an RBI double. He is a .464 hitter with five home runs and 14 RBIs in 12 games against them. This will be painful, but … he was a .160 hitter against the Padres when he was a Giant.
The Padres go home to begin a series with the Mets on Monday. Sanchez might stow away somewhere in the visiting clubhouse, then sneak his way into a Pirates jersey, instead.
• The Giants couldn’t do much damage against a rookie pitcher, Dinelson Lamet, who entered with a 6.40 ERA in nine career starts and was a lightly regarded minor leaguer who didn’t sign out of the Dominican Republic until he was in his 20s. The middle of their order — Belt, Posey, Crawford and Pence — was 1 for 16.
• And in the wider view, the Giants lost three of four at home to San Diego while dropping to 4-9 against the rebuilding Padres this season. They are 6-17 against them since last year’s AllStar break. They haven’t won a series against the Padres since May, 2016.
• A reminder: the Padres are in orchestrated tank mode.
At least they settled matters in the minimum nine innings this time.
There’s no sense beating you over the head with how poorly the Giants have played this season. By now, you expect that a catcher’s legs will win a skills competition with Denard Span’s arm from center field, or that a rookie pitcher will prove too mysterious for the Giants’ power-bereft lineup or that they’ll fall behind early.
But then you’re reminded that ownership is tasking this front office with turning the Giants into a contender in 2018. And you realize how impossible that task appears to be.
Ty Blach became the sixth different Giants pitcher to give up a home run to Myers this season, when the Padres first baseman took the left-hander deep in the first inning.
Myers has hit six of his 20 home runs against the Giants this season — a major failure given the relative lack of threats elsewhere in the Padres lineup.
Bochy was asked in the postgame interview room: what is it about Myers …
“What about him?” Bochy said, with a half guffaw. “Well, he’s had some pretty good pitches to hit. I think that’s fair to say. That’s our fault, I guess, for the mistakes we’ve made to them. … You make mistakes to guys with power, and that’s what can happen.”
At least Myers’ shot came with two outs, the bases empty and Blach pressed to pitch aggressively so he could get deep enough into the game to save a bullpen that was gassed following an 11-inning game Friday night and a 12-inning game Saturday afternoon.
Blach pitched carefully to Myers with one out in the fourth, and issued a walk. Yet the opposite tact didn’t end up working out, either. The next four Padres collected hits as part of a four-run inning. Blash drove in two with a double. Sanchez followed with his RBI double.
It’s been a problem all season: the same players keep doing damage against Giants pitchers — even former backup catchers who have plenty of holes in their heat map. That is probably more of an execution problem than due to flawed scouting reports, although given the depth of their failure, it’s worth examining for faults in every area.
There is no reason for an opposing pitcher to tiptoe through the Giants lineup, especially at home. Belt is the only player who has hit more home runs this season (seven) than Myers’ total in seven games here.
After 100 games, it keeps adding up the same: the Giants are the worst team on the field, no matter whom they play. Even when their opponent is angling for a draft pick ahead of theirs.
It leaves a seasoned and accomplished coaching staff shaking their heads and punching walls.
“I wish I could (explain it),” said Bochy, asked why his club hasn’t measured up even against the Padres. “For some reason our starters have not had very many good starts against these guys. They’ve hit their fair share of home runs. Myers, Sanchez, they’ve killed us.
“And on top of that, their guy coming in had good stuff, but he’s got a 6 ERA and the heart of our order was 1 for 16. That’s not going to work.”
The math says that 162 minus 100 equals 62 more games to play. How long until Pablo Sandoval comes up?