SAN FRANCISCO–On Friday night, the Giants ran into Minnesota Twins’ right-hander Ervin Santana. On Tuesday evening, San Francisco squared off against Kansas City Royals’ left-hander Jason Vargas.
Together, the duo has 25 seasons of Major League experience under their belt, and just one All-Star Game appearance.
In most seasons, facing Santana and Vargas four days apart from one another is a rather routine task for a Major League club.
But 2017 isn’t most seasons.
On Friday, Santana tossed his third complete game shutout of the year against San Francisco, lowering his earned run average to 2.20, nearly 1.2 points lower than his career-best mark of 3.38, which came in 2016.
On Tuesday, Vargas threw seven innings of one-run ball against the Giants, and dropped his ERA to 2.10, more than 1.6 points lower than his career-best mark of 3.71, set back in 2014.
For a Giants’ offense that began its two-game set with the Royals with the third-lowest batting average in the Major Leagues, facing Vargas just days after staring down Santana was hardly the medicine Dr. Bruce Bochy ordered.
“Just remarkable command, that changeup they can sit on it and they’d have a hard time with it,” Bochy said, when asked why Vargas has been so successful. “It just, it’s like slows down on the way. The second time there and they just have a hard time staying back on it. He even mixes in a good breaking ball but the fastball he can work in and out with it with the great command he has and it’s just hard for the hitters to get the barrel on it because he changes speeds so well, you know. You can’t sit on one pitch with him because he’s got three pitches and he changes speed on them.”
With the All-Star Game approaching in less than a month, both Santana and Vargas are on track to represent the American League. As for the Giants’ only catcher Buster Posey, who had two of the team’s five hits off Vargas on Tuesday, appears locked into a spot.
After Tuesday’s loss, San Francisco fell 14 games below .500, and now sits 14.0 games back of the first-place Colorado Rockies and Los Angeles Dodgers, the teams tied atop the National League West. If the Giants’ four-game set with the Rockies in Denver this weekend goes South, it could be time for general manager Bobby Evans to admit defeat.
Blach’s battle
The Giants countered Vargas with a left-hander of their own, Ty Blach, who came into Tuesday’s game two starts removed from his first career shutout against the Philadelphia Phillies.
Armed with a 1.75 ERA in five home starts this season, Blach came into AT&T Park with the confidence to match Vargas, and for the first two innings, he delivered.
But in the top of the third inning, a trio of softly-hit singles including a well-placed bunt off the bat of Vargas loaded the bases, and Blach surrendered the Giants’ early 1-0 advantage.
“Yeah I felt good, I felt strong, I felt like I was locating pretty well, just a few unlucky bounces here or there and that’s the way it goes,” Blach said after his outing.
Bochy was frustrated that Blach’s night ended the way it did, especially considering Blach pitched much better than his final line indicated. Even though the Creighton product allowed 10 hits, the Royals took advantage of a handful of defensive miscues in the second inning, and in their six-run sixth inning that broke the game wide open.
“It’s one of those things where you’ve got to know that you’ve got to come back out there in five days and go again so you just try to flush it and learn from the things that have happened and go out there and try to get them in five days,” Blach said.
Slater on a roll
Less than two weeks ago, Giants’ manager Bruce Bochy called the team’s left field position a “black hole.”
Since that time, it’s been nothing but sunshine.
Even though the team’s offense has struggled, rookie Austin Slater has become a force at the plate, compiling his third consecutive multi-hit game in Tuesday’s loss.
After finishing a home run shy of the cycle in the Giants’ 13-8 win over the Twins on Sunday, Slater continues to show a mature approach at the plate. In the bottom of the seventh, Slater took a Vargas breaking ball and slammed it into the right center field gap, keeping his hands back and showing poise on a pitch most rookies –and many veterans– have a tough time handling.
Bochy said hitting in the eighth slot has aided Slater’s development, and he compared his early success to the success shortstop Brandon Crawford found when he was first called up to the Major Leagues.
“Similar to when Craw came up, it helped Craw, it kind of taught him how to hit, how to think as a hitter but no, Slater is doing a nice job in that eight-hole,” Bochy said. “That’s a big spot. You think, well, you’re putting a guy there because he may not be as strong of a hitter but that can turn the order around and he did a good job tonight.”
Dyson deals a scoreless frame
Bochy said aside from Slater’s two-hit night, the scoreless frame new reliever Sam Dyson tossed in the top of the ninth inning was the silver lining for the Giants in their loss.
Dyson pitched in the ninth inning of Sunday’s victory over Minnesota, but faced five hitters without recording an out. Dyson was a victim of bad luck, as he allowed an infield hit to one Twins batter and allowed another to reach on an error by Buster Posey, but after posting a 10.80 ERA in 17 appearances with the Rangers this season, it was hardly the introduction Dyson was hoping for.
On Tuesday, Dyson allowed a leadoff double to Royals’ catcher Salvador Perez, but set down three straight Kansas City hitters to finish off the night.
“You look at a silver lining, along with Slater’s at-bats, I thought Dyson had a good inning,” Bochy said. “Yeah, he gave up the leadoff double, but settled down and you know, he got the next three hitters. Good for him, he just needs some work so we’re going to find our spots and get him worked into some higher-leverage situations.”