OAKLAND — It doesn’t take much for Jake Peavy to snap on the mound. He might fire a pitch in the dirt. A close play could go against the Giants. He might be walking off the mound after a long, treacherous inning.
Usually though, he’s shouting at himself. That wasn’t the case Wednesday night.
Billy Burns lined a single to left field, bloating the A’s lead to 6-0, and Angel Pagan couldn’t handle a routine hop in the outfield. The speedy Burns cruised into second as the throw sailed in late, and Peavy was incensed. With his back to home plate, he screamed out to anyone who would listen, exuding the most energy of any Giant on defense that inning.
“Obviously it’s tough when anyone makes a mistake out there against a big league team,” Peavy said. “You are certainly putting yourself in a situation. I tried to grind through it, and I just didn’t do enough. I’m upset with myself.”
Pagan’s misplay was one of several for the Giants in a two-inning span that sealed the 7-1 final in the fourth inning. Only three of the seven runs scored on Peavy (4-7, 5.44 ERA) were earned, but he was justifiably fired up as the Giants (49-31) let the A’s (35-43) trounce over their mistakes again, losing a third straight game to Oakland.
The Giants soared for weeks as one of the hottest teams in baseball, but as injuries are piling up, a depleted roster is finally beginning to rear itself. Manager Bruce Bochy announced after the loss that Ramiro Peña is headed to the disabled list after injuring his left ankle, forcing the Giants to recall another infielder. The move will come one day after swapping Joe Panik for Ruben Tejada, as Panik landed on the 7-day concussion disabled list 11 days after getting hit in the back of the head.
Tejada started his first game with the Giants at third base, and was one of three Giants to make an error as he tried to basket catch a popup between third base and home.
“We gotta catch the ball,” Bochy said. “We’ve gotta catch and score runs. That’s what we have to do.”
Peavy’s shouting was the most visual reaction to any of the Giants’ fielding misfortunes, which began two batters into the third inning. Peña and Mac Williamson engaged in a collision course to handle Marcus Semien’s shallow fly ball in right field. As the Giants right fielder shouted for the ball, Peña never heard him and the collided with Williamson, hitting the ground simultaneously with the ball. Originally ruled a triple, the scoring decision was changed after the game to a three-base error, one that Williamson felt equally responsible for.
He spoke in a hushed tone at his locker after the game, lamenting the dropped pop up he attributed to a tough environment in the Coliseum. Williamson said he struggled to see Peña calling for the ball, so he never let up.
“I feel like I didn’t give our guys a chance,” Williamson said.
He was especially down because two batters later, he had the ultimate chance for redemption. Jed Lowrie put a charge into a full-count fastball, sending Williamson back up against the wall. He timed his jump perfectly to snag the ball. It rocketed into the pocket of his glove, but jarred out almost as quickly when he tried to bring it down.
“I thought I had it,” Williamson said. “I thought I had it when I came down.”
But he didn’t, and the A’s never loosened their grip around the Giants. Or rather, the Giants also never loosened the grip around themselves. Semien cashed in again on another misplay when he skied one to the warning track in left field. Pagan eased up on his route as he neared the wall, but lost the ball in the sky. He was adamant it was not the lights, but the late evening sky that Semien’s ball disappeared in, only to reappear as the A’s shortstop settled into third base yet again. Pagan compounded his mistake by bobbling Burns’ single in the next at-bat, and also failed to cut off a Coco Crisp line drive that turned into a triple.
Peavy had done enough to keep the A’s off base early — only needed 15 pitches to work through the first two innings — but his defense forced him to throw 68 pitches and end his outing after 3.1 innings. He deflected blame off his fielders after the game, but Peavy said it enough when he ignited on the mound.
Try all he might, it was apparent who and what led the Giants to a third loss in three days. And the questions are becoming harder to answer about the direction of this team, preparing to place a ninth player on the disabled list.
“We value the experience of having to win like this,” Peavy said. “It makes you a better bunch. There’s been a lot of character and team wins.”
Peavy’s right, but that didn’t happen on Wednesday night, and its fair to wonder how many times it will happen in the immediate future.
–Per Andrew Baggarly and Alex Pavlovic, Bochy will forego the designated hitter on Thursday to have Madison Bumgarner hit in the lineup. More than anything, it speaks to the team’s lack of depth, especially against left-handed pitching.
