Any team would be hard-pressed to win when their best defensive player makes three errors in a game. When that team is the Giants, entering the night on a five-game losing streak and struggling to score, Brandon Crawford’s third error all but ended the game. Here’s how the Giants lost their sixth in a row, with an update on the injured Buster Posey.
The big moment
The Giants labored through eight innings and several scoring chances to finally tie the game. It took only three hitters to give the lead back. Here’s how the Yankees scored the eventual winning run, and tacked a third error on Crawford.
Posey’s injury
The Giants catcher fouled a ball off his back foot while hitting in the second inning and was replaced by Trevor Brown in the bottom of the fourth inning. X-Rays came back negative, giving the Giants catcher a right foot contusion. He’s day-to-day, but it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him sit out the next few games.
After fouling the ball off his foot, Posey took a few moments to collect himself before stepping back in the box. He eventually walked, and singled in his next at-bat in the fourth inning.
At the plate
There’s a laundry list of reasons the Giants have yet to win a game in the second game. No acronym sums it up better than RISP. The Giants were hitless seven at-bats with runners in scoring position before Mac Williamson tied the game with a two-out, eighth-inning double off Andrew Miller.
The Giants put at least two runners on base in the second, third and fourth innings, but none came around to touch home plate. The closest was Gregor Blanco, who was thrown out by Carlos Beltran trying to tag up on a shallow fly ball to right. Bruce Bochy unsuccessfully challenged the out call on the field, and subsequent replays weren’t conclusive that Blanco even touched home.
Jarrett Parker did in fact touch the plate in the seventh inning, as he scored the Giants’ first run in the seventh inning on a wild pitch. That was only the third run scored off Dellin Betances in his last 19 appearances, and per Alex Pavlovic, the Giants are the second team this year to score off both Betances and Miller in the same game.
Fittingly the Giants began the ninth inning with a runner on second base against Aroldis Chapman, but went 0-for-3 from there to cement a sixth consecutive loss, and a 1-for-12 night with runners in scoring position.
On the mound
With the thermometer touching 92 at first pitch, Bumgarner had the exact kind of first inning he was hoping to avoid. It took only five pitches for the left-hander to dig himself into a 1-0 hole, and he unfurled 24 first-inning pitches in total. Brett Gardner dunked a single to left field leading off the inning, and Starlin Castro, who finished the game 3-for-4 off Bumgarner, doubled past Angel Pagan in left field.
The Yankees stretched the lead out by another run in the second inning when Beltran singled with runners on the corners. Bumgarner needed 23 pitches to get through the frame, and 47 to get through two innings, but began to settle in. He set down the next six hitters before the first two reached in the fifth inning.
Bumgarned carved through Alex Rodriguez and Chase Headley for a pair of strikeouts, and Rob Refsnyder flew out to end the Yankees’ last real threat against the Giants left-hander. Through his early troubles, Bumgarner still threwseven innings on 115 pitches in his first-ever start against the Yanlees.
In the ‘pen
Moments after the Giants clawed their way back to even the score, they gave the lead back to the Yankees with an infield hit, walk and error to start the bottom of the eighth inning. Rookie left-hander Josh Osich was on the mound for it all, and his biggest mistake was walking Mark Texeira on a full-count fastball in the dirt.
Romine then hit what looked to be a tailor-made double play, especially with a catcher running. Instead of shoveling the ball to Peña, Crawford fielded the ball and flung a throw to Brandon Belt as he twirled off second base. The throw forced Belt to jump, and ultimately miss the ball to allow Chase Headley to score the winning run.
Sergio Romo recorded the last two outs in the eighth inning.
On deck
Since throwing his only complete game of the season, Jeff Samardzija (9-5, 4.05 ERA) has a 7.16 ERA in five starts since. Looking for the Yankees to help the right-hander get on track might be looking the wrong direction. Samardzija most recently faced New York last season and allowed nine runs. He’ll square off with Ivan Nova (7-5, 4.92 ERA). First pitch at 1:05 p.m.