SAN FRANCISCO — The Giants best reliever Tuesday night was in Single-A. Sergio Romo pitched two scoreless inning, a feat no Giants reliever came close to as they combined to allow 10 runs. The bullpen turned a three-run lead into a four-run deficit, and the Giants (49-20) lost, 13-11, to the A’s (34-43).
Here’s how a weird, weird night at AT&T Park played out.
The big moment
Right-handed hitters had been 0-for-10 off Javier Lopez before Jake Smolinski stepped in as the go-ahead run. He hammered a pinch-hit, three-run home run to put the A’s up in the eighth inning.
In the ‘pen
Kontos couldn’t retire any of the four hitters he faced in relief of Suarez. He wasn’t helped out by Gilaspie, who pulled Brandon Belt off first base with a throw he didn’t even have to make. Stephen Vogt was running at Gillaspie, waiting to be tagged. But the inning continued, and Hunter Strickland doused the A’s rally.
Josh Osich threw only 13 pitches to work through the seventh, and that was the only clean frame out of the Giants bullpen. Things blew up in the eighth inning. Cory Gearrin walked his first two batters, and yielded an RBI single before being yanked for Lopez.
Span made a leaping catch in right-center to spare the Giants momentarily, but there was no getting in the way of Smolinski’s home run. That was the first of three hits off Lopez, who was on the mound when four of the A’s five runs scored in the eighth inning. Derek Law finally ended a meltdown that lasted nearly 25 minutes.
Bochy turned to Santiago Casilla in the ninth, the only reliever he had left outside of Chris Stratton, who threw 57 pitches the night before. By the end of Casilla’s nightmare inning, he’d throw 31 of his own. The Giants closer retired the first hitter before allowing five of the next six to reach en route to three more runs scoring. Casilla allowed doubles to Stephen Vogt, Yonder Alonso and Coco Crisp.
At the plate
After rookie Daniel Mengden stymied the Giants on Monday, not allowing a baserunner until the fifth inning, the Giants’ bats pounced a bit quicker on Kendall Graveman. They didn’t score off two hits in the second inning, but Crawford cashed in on a pair of RBIs in the third inning with a two-out double. His 49 RBIs are only one behind Trevor Story and Xander Boagerts for the most by any shortstop.
The Giants pushed across two more runs in the fourth inning, another rally spearheaded by Conor Gillaspie and Ramiro Peña. In the last three games, the duo has reached base consecutively in four innings. That goes a long way in sustaining rallies when they originate from the No. 7 and 8 hitters. Pagan drove them in with a bases-loaded single, extending his nine-game hitting streak.
Crawford emerged again in the sixth, a half-inning after the A’s stormed ahead by a run. Marc Rzepczynski intentionally walked Buster Posey to get the lefty-on-lefty matchup with the Giants shortstop. Crawford responded with a bases-clearing triple into left-center, giving him his fourth career game with five or more RBIs. He gave the Giants a lead that lasted one inning.
To cap off one of the stranger games of the year, Parker and Span led off the ninth inning with back-to-back home runs. The Giants hadn’t hit one in six games. Pagan walked to bring the tying run to the plate with nobody out, but he’d advance no further.
On the mound
Suarez continued as the Matt Cain fill-in, and put together another substantial outing. He’s not pitching as deep into games as Madison Bumgarner and Jeff Samardzija, but he’s keeping the Giants close when he pitches. That’s about all a team could ask from their No. 5 starter. Suarez strung 5.2 innings together Tuesday night, leaving with two base runners on in the sixth inning. George Kontos allowed both to score on a two-out double, tacking Suarez’s final line with three total runs.
He cruised at the start of his evening, but faltered with both two outs and two strikes against Khris Davis. He stung a two-strike, knee-high curveball into the left-field seats, a line-drive home run representative of Davis’ strength (and 18 other homers). His two-out single was the precursor to Suarez’s departure in the sixth inning, and he scored two of the A’s first three runs.
On deck
The Bay Bridge series moves to Oakland, where Jake Peavy (4-6, 5.22 ERA) will face Sean Manaea (2-4, 6.02 ERA). Peavy pitched seven strong innings against the Phillies his last time out, lowering his June ERA to 2.63. In 15.1 career innings at the Coliseum, Peavy’s allowed only three earned runs. First pitch at 7:05 p.m. on KNBR 680.