Belt’s luck mostly bad

ATLANTA — Giants first baseman Brandon Belt has been making better contact lately, or so it appears, but the results aren’t always evident. Make a perfect shot in basketball, the ball goes in the hoop. Hit the ball on the barrel in baseball, it doesn’t always fall.

Belt is hitting .226 with a .342 on-base percentage — both down significantly from his career numbers entering the season (.272, .359). He had five hits in his final five games of the trip, including two homers in three days, but could have had a few more with a bit more luck.

He was robbed of two hits in Monday’s opener and in other at-bats hit the ball on the screws at defenders.

“My goal is to go up there and look for a pitch and hit the ball hard,” Belt said. “If I’m doing that, what else can I do?”

In fact, Belt leads the Giants in hard contact, according to Statcast, which measures these things and ranks him tops on the team in exit velocity and barreled-ball percentage.

Through it all, Belt’s trying to stay positive.

“Really don’t have much of a choice,” he said. “Through experience, I’ve been there before where you let the past performance bring you down. It’s not good. After a while, you discover, hey, you have to move on. You learn that the more you play.” Slater’s spot: Austin Slater is hitting .323since his June 2 promotion to the big leagues and .378 in his past 12 games. Until further notice, manager Bruce Bochy said, Slater is the left fielder.

“He’s done a nice job,” Bochy said. “Each level he’s gone to, he’s figured it out. I’m not saying he’s figured it out yet. Too small a sample size here. Two or three games, he wasn’t that comfortable. Now he’s carrying himself well, getting good swings off, playing good defense and throwing up some pretty good at-bats. You’re going to have growing pains. But at the same time, all you want is a little consistency there, and he’s given us that.” Medical decision: Third baseman Eduardo Nuñez (left hamstring) will be examined Friday, and there’s a chance he’ll go on the disabled list and be replaced by Conor Gillaspie.