Missed opportunities prevented the Giants from clinching their first division title since 2012 during Saturday’s extra innings
Thousands of movements, missteps, inches, calls and decisions make or break any single baseball game. In SF’s narrow loss to the Padres, a few stand out that, if yielded different results, could’ve allowed the Giants to secure their ninth ever NL West title.
There’s a whole Marvel television show — “What If? — dedicated to hypotheticals. The below decisions from Saturday won’t take you to alternate realities, but they remain key inflexion points in a pivotal game.
Removing Kevin Gausman in the 8th
At just 84 pitches, ace Kevin Gausman left the game after seven one-run innings. Manager Gabe Kapler sent him out to the mound with no intention of keeping him in, instead letting the fans have a moment and confusing the Padres.
The Giants yanked Gausman mainly because his hand was cramping. Gausman had thrown 33 split-fingered fastballs, and the middle of his hand felt uncomfortable. He said postgame it’s a problem he’s had occasionally during day games this year.
“We need to be very careful with a starting pitcher like that, as important as Gausman is,” Kapler said. “He had just done enough for us. We felt like we could turn to the bullpen at that point and get through it with that group.”
Gausman has thrown a career-high 192 innings in 2021 and heads into the playoffs coming off two one-run gems.
Replacing him with Zack Littell
With Tyler Rogers and Dominic Leone unavailable, the Giants turned to Zack Littell to relieve Gausman and face pinch-hitter Tommy Pham plus the dangerous top of San Diego’s lineup.
Littell entered the weekend with a 2.80 ERA and a career-high 9.1 strikeouts per nine innings. His elevated fastball has been lively all season. He’d also pitched four straight scoreless appearances before Saturday.
“We felt good about Littell,” Kapler said. “Obviously he’s been excellent for us all year. He’s gotten some big swings and misses at the top of the zone. Been a great competitor for us, gotten out of so many jams for us.”
But the righty allowed a leadoff single to Pham and then a double down the first base line to Trent Grisham. Which leads to the next big choice.
Pitching to Manny Machado
With Pham’s pinch runner Javy Guerra and Grisham occupying second and third base, Littell struck out Fernando Tatis Jr. on three pitches. It was a big-time punchout.
The Giants determined to pitch to Manny Machado with an open first base. Machado was 1-for-2 lifetime against Littell, and Jake Cronenworth (0-for-2 career vs. Littell) was on deck. The sample size didn’t warrant a pitch-around or intentional walk.
Machado, who had already lined an RBI single in the sixth inning, smacked a sacrifice fly to left field, scoring Guerra from third and tying the game 2-2.
One-out bases loaded to Cronenworth still would’ve been a big spot for any pitcher. Still, pitching to Machado may be the most curious move of all.
Using Jarlin García against Cronenworth
Rookie Kervin Castro continued his double-digit scoreless inning streak by forcing Grisham to ground out and striking out Tatís Jr. to start the 10th inning. With two outs and the ghost runner Victor Caratini manning third, SF elected to replace Castro with Jarlin García.
García, a lefty, had the platoon advantage over the left-handed Cronenworth (Castro pitches righty). Playing the percentages there makes sense.
In another extremely minute sample, Cronenworth had gone 1-for-4 with a double against García entering Saturday. He’d never faced Castro. Left-handed hitters are faring slightly better than righties against Castro (.286 to .240 average), but not as dramatically as some opposite-handed examples.
Still, going with García was likely the right move. Cronenworth just turned on a high and inside changeup that probably should’ve been placed lower. His double down the first base line put the Padres ahead for good.
“Between Littell, Castro, Alvarez and Garcia, we had some good weapons to get through that game,” Kapler said. “All of those guys have been excellent all year. Felt good depending on them.”
Not bunting to start the 10th
With the quick Mike Yastrzemski automatically placed on second to start the 10th inning, outfielder Steven Duggar dug in. Duggar, likely the fastest player on the Giants, could’ve tried to bunt to move Yastrzemski over to third.
Duggar, though, has struggled with sacrifice bunts in his career. It’s a part of the game he’s still developing, Kapler said.
Duggar struck out, setting into motion a 1-2-3 10th that sealed the loss for San Francisco.