SAN FRANCISCO — In a night where the Giants’ primary leadoff hitter returned to the lineup after several weeks out due to injury, one would have to assume a strong performance from him would translate to team success. But it didn’t.
Denard Span missed the last 17 games with a shoulder injury, and as a result Bruce Bochy used a revolving door of leadoff hitters. Joe Panik batted at the top of the order seven times in Span’s absence, Hunter Pence led off in four games and Gorkys Hernandez had three cracks at leading off as well. Throw in appearances from Kelby Tomlinson and Eduardo Nunez atop the lineup, and it’s safe to say Bochy was eagerly awaiting the steady presence of Span in the one spot.
On Thursday night, Span turned in a 4-for-5 outing that raised his batting average by 55 points. That performance is well beyond what may have been expected from someone who played just two rehab games at Single-A prior to rejoining the team. Span knocked a solo home run in addition to a double and two singles, but the rest of the Giants’ offense failed to produce behind him and stranded him on base three times in a 3-2 loss to the Reds.
“It’s hard to figure really, we had two runs and we had such a big night from him, a home run and a double, and we had two runs,” Bochy said of Span. “That makes this game a little bit tougher.”
On two different occasions, Span was stranded in the midst of prime run-scoring opportunities. His one-out double in the third went for naught after Hunter Pence flied out and Brandon Crawford grounded out. And in the ninth, Span delivered a two-out single that moved pinch-runner Gorkys Hernandez over to third base as the tying run. But Brandon Belt popped up to left to end the game.
The Reds had no such problems scoring their leadoff batter, as the freaky fast Billy Hamilton reached base twice in four at-bats and came around to score on both occasions. Hamilton has scored nine runs in just four games against the Giants this season and has singlehandedly outscored San Francisco, which has just seven runs as a team in those four contests.
If the Giants are to crawl out of the 12-24 hole they’ve dug themselves early on this season, contributions from the top of the order will be imperative. On Thursday night, Span did his part. It’s the rest of the top half that struggled. Each of Belt, Pence and Crawford delivered exactly one hit, but none did anything to help Span score.
Belt’s lone hit was a solo homer and came in the first inning after Span’s only out of the game – a bit of bad luck, sure. But after the game Belt had no desire to blame luck or circumstance.
“It’s hard to think about that, you just go up there and you try to hit the ball as hard as you can and do as well as you can,” Belt said. “You can’t control whether people are on base or not. You try to do your best to get a pitch to hit, and if you accomplish your goal of swinging at strikes, the rest you can’t control.”
The rest of the weekend series between the Reds and Giants could very well be a battle of the leadoff men, as it was on Thursday. Hamilton has burned San Francisco this season, and Span could ride the momentum of a four-hit outing into more good performances. But if the Giants hope to come back and win the series, those behind Span will need to produce at his level.