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He’s back.
Madison Bumgarner will return to Oracle Park before his fans do, the legendary lefty set to be activated off the injured list for Saturday night’s game against the Giants.
The park will not be as he left it, the adoring fans to whom he tipped his helmet now at home, as is his beloved battery mate, Buster Posey helping raise his adopted twins. The Giants won’t be as he left them, either, the new-look club fighting for a playoff spot that eluded his club his final three seasons in San Francisco.
But Bumgarner again will toe a mound he loves and be back on any big-league mound for the first time since Aug. 9, missing nearly four weeks with a mid-back strain. Before the injury forced him to the shelf, he looked like a diminished pitcher who had allowed 18 earned runs in 17 1/3 innings in four starts. He surrendered seven home runs and his velocity, already down from his heyday, was gone, the 31-year-old struggling to even hit 89 mph. Perhaps the back was to blame, and the Giants will be the first to find out.
Bumgarner will be facing a lineup that has hammered lefty pitching this year, their .805 OPS against southpaws entering Wednesday’s play the eighth best in baseball. It won’t be a lineup he became accustomed to, and it won’t be the same Oracle Park, which literally is smaller with moved-in fences and has played significantly cozier with the right-field ducts closed off from the wind.
The Diamondbacks just sold off many pieces at the deadline, now 14-22 and heading into obscurity. Still, it will be Bumgarner back at Oracle Park, perhaps with Stephen Vogt catching him, on a night that will have a buzz even in an empty park.
Gabe Kapler chalked up the Giants’ 9-6 loss in Colorado on Wednesday essentially to baseball being baseball. (Although baseball is slightly un-baseball at Coors Field.)
Sam Coonrod and Tyler Rogers, who both have been excellent for varying amounts of recent time this season, combined for one inning and five runs in helping blow a 6-1 lead. They can’t always be perfect, Kapler said,
“I think if [Rogers] could have that pitch back to [Kevin] Pillar, I think he would,” Kapler said of the go-ahead triple in the seventh. “And I really do believe he was trying to bury that away or throw it up and off the plate away, and the ball just kind of sat there and spun on the plate — that happens here. It sucks, but it happens.”
The Giants fell out of playoff position, the Rockies reclaiming the driver’s seat and moving back into third in the NL West. Kapler is not deterred.
“The ball’s in our court. We have the ability to control our own destiny,” Kapler said over Zoom before the Giants head home for a four-game set with Arizona. “Today’s loss was disappointing. At the same time, we’re swinging the bats really well. We’ve got a lineup that can put up runs, Coors Field or not. And we can do that against righties and lefties. And what we’re starting to see is, our starters are giving us a chance to win games. Outside of today, our bullpen has been pretty good as well.
“We need it all to come together in these last couple of weeks. I think our schedule is a manageable one.”
The Giants had kept Tuesday night’s party going with a lengthy, four-run first inning, though the timing messed with Logan Webb. Over the half-hour frame, he threw some weighted balls and tried to stay warm, but he hadn’t been warmed up in a while.
“That first inning, that was on me,” said Webb, who walked Raimel Tapia, the first hitter he saw.
Webb’s line — 5 1/3 innings of four-run ball on seven hits and two walks — was not generous, two runners he left on in the sixth coming around to score.
“There were a couple pitches I’d like to take back,” said the 23-year-old righty. “Just pissed off we lost.”