SAN FRANCISCO — Bruce Bochy thinks there’s something contagious going around among Giants starting pitchers of late.
For more than one full turn in the rotation now, San Francisco’s starter has pitched deep into the contest. Ty Blach’s seven innings of one-run baseball Tuesday night marked the sixth straight game the Giants have had their starter go into the 7th or later and his close loss to Cincinnati last Thursday actually kicked off the impressive streak.
Since then, Johnny Cueto, Matt Moore, Jeff Samardzija, Matt Cain and Blach (again) have taken turns leading their team through the middle innings and making things easier on the Giants bullpen. It would be hard to deny the starters have keyed the current five-game winning streak San Francisco is riding.
“They’re getting us deep in the game by pitching pretty efficiently,” Bochy said of his rotation after Tuesday’s 2-1 win over the Dodgers. “I think that’s gotten a little contagious, they want to match each other and stay out there.”
Blach’s bookend starts in the current hot stretch have been methodical and impressive to watch. He kept the Giants in the game last Thursday until Hunter Strickland allowed a late run that ultimately cost them. On Tuesday, however, Blach was even more remarkable, pitching well against the Dodgers for the fourth time in his career. In 23 career innings against San Francisco’s rivals to the south, Blach has allowed just three earned runs.
He may have been inserted into the rotation as a long-term (yet still temporary) replacement for the injured Madison Bumgarner, but Blach is quickly showing that he’s here to stay. The 5th-round pick out of Creighton lowered his season ERA to 4.15 in what was his first win of the year.
“It’s nice to be able to go out there, get deep into the game, get into that 7th,” Blach said Tuesday. “It feels good to just keep that winning streak going. I think guys are starting to play really confident right now and we’ve got to keep it rolling and keep making up some ground.”
Blach is the first one to credit the defense behind him when asked about his recent success, and the team’s fielding can’t be ignored. The Giants have made just one error in the past six games, despite Bochy’s shuffling of the defensive lineup that’s seen players like Eduardo Nunez and Christian Arroyo moved around to a multitude of different positions.
Arroyo, who started at second base for the first time in his MLB career on Tuesday and made several impressive plays, said the recent starts from Giant pitchers have energized the team.
“I think our starters have been throwing well, they’ve been throwing really well,” Arroyo said. “I mean, lot of quality starts, going deep into games, just a few earned runs.”
The offensive potential is in fact there for the Giants. The lineup’s been considerably banged up this season with Denard Span and Brandon Crawford both missing extensive time and Hunter Pence hitting the DL this week. But Span and Crawford are both pulling their weight immediately after coming off the disabled list last week, combining for 17 hits in just the six games they’ve played since returning from injury.
What’s really important is the pitching, which was expected to take a hit with Bumgarner shelved until at least after the All-Star break. The Giants may have already weathered the worst of that storm, though, and if the five guys currently riding a contagious wave of quality starts continue to turn in outings like Blach’s on Tuesday, Bumgarner’s return may present the Giants with the good problem of having too many effective starters.
Time will tell, but for now, the starting rotation is certainly holding more than steady.