Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports
LOS ANGELES — Blisters subside. Command can come and go, a skill that is more honed than natural.
Which is to say, the Giants are publicly saying Jeff Samardzija can be fixed.
Samardzija struggled again Friday, allowing three home runs in four innings, the Dodgers tagging him for six runs in all (five earned), and the big righty again unable to finish hitters. He did not have his favorite pitch, his splitter, in his arsenal because of a blister that is still forcing him to throw a tweaked changeup instead, and without a putaway pitch, no one has been put away.
Samardzija struck out three and induced just four swings and misses among 90 pitches. For the season, his ERA is 9.88, and he has five Ks in 13 2/3 innings. All three of his starts have been Giants losses.
There was hope early, Samardzija going through the LA lineup once while allowing just a Mookie Betts double. The second time the Dodgers saw him, though, got ugly quickly.
“Tonight we actually saw some some weaker contact,” Gabe Kapler said over Zoom after the 7-2 loss at Dodger Stadium to begin the three-game series. “… And then he had a little bit of a lack of fastball command. This is a very difficult lineup to get through even if you’re locating your pitches. Thought Shark just wasn’t able to have enough fastball command to beat the Dodgers.”
It was a cutter that Betts hit out in the third. The fastball got too much of the plate to Max Muncy in the fourth, though, and wound up over the fence.
“Kept them off-balance there for a little bit,” said Samardzija, trying to figure out his new pitch mix on the fly. “That pitch to Muncy, wish I could have that one back. Threw some good changeups in that at-bat and then left that one out over the plate.”
Will Smith homered, too, and Samardzija left with the bases loaded in the fifth, his line spared by solid work from Sam Selman. Samardzija expressed optimism his blister would be better soon and thus his splitter would be back soon; he has seen a lot of 0-2 and 1-2 counts go much deeper because he doesn’t have his top pitch.
And he doesn’t have his top speed, either. In last year’s bounce-back season, the veteran averaged a 91.9-mph fastball, which is far down from his mid-90s prime, but was enough, when paired with his other offerings, to miss bats.
On Friday, Samardzija’s fastball was slightly up from where it has sat this season — and yet it averaged 90.4 mph. Kapler pointed out the increase, which is slightly encouraging but also is not where he was.
Where he is now is a place in which Kike Hernandez was grazed on the elbow pad by a Samardzija sinker in the fifth and did not want to take first base. Samardzija said he’s seen it before and added Hernandez was “just being honest. It’s a good quality to have.”
At the moment, Samardzija does not have the qualities of good command, great stuff or a splitter he can throw, which also may have been part of the reason Hernandez campaigned to get back in the box rather than take first base.
The Giants and Samardzija are saying there are fixable qualities, which will be tested if he continues to struggle, especially once Drew Smyly returns.