Giants Bulletin: Dissecting Thursday’s horrors as Giants get set for Rays

By Jack Loder

We can only hope that when the dust settles and the standings are final at the end of September, the Giants and their fans aren’t looking back at April 30 with dread and regret. That’s how bad Thursday was for the Giants, the kind of day that only comes once in a decade, if even that often. 

The Giants entered the day at 13-16, should have left it 15-15, and are instead 13-18 after brutally gift-wrapping the reeling Phillies a pair of wins in which the Giants led through eight innings in both. That sentence still somehow doesn’t seem to sum up how disappointing Thursday was for San Francisco. 

In the first game of the day, Logan Webb wasn’t at all thrown off by the previous day’s postponement. He dominated the Phillies aside from one bad pitch to Kyle Schwarber, going seven innings allowing just that one solo homer. It was the kind of outing that Giants fans and Webb alike have yearned for in 2026, one that could be sealed with the true stamp of an ace. He deserved the win. 

Unfortunately for Webb, his rookie manager made one of his first blatant errors in bullpen management in the home half of the ninth. Tony Vitello trotted out Ryan Walker to try to save a 2-1 win for the Giants, the kind of close low scoring victory it seems like this anemic offense will need to thrive off of. Walker allowed a one-out game tying triple to Bryson Stott on the ninth, yes NINTH sinker of the at bat. Walker’s once heralded slider was being printed on the sides of San Francisco milk cartons early Friday morning. The Phillies walked it off two batters later on an infield single. Gut punch. But you can still bounce back, right? 

Sure. Not with any immediate help from Adrian Houser, tho. Houser gave up solo blasts to Trea Turner and Schwarber on the first two batters he faced in the second game of the split. It put the Giants in an early hole, but one that the resilient (?) club was able to claw back from. The Giants tied the game at two, then later tied it at four after again trailing by two runs. In the top of the ninth, Jung Hoo Lee laced an RBI single up the middle to give the Giants a 5-4 lead. All the makings of a palate-cleansing win before heading to the airport, right? Wrong. 

Keaton Winn, who by all means should have been sent out for the ninth inning in game one, was tasked with saving game two. Like Walker, he wilted. The Phillies tied the game with two outs, and would win it an inning later. But to simply summarize the events that shortly would be skipping too much incompetence.

In the top of the 10th, Drew Gilbert was stationed at second as the automatic runner. Heliot Ramos roped a sharp grounder up the middle, glancing off of Stott’s glove and trickling into center field. It was the perfect makings of a run-scoring knock, settling in no man’s land between the infield and the outfield. I saw it that way, you saw it that way, about 20,000 Phillies fans who had braved yet another rain delay saw it that way too. Giants’ third-base coach Hector Borg didn’t see it that way. He inexplicably, shockingly, mind-numbingly put the brakes on Gilbert as he flew around third. Holding him up instead of allowing him to score with what wouldn’t have even been a play at the plate. 

Heliot Ramos couldn’t believe it as he stood on first base. Neither can we, Heliot. 

There’s not enough space on this scroll to dissect what Rafael Devers and Willy Adames are doing to this baseball team. They’re two of the highest paid players in the game, and as of May 1, they’re two of the worst qualified hitters in baseball, bar none. Rafael Devers’ .530 OPS with TWO home runs through 31 games is bone-chilling. He can’t seem to pick up a four seam fastball, and he is striking out at a more than alarming rate. Willy Adames started the year better, but has endured a two-week ice age that makes Patrick Bailey look like a Silver Slugger. If the Giants are going to compete for a playoff spot this season, their best players need to be far better than league average, not battling to get back to that mark. 

Murph summed up most fans’ emotions pretty well on the very top of Friday’s morning show. Enjoy.