Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports
The moments will be entrenched in the minds of the 41,909 who were in attendance and the countless others who watched from home.
Pinch-hitting Madison Bumgarner stepped out of the batters’ box and swept his helmet to an adoring crowd. Bruce Bochy did not need note cards to recite a speech that thanked Giants fans for staying with him every step of the way.
The Sept. 29 ceremony masquerading as a baseball game was boisterous, emotional, dramatic and came with an air of finality. What was unknown then was it served as a bit of a going-away party for the sport in San Francisco as well.
Fans will not be in attendance this season, whose home slate of the Giants’ schedule begins today, 10 months after the last game played at Oracle Park. Outside of the lines of the baseball field, nothing about Giants-Padres will feel the same. Hell, even inside the lines will be masks, a designated hitter, a three-batter minimum for pitchers and a runner on second to begin extra innings.
“It’ll be a little weird,” said Mauricio Dubon, who himself used to be a fan at (the now-named) Oracle Park before he debuted as a player last year. “I feel the crowd, especially in San Francisco, the fans are unreal. It’s going to be a little weird, but we’ve got to get used to it. We got used to it here at Dodger Stadium.”
The first taste the Giants had of a season without energy transferring from fans to players was a strange one, each player feeling it differently. Tyler Anderson said it felt as if the game took “forever” while he was on the Dodger Stadium mound, with the only noise around him the piped-in crowd murmurs.
Logan Webb called it “definitely weird,” a young pitcher who thrives on energy.
“It’s definitely different,” Webb said Saturday. “The sim games and stuff [at Oracle Park], it was still a little weird at that point. … [But during my start] I felt the exact same. The adrenaline, the butterflies, everything was the exact same. Once you cross that line, it’s baseball.”
There is a bit of presumption to assuming the Giants will be crossing that line after the Marlins’ season reportedly has been paused, the team dealing with a coronavirus outbreak that reportedly has infected at least 15 players of a 30-man roster. A big part of the reason MLB has instituted the 30-man satellite camp is so, in this dystopic reality, sick players can be replaced. But replacing half a team (at the least) makes for a competitive disadvantage that threatens to cancel the season. As does the Marlins having played the Phillies with infected players. A sprint of a 60-game baseball season feels much more ambitious than it once did.
At least as of publishing time, the Giants were planning on hosting San Diego, debuting at home in front of cutouts, TV cameras and a limited number of media.
“Good thing we have teammates,” said Dubon, who appreciated the dugout cheering section.
The park itself, too, will be different, at-home fans’ first peek at a center-field distance that has shrank from 399 to 391 feet. Triples Alley has gone from 421 to 415; left-center was at 404 and is now at 399. The park has played significantly smaller in the tiny sample size of the few weeks of intrasquad scrimmages.
Of course, those games were primarily during the day, when the ball will fly more in the San Francisco heat. Night games will test how much of a pitchers’ park it still is.
If there is a significant advantage for the Giants, it is that they played at home for three weeks, learning the new angles.
“Comfort matters for baseball players,” said manager Gabe Kapler, who named Jeff Samardzija his home-opener starter. “I think our players are going to be comfortable going home to Oracle Park, and they’re going to feel at home.”
That suggests a comfort with all the elements — playing a game without fans during a pandemic that is increasingly putting the entire season at risk.
It has been a long 10 months since Bochy said goodbye.