Return of Bumgarner fails to stimulate Giants
LOS ANGELES >> From the day Madison Bumgarner suffered a fracture that required surgery on his pitching hand to the moment the Giants ace first took the mound at AT&T Park in 2018, Bumgarner’s teammates operated with a welldefined mission.
Stay in the hunt, then ride their horse to the finish line.
It’s been two weeks since
Bumgarner returned to a 30-30 club and after Saturday’s 3-1 loss to the Dodgers, the Giants sit three games under .500.
The kicker? The Giants have dropped all three of Bumgarner’s starts.
Dodgers outfielders Matt Kemp and Kiké Hernández blasted home runs while the Giants mounted just four hits for the second straight night, failing to provide Bumgarner with the run support necessary to down their rivals.
“This is a ballpark that’s probably more conducive to pitching, so you’re not going to score a lot of runs,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “Hopefully your guys do a good job and really, they did here these two starts. We’re just get-
ting shut down.”
The last time Bumgarner won a game for the Giants was Sept. 23, 2017 at Dodger Stadium, when he tossed 7 2/3 innings of one-run ball to stifle Los Angeles at the end of the most frustrating season of Bumgarner’s career.
The 2018 campaign hasn’t been much easier for Bumgarner, who has yet to pitch into the seventh inning after needing 112 pitches to complete six innings against the Dodgers on Saturday.
“Each time out I’ve felt better,” Bumgarner said. “The game in Miami wasn’t a very good result, but each time out there I’ve felt better and better so that’s the only thing you can ask for.”
Bumgarner missed the first two months of the season with a fractured pinky suffered in his final spring training start. But after returning to the Giants rotation following a two-start rehab stint, the left-hander allowed six earned runs over his first 11 1/3 innings.
The Giants ace expressed frustration with his inability to put Miami Marlins hitters away in his last outing, a performance that ended with the first ejection of Bumgarner’s major league career from umpire Jeremie Rehak.
Home plate umpire Dan Bellino also drew Bumgarner’s ire Saturday, as Bellino didn’t ring up a pair of Dodgers hitters on called third strikes that appeared to pound the strike zone. While inconsistent calls forced Bumgarner’s pitch count to rise, the lefthander managed to limit mistakes in an outing that suggested he’s closer to rounding into form.
“It was a good day for him,” Bochy said. “Everything was crisper, he’s getting real close. That was a good day for him and it’s good to get him stretched out there.”
The first-pitch fastball Kemp lifted out for his 12th home run of the year in the second inning was hardly a hitter’s pitch, as Bumgarner delivered it an inch off the inside corner. Kemp muscled it out anyway.
“Looking at it with the strike zone, it wasn’t bad, but that’s not where I wanted to go,” Bumgarner said. “He does a pretty good job down there.”
The first-pitch offering to Hernández did haunt Bumgarner, in part because Hernández always seems to haunt Bumgarner.
With the score tied 1-1 in the fifth, Bumgarner opted to challenge Hernández, a .217 hitter entering Saturday’s contest, with a curveball that caught far too much of the plate. The location mistake was compounded by the fact Bumgarner had already pumped a steady dose of breaking balls in against Hernández in earlier atbats, so the Dodgers No. 2 hitter was certainly sitting on the pitch.
Hernández’s two-run blast put the Dodgers ahead for good and marked his fourth career home run and ninth career extra-base hit against Bumgarner in 33 atbats.
“It’s no secret I’ve thrown Hernández a ton of curveballs the last few times against him,” Bumgarner said. “He made the adjustment.”
A 3-1 deficit shouldn’t be as arduous to overcome as the Giants made it look, but the club’s road woes and hitting struggles at Dodger Stadium continued Saturday.
Even though Dodgers starter Alex Wood had allowed at least four runs in each of his last three starts, an outstanding defensive effort behind him helped Wood complete 5 2/3 innings of one-run ball.
“They’re an athletic group,” catcher Buster Posey said. “A guy like (Chris) Taylor probably doesn’t get enough credit, or Kiké for being able to bounce around like they do at the highest level.”
The Dodgers bullpen continued to flummox Giants hitters, as Los Angeles extended a streak of limiting the Giants to two runs or fewer at Dodger Stadium to 11 consecutive games. Though San Francisco was victorious in three of those contests — Bumgarner’s last win and the first two games of the 2018 season — the Giants lost again and dropped 11 games below .500 away from AT&T Park this year.
“We’re just getting shut down,” Bochy said. “The boys I’m sure are beat up, but we’ve got to find a way to get some runs here.”