With a chance to beat the Tampa Bay Rays in a series at home, the Giants forgot to bring all three phases of the game to the ballpark.
San Francisco couldn’t keep the Rays in the park. They fumbled around in the field. And they backslid offensively, scoring one run a day after dropping seven.
Ross Stripling, San Francisco’s quasi-starter, gave up five earned runs on 11 hits in six innings. Two errors in the field didn’t help anything. And although San Francisco tallied eight hits, just one of them went for extra bases as their power drought continued in a 6-1 loss.
The defeat sends the Giants (64-57) into their off-day having lost four consecutive series — to the A’s, Angels, Rangers and Rays. They’re still in the thick of the postseason picture, but possibly the toughest stretch of their schedule awaits with nine games against the Braves and Phillies.
“Stay the course,” Stripling said postgame when asked what SF needs to do to reach the postseason. “We’ve been grinding all year, as far as being streaky. We know what’s in front of us as far as the schedule and how big of a road trip this is, and the home stand when we get back. We control our own destiny.”
The Rays got the scoring going in the first inning, when J.D. Davis’ fielding error at third base allowed a run on a walk and single. Davis had the previous two games off in an effort to get him mentally and physically fresh. Perhaps the benching caused some unintentional rust.
San Francisco came inches from tying the game right away, but Wilmer Flores’ RBI double got overturned when replay review revealed it hit the left-field corner just foul.
Stripling replaced opener Ryan Walker, and the home run bug crawled up his pant leg once again.
Stripling had given up 17 homers on the season entering the finale. He’d been better recently, posting a 3.38 ERA over his past 40 innings, but had still allowed an average of 2.1 homers per nine.
In the fourth inning, Josh Lowe squared up a 92 mph fastball that leaked over the middle of the plate for a no-doubter to center field. His 15th homer of the season put the Rays up 2-0.
The next frame, Brandon Lowe clobbered a meaty changeup down the middle 421 feet for a two-run shot. That was part of a three-run Rays rally that included an Heliot Ramos error in left field.
To add to their lead, pinch-hitter Luke Raley went after the first pitch he saw and scorched it 110.6 mph off the Triples Alley bricks. It ricocheted off the top of the fence and trickled to a vacant center field, allowing Raley to trot home on a wild inside-the-parker.
When he was still on the bench, Raley must’ve been chomping at the bit to face Stripling. He registered the 12th ever inside-the-park homer at the Giants’ waterfront diamond.
Tampa Bay is the fourth most prolific power-hitting team in MLB. Up and down their lineup, they have thumpers up and down the lineup. Especially in a day game, it wasn’t a great matchup for the homer-prone Stripling.
The Giants thought they had a similar order, one with home run threats in the top, middle and bottom of the lineup. Just two years ago, they led the National League in homers. They retooled by signing Mitch Haniger and Michael Conforto, bringing back Joc Pederson and hoping some of their rookies could fill in the gaps.
San Francisco’s vision of slugging depth hasn’t panned out. They rank in the bottom third in total homers as the offense has cratered for the past two months. Wilmer Flores leads the club with 16 homers; seven different Rays have as many or more.
Since July 1, the Giants rank 20th in hard hit rate, and 24th in average exit velocity. They’ve scored the fewest runs in baseball in that span and have 34 homers (29th).
Against the Rays, SF only put one runner on first in the first six innings. They scratched a run in the seventh, but then Austin Slater — pinch hitting for Wade Meckler — grounded into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded. It was one of four double plays SF hit into.
Gabe Kapler replaced Meckler in almost the identical situation that he let him hit in the series opener. In that point, the manager said the organization is confident that Meckler will be able to hit same-sides pitching, citing his impressive minor league splits. It would have been Ramos, not Slater, getting inserted from the platoon advantage.
Meckler had two hits Tuesday and another Wednesday, but didn’t get a chance to cut into Tampa’s lead there. Slater has a career .984 OPS as a pinch hitter — an elite mark in situations where he’s most commonly facing a left-handed pitcher. But he was hitless in his last 15 plate appearances and had hit .121 since July 1.
The more recent slump superseded Slater’s track record. Kapler considered the decision a black and white one even though it didn’t go the Giant’s way.
The only clear-cut thing with the Giants now, though, is their offense hasn’t been potent enough.
“We’re going to keep working on it,” Kapler said. “Obviously, there’s no switches to flip. It’s just not how baseball works. But we’ll keep trying to improve our process every single day.”